Court Opinion

ID: 9565122
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:15:17.874718+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:25.178014
License: Public Domain

ORME, Court of Appeals Judge:
(concurring and dissenting).
I concur in parts I through III of the main opinion, but am not in accord with the view taken in part IV of that opinion. I agree with Justices Zimmerman and Durham that the case should be remanded, but do not share their conclusion that remand should be for the limited purpose of giving the prosecutor an opportunity to rebut the inference of racial motivation which they find to be present in this case.
In my view, the threshold question of whether the record establishes an inference of racial motivation should be decided by the trial court.1 This was the approach taken in United States v. Allen, 814 F.2d 977 (4th Cir.1987) (per curiam). I agree with Allen that “factual contentions of this nature are best resolved in the district court.” Id. at 978. I also agree with the suggestion in Allen “that trial judges, experienced in supervising voir dire,” are in a better position to evaluate whether a particular peremptory challenge gives rise to a prima facie case of impermissible racial motivation in connection with its exercise. Id. (quoting Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 1723, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986)).
I would follow Allen and remand for plenary consideration of whether the peremptory challenge of Mr. Lopez was unconstitutional in light of the doctrine announced in Batson.
HALL, C.J., concurs in the concurring and dissenting opinion of ORME, J.
STEWART, Associate C.J., does not participate herein; GREGORY K. ORME, Court of Appeals Judge, sat.

. In concluding that this Court, rather than the trial court, should determine whether an inference of racial discrimination has been shown in the exercise of a peremptory challenge, the main opinion correctly observes that the trial court would also "have to rely primarily on the record.” I am unable to agree that trial courts are, for this reason, in no better position to decide the question than are appellate courts. Trial judges have more experience with voir dire and the impanelling of juries and therefore an acquired expertise which appellate judges, as a group, may lack. In addition, in most remand situations, the same judge who presided over the case originally will have to decide the Bat-son question on remand. That judge may well have some independent recall of the actual circumstances- of, and persons and personalities involved in, the particular jury selection process.