Opinion ID: 1036479
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Totality of the Evidence

Text: In sum, courts should consider all relevant circumstances in determining if a Batson violation occurred. Batson, 476 U.S. at 96, 106 S. Ct. at 1723; see also Johnson, 545 U.S. at 170, 125 S. Ct. at 2417; Miller-El, 545 U.S. at 240, 125 S. Ct. at 2325. We have examined the voir dire answers, the State’s strike reasons as to the contested venire members, and every fact or argument proffered by Lee to support his Batson claim. After doing so, and given our highly deferential AEDPA review, we conclude that the state appellate court did not unreasonably apply Batson to the facts here, i.e., all relevant circumstances in Lee’s case, and its decision is entitled to deference.38 38 In his briefs to this Court, Lee makes only passing references to 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(2) and a conclusory contention that the state courts unreasonably determined the facts. The thrust of Lee’s argument is that the state courts failed to follow Batson’s third step and unreasonably applied clearly established federal law. Thus, Lee’s claim is more appropriately analyzed under 120 Case: 12-14421 Date Filed: 08/01/2013 Page: 121 of 128 Although Lee contends that there are factual parallels between his case and McGahee and Adkins, our recitation of the facts in those cases already demonstrates how materially and starkly different the evidence was in those cases from Lee’s. If anything, the evidentiary differences between this case and McGahee show how weak Lee’s Batson claim is. Lee’s jury was not all white but was 75% black, with nine black jurors and three white jurors. In Lee’s case, each of the prosecutor’s reasons for the strikes was race-neutral and supported by the record. There was no explicitly racial reason for striking any black venire member. No state court’s reasoning, given in its own opinion in Lee’s case, revealed that the court did not consider an explicitly racial reason for a venire member strike. No prosecutor gave a “low intelligence” reason historically tied to racism. The record evidence in Lee’s case is also nothing like Adkins, where only one black juror served. In Lee’s case, there is no jury list with racial notations by the prosecutor. There is no prosecutor admitting he did not consider any Batson restraints in striking black prospective jurors. There is no ex parte affidavit by the prosecutor about strike reasons. There is no augmented record, assembled well after the original trial, with extensive objections by trial counsel. There is no evidence of black venire members struck for age or answers where white venire § 2254(d)(1). McGahee, 560 F.3d at 1256 (“Where the concern is that a state court failed to follow Batson’s three steps, the analysis should be under AEDPA § 2254(d)(1) . . . .”). In any event, Lee has not shown an unreasonable determination of the facts under § 2254(d)(2). 121 Case: 12-14421 Date Filed: 08/01/2013 Page: 122 of 128 members with the same age or the same answers were not struck. Rather, in Lee’s case, the prosecutor’s race-neutral reasons for the struck venire members were largely not objected to at trial, and were supported by the trial record. Lee has failed to show any Batson violation.