Opinion ID: 2812008
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: David Joiner - Venire Member Number 153

Text: ¶63. The State’s S-11 peremptory challenge was to Joiner. The State provided that Joiner had indicated on his questionnaire that he could never consider the death penalty. The questionnaire was marked and entered as an exhibit, and the trial court accepted the State’s argument, stating that it was a race-neutral reason. We discern no error. ¶64. The party objecting to the peremptory challenge must: (1) “make a prima facie showing that race was the criteria for the exercise of the peremptory challenge[;]” then, (2) “if this initial showing is successful, the party desiring to exercise the challenge has the burden to offer a race-neutral explanation for striking the potential juror[;]” and (3) “[t]he trial court must then determine whether the objecting party has met their burden to prove there has been purposeful discrimination in the exercise of peremptory challenges.” Strickland, 980 So. 2d at 915. Here, the trial court fully considered each challenge offered by the defense and each reason offered by the State and concluded that there was no 28 discriminatory intent or purposeful discrimination. “[T]here is a presumption that the judgment of the trial court is correct and the burden is on the Appellant to demonstrate some reversible error to this Court.” Birkhead v. State, 57 So. 3d 1223, 1231 (Miss. 2011) (citing Juarez v. State, 965 So. 2d 1061, 1061 (Miss. 2007)). This finding, the byproduct of the eyewitness impressions recorded by the trial judge in fulfilling his pivotal role in evaluating Batson claims, is entitled to “great deference.” In other cases, perhaps a cold appellate record could reveal facts from which an appellate court could safely declare error. But such is not the case here. Booker v. State, 5 So. 3d 356, 361 (Miss. 2008) (internal citation omitted). ¶65. The trial court determined that Cox had failed to meet his burden of proving discriminatory intent or purposeful discrimination. We find no abuse of discretion in the trial court’s ruling.