Opinion ID: 1401773
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: aftermath of martinez-salazar.

Text: As noted supra, Martinez-Salazar applies only to federal courts and is not binding on the states. In the five years since it was decided, nine states have abandoned the per se reversible error rule and embraced its reasoning. Dailey v. State, 828 So.2d 340, 344 (Ala.2001); State v. Hickman, 205 Ariz. 192, 68 P.3d 418, 427 (2003); State v. Santana, 135 Idaho 58, 14 P.3d 378, 384 (2000); State v. Entzi, 615 N.W.2d 145, 149 (N.D.2000); Green v. Maynard, 349 S.C. 535, 564 S.E.2d 83, 86 (2002); State v. Verhoef, 627 N.W.2d 437, 441-42 (S.D.2001); State v. Fire, 145 Wash.2d 152, 34 P.3d 1218, 1225 (2001); State v. Lindell, 245 Wis.2d 689, 629 N.W.2d 223, 250-51 (2001); Klahn v. State, 96 P.3d 472, 483-84 (Wyo.2004). On the other hand, eleven state courts, six since 2002, have declined to follow the reasoning of Martinez-Salazar , specifically retaining the  per se reversible rule. People v. Lefebre, 5 P.3d 295, 307 (Colo. 2000) (rejecting Martinez-Salazar and holding that [o]ur decisions have consistently recognized that, under Colorado law, a defendant suffers reversible prejudice if he is forced to use a peremptory challenge to remove a juror whom the trial court failed to remove for cause and he exhausts his peremptory challenges); Busby v. State, 894 So.2d 88, 96-105 (Fla. 2004) (rejecting Ross and Martinez-Salazar and retaining its rule that the failure to excuse for cause is reversible error per se if the defendant exhausts peremptories and identifies a juror he would have peremptorily excused if he had not exhausted peremptories); Fortson v. State, 277 Ga. 164, 587 S.E.2d 39, 41 (2003) (ignoring dissent's urging that Martinez-Salazar be applied and recognizing that causing a defendant to unnecessarily use a peremptory strike on a juror that should have been excused for cause is per se harmful error); State v. Taylor, 875 So.2d 58, 62 (La.2004) (noting that Martinez-Salazar follows a different rule than is followed in Louisiana); State v. McLean, 815 A.2d 799, 805 (Me.2002) ([W]hen a defendant's right to have jurors selected in the manner prescribed by the Rules is impaired, as it was in this case, it would be virtually impossible for the State to show after conviction that the injury to the defendant is harmless, and equally difficult for the defendant to demonstrate prejudice.); Whitney v. State, 158 Md.App. 519, 857 A.2d 625, 633 (2004) (Although the Supreme Court in Martinez-Salazar has clarified as dictum the statement from Swain that the impairment of a federal defendant's peremptory challenges dictates reversal per se, we discern no effort by the courts of this State to retreat from the `reversibility per se ' rule for the judicial impairment of a party's allotment of peremptory strikes.). See also State v. Good, 309 Mont. 113, 43 P.3d 948, 959-60 (2002) (prejudice presumed if juror should have been excused for cause, defendant used peremptory strike to excuse juror, and defendant exhausted all peremptory strikesstructural error not subject to harmless error analysis); People v. Cahill, 2 N.Y.3d 14, 777 N.Y.S.2d 332, 809 N.E.2d 561, 578 (2003) (An erroneous denial of a defendant's challenge for cause is not rendered `harmless' because the defense later excuses the juror peremptorily. To the contrary, the defendant's loss of the peremptory challenge constitutes the harm. (Citations omitted.)); Hanson v. State, 72 P.3d 40, 48-49 (Okla.Crim.App.2003) (reversal required where one juror should have been removed for cause, and defendant exhausted all peremptories and identified additional juror he would have stricken (objectionable but not removable for cause) with the lost peremptory); Johnson v. State, 43 S.W.3d at 10-11 (Johnson, J. concurring) ([T]he primary rationale for peremptory challenges in federal court ... [is] `to help secure the constitutional guarantee of trial by an impartial jury,' Martinez-Salazar, 528 U.S. at 316, 120 S.Ct. at 782.... [W]e have consistently reversed convictions and ordered a new trial when ... the trial court improperly denied a challenge for cause and thereby forced the defendant to use a peremptory challenge ... to correct error by the trial court.); Brown