Opinion ID: 2571564
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Use of peremptories against women

Text: The juror pool included 48 men and 30 women. The prosecution used 20 strikes on women (and 10 on men), while the defense used five strikes on women (and 25 on men). As a result, the final jury included seven men and five women. Nichols made numerous Wheeler challenges to the prosecution's striking of women, and midway through jury selection Bonilla indicated he joined in Nichols's Wheeler motions. The trial court denied the motions without seeking further explanation from the prosecution for its strikes, implicitly concluding the defense had not made out a prima facie case of group bias against women. The People argue Bonilla failed to preserve objections to all but eight of the women the prosecution struck. We disagree. As the People acknowledge, during a recess in jury selection to address Wheeler/Batson issues, Bonilla joined in Nichols's pending Wheeler/Batson motions (which then included challenges to the use of eight strikes on women). The prosecution sought to preclude any further interruption of jury selection, not wanting defense counsel to engage in speaking motions that would highlight for the jurors their concerns the prosecution was discriminating, and offered to stipulate that all Wheeler/Batson objections would be deemed preserved and could be taken up at the close of jury selection. The trial court was unsatisfied with this approach, which would make it more difficult for it to track and evaluate defense objections, and eventually directed Nichols's counsel to simply interject the single word motion after any strike challenged on Wheeler/Batson grounds. It is unclear from the record whether the parties understood Nichols's interjection would suffice for both defendants, just as in exercising the two defendants' joint peremptory challenges during jury selection one counsel would frequently speak for both parties. It is similarly unclear whether Bonilla's counsel intended his joinder in Nichols's Wheeler/Batson motions to cover only those then pending or those going forward as well. Given these ambiguities, we decline to find a forfeiture of additional Wheeler/Batson claims based on Bonilla's counsel's failure to echo Nichols's counsel's interjection of the word motion during the remainder of jury selection. Turning to the merits, Bonilla again rests his claim solely on a statistical analysis of the prosecution's strikes. While the juror pool contained 38 percent women (30/78), the prosecution used 67 percent of its strikes on women (20/30). Closer analysis, however, reveals this apparent disparity is not all it appears. First, the ultimate composition of the jury (42 percent women) mirrored that of the juror pool (38 percent women). (See People v. Ward, supra, 36 Cal.4th at p. 203, 30 Cal.Rptr.3d 464, 114 P.3d 717 [ultimate composition of the jury is a factor to be considered in evaluating a Wheeler/Batson motion]; People v. Turner, supra, 8 Cal.4th at p. 168, 32 Cal.Rptr.2d 762, 878 P.2d 521 [same].) Indeed, after the prosecution expended its final peremptory, the jury stood at six men and six women; only Bonilla's subsequent use of his final individual strikes reduced the jury to five women. The defense challenged the prosecution's use of peremptories against prospective jurors in seats 1, 3, 5, 6, and 9 as gender-biased, but near the end of jury selection the prosecution passed, accepting the jury, despite the fact women held every one of those seats. By the time the prosecution used its final peremptory strikeโto remove a man from the juryโ four of those five contested seats were held by women. [15] Thus, the prosecution's pattern of peremptories does not suggest it attempted to, nor did it in fact, deprive Bonilla of a jury containing a fair cross-section of men and women. Second, looking only at the overall juror pool exaggerates any discrepancy between the prosecutor's use of strikes and the juror pool composition. Two male jurors were excused, four male jurors were never called or failed to appear, four male jurors were called and seated after the prosecution had exhausted its challenges, and seven male jurors (and two female jurors) were challenged by the defense immediately on seating, before the prosecution had any opportunity to act. Thus, the pool the prosecution had the opportunity to challenge was actually 47 percent female (28/59). Third, the record discloses gender-neutral reasons for the strikes Bonilla objected to under Wheeler. Rosalind H. was the first challenged woman to draw a Wheeler/Batson motion; her husband had a prior conviction, and her father had been convicted of killing his brother. Moreover, the record establishes the defense challenged the use of a strike against her, not because she was a woman, but because she was African-American. As noted above, Bonilla failed to make out a prima facie case of discrimination against African-Americans. The defense next challenged the use of a strike against Carla G. The prosecutor explained that he struck Carla G. because she would not directly answer his questions, leaving him uncertain whether he could trust that he knew where she really stood. The record supports this. Carla G. gave a series of equivocal answers about whether she could impose the death penalty, described her feelings about the death penalty as mixed in her juror questionnaire, and gave no answer to questions about her thoughts on life without the possibility of parole. She further indicated she believed the death penalty was imposed randomly and that it should be reserved for heinous crimes such as mass murderers or children killers. [16] Next, the defense challenged the use of strikes against Shirley C, Laura M., Joanne M., and Ramona T. Shirley C. indicated in her questionnaire that she had served on a jury on three previous occasions, two of which had resulted in a hung jury. Her initial reaction to being put in the position of making a life-or-death decision was that she would be kind of uncomfortable, although hopefully she would be strong enough to make the right decision. Laura M., like Rosalind H., had a close relative (her brother) who was serving time for a felony conviction. She described herself as moderately in favor of the death penalty but strongly in favor of life in prison without possibility of parole, and identified the circumstances warranting the death penalty in her mind as mass murders, child murders. Joanne M. described herself as liberal. She believed the death penalty was imposed randomly. She noted she was a Catholic and the Catholic Church stands against the death penalty, but