v. Commonwealth, 33 Va.App. 296, 533 S.E.2d 4, 8 n. 2 (2000) (prejudicial error occurs when a trial court forces a defendant to use a peremptory challenge afforded him by statute to excuse a juror who should have been excused for cause, rejecting Martinez-Salazar ). It is generally accepted by jurisdictions operating under Martinez-Salazar 's regimen that its principles apply to civil actions as well as to criminal prosecutions. Thompson v. Altheimer & Gray, 248 F.3d 621, 623-24 (7th Cir.2001) ( Martinez-Salazar was a criminal case but we cannot think of any difference which that would make.); Walzer v. St. Joseph State Hosp., 231 F.3d 1108, 1111 (8th Cir.2000) (applying Martinez-Salazar to a Title VII action); cf. Cruz v. Jordan, 357 F.3d 269, 271 (2d Cir.2004) (deciding issue on other grounds but noting that we see no reason why Martinez-Salazar would not apply to Cruz's civil claim). Indeed, Justice Keller, who is accurately identified by the majority opinion as having first advanced this notion in Kentucky, assumed it would apply to both civil and criminal cases, and to both the erroneous failure to grant a challenge for cause and the failure to allocate peremptories according to law. Sand Hill, 83 S.W.3d at 497-501 (Keller J., concurring); Stopher v. Commonwealth, 57 S.W.3d 787, 808-17 (Ky.2001) (Keller, J., dissenting). Interestingly, the Alabama Supreme Court, which invoked Martinez-Salazar to deny a peremptory challenge to a criminal defendant in Dailey, 828 So.2d at 344, and to a medical malpractice plaintiff in Bethea v. Springhill Mem'l Hosp., 833 So.2d 1, 6-7 (Ala.2002), balked when a trial judge erroneously denied five challenges for cause by General Motors in a products liability action, thereby requiring the company to use five of its nineteen peremptory challenges to excuse those jurors. Gen. Motors Corp. v. Jernigan, 883 So.2d 646, 672-73 (Ala.2003). In that circumstance, the court held that General Motors's rights had been substantially impaired. Id. Sound familiar? Does that mean that under the regime of Martinez-Salazar , appellate courts will evaluate on a case-by-case, party-by-party basis the number of peremptory challenges that must be lost, or the type of case in which they were lost, or the type of litigant who lost them, in order to determine whether a litigant's substantial rights are impaired? Does it make a difference whether the aggrieved party is a criminal defendant or a medical malpractice plaintiff who lost one peremptory challenge, or a giant corporation that lost five? Although the majority opinion purports only to overrule Thomas v. Commonwealth (while, curiously, concluding that Thomas was rightly decided because, like General Motors, the defendant was prejudiced too much), it has, in fact, overruled our entire judicial history with respect to peremptory challenges in civil and criminal [27] cases. In doing so, the majority opinion has effectively delegated the allocation of peremptory challenges to trial judges, the motivations of the vast majority of whom are undoubtedly exemplary. However, I believe that the determination of the proper allocation of peremptory challenges should remain in the hands of appellate courts where the whims of one compliant, biased or eccentric judge, Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U.S. at 156, 88 S.Ct. at 1451, if one there be, cannot alone deprive a litigant of his or her substantial right to the peremptory challenges allowed by law. I believe our historical treatment of the right to the peremptory challenges allotted by law as a substantial right is both correct and a matter of stare decisis. It took the General Assembly fifty-five years (1877-1932) to abrogate our predecessor court's erroneous denial of a criminal defendant's right to the peremptory strikes guaranteed by law. Today, this Court has not only returned to those dark ages, it has compounded the error by applying the denial in a way that affects both civil and criminal litigants, whether plaintiff or defendant, person or corporation. Hopefully, it will not require another fifty-five years to correct this egregious error. Accordingly, I dissent. JOHNSTONE, J., joins this opinion. LAMBERT, C.J., joins in the legal analysis set forth in this opinion.