she indicated this would not affect her ability to choose either life or death. She believed the death penalty was appropriate for the most heinous crimes where victims were made to suffer or died an especially violent death, as well as especially brutal [crimes] ... that caused the victim intense suffering before he/she died, while life without possibility of parole should apply to murders that did not satisfy these criteria. In addition, she was newly pregnant and expressed extreme uncertainty over how this might affect her service or her ability to decide that another person should die. Asked again whether she could go through with sentencing someone to death, she indicated: I think I would balk a little bit. I don't even know if it is because of my emotional state right now, but it kind of gives me theโI don't know. I would feel bad, I think, if it came down to that. In each of these three cases, the juror's responses would give reason enough for a prosecutor to consider a peremptory, without regard to the juror's sex. Ramona T.'s questionnaire was virtually blank with respect to her view about the criminal justice system and the death penalty; it gave essentially no insight into her views other than that she had given them little thought. Asked how important the fact someone had been killed would weigh in her life-or-death calculus, she replied opaquely, If I feel that is fair, then, no, it is not important. Asked whether the fact that money is involved or financial gain in your own personal value system, is that something important to you as to make any difference between the death penalty or life without possibility of parole should apply?, she replied, No. Asked whether her view that life or death might be appropriate in any case would extend to a situation where the defendant murdered more than 10 people, or blew up an airplane and killed 80 people, she indicated again that either life or death might be appropriate. Finally, she described herself as a very strong person emotionally and I will develop my own opinion. The difficulty from a prosecution or defense perspective is that it was virtually impossible to glean from her voir dire or questionnaire any clue as to what those opinions might be. Ramona T. thus presented a wild card, even more so than Carla G. Given her indication that murder for financial gain was not a factor she considered important, the prosecutor could reasonably have used a peremptory for reasons unconnected to Ramona T.'s sex. After a short conference to address Nichols's (and Bonilla's) first six Wheeler/Batson motions, jury selection continued, and the defense challenged the use of peremptories against five additional prospective female jurors: Anne E., Candice M., Carol L., Barbara B., and Victoria D. Again, the record discloses gender-neutral reasons why a prosecutor might consider these prospective jurors less than ideal and elect to use one of his 30 peremptories to remove them from a penalty phase jury. Anne E. described herself in her questionnaire as a political liberal. She described the death penalty as acceptable in principle, but [t]he circumstance[s] must be of such a nature that the sentence is the only one at which to arrive. While she was neutral toward the death penalty, she was strongly in favor of life in prison without possibility of parole. She described some methods of execution as criminal as to suffering of the executed and medieval. She identified the best arguments for or against the death penalty as innocence of crimeโinhumane techniques. Candice M. indicated she did not believe the death penalty should be used often and instead should be reserved [o]nly for the most heinous of crimes. She identified those deserving death as mass murderers [and] people who torture their victims. While strongly in favor of life without possibility of parole, she was less strongly in favor of the death penalty. During voir dire, she indicated, But just [as to the] scale between death and life imprisonment, I would have to say that my scale might be a little uneven towards life imprisonment, and confirmed in response to a follow-up question that, indeed, her personal scales had a small but clear preexisting tilt towards life in prison rather than death. Carol L. gave little or no written responses in her questionnaire, checking yes or no boxes without elaboration and leaving most questions blank or responding No or None when asked her views and attitudes. Her rare elaborations were semiliterate (e.g., Q: What are your general feelings concerning the death penalty? [ถ] A: Some one was murdered, and the a [sic] person was sentencedโ yes.) Voir dire shed only minimal additional light. Barbara B. described herself as a liberal. She expressed concern about news reports indicating executions are not painless and on the death penalty described herself as confused and uncertainโon one hand it makes sense that it is the correct punishment for a crime, on the other hand killing someone seems wrong. Asked how she would vote if whether to have the death penalty were on the ballot, she indicated she was unsure; asked what she thought the best argument for or against the death penalty was, she replied, The best argument against [the death penalty] is that it is wrong to kill another person under any circumstances. Asked whether she thought the death penalty should apply to most premeditated murders, or only the most heinous crimes, she replied, Heinous crimes. Finally, Victoria D. indicated that, like Shirley C, she had prior jury experience, and the previous jury she had served on, in a drug case, had deadlocked without reaching a verdict. Asked about this experience, she emphasized the defendant was not found with any drugs on him, just money and a pager; she later reported the jury was 6-6, she was fine with her decision, and if she served again, she again would adhere to her views and have no problem sitting on a hung jury. One might reasonably speculate from these comments there was a fair chance she was among the six jurors who held out for acquittal. In other questionnaire responses, Victoria D. indicated she believed the death penalty was imposed randomly and was unsure whether she would vote to retain it because she was unsure whether it was fairly handed out. Nor was she sure what circumstances should warrant the death penalty or life without possibility of parole. In sum, for each strike the defense challenged under Wheeler/Batson, the record reflects reasonable gender-neutral bases for use of a peremptory challenge. The trial court did not err in concluding no prima facie case of group bias against women had been made out.