Court Opinion

ID: 9602573
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 01:56:58.618199+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:02:05.010584
License: Public Domain

Ruffin, Judge,
concurring specially.
I concur in the Court’s judgment, but not in all that is said in the Court’s opinion.
Error and harm are like star-crossed lovers — they meet, and they die together. Where simultaneously present, a prerequisite for reversal, error and harm are mutually illuminating. I agree with the majority that there was no error in this case, and that the correct standard is that set forth in Purkett v. Elem, 514 U. S. 765 (115 SC 1769, 131 LE2d 834) (1995). While I agree with much in the majority’s exegesis, I fear that the opinion obscures, by far, too much. *439Moreover, I believe that it both skews and obscures a critical issue that is so crucial and central to today’s jurisprudence. As appellate judges we oftentimes find the great in the small, the many in the few, the numberless in the number, the obscure in the obvious, the difficult in the easy, and the trivial in the true, as we say and decide what we should not.
Decided March 12,1997
Kirbo & Kendrick, Bruce W. Kirbo, Jr., for appellant.
J. Brown Moseley, District Attorney, John A. Warr, Assistant District Attorney, for appellee.
The single issue presented in this appeal is whether the appellant’s use of peremptory strikes was racially motivated. Majority opinion, p. 427. While encasing this error in context, we need only examine the issue within the ambit of Georgia v. McCollum, 505 U. S. 42, 59 (112 SC 2348, 120 LE2d 33) (1992).
I do not believe that the instant case, however, requires any new or extensive interpretation of Purkett or McCollum. Purkett clearly establishes that we must exercise restraint in reviewing a trial court’s decision on a McCollum issue. The true precedential value of the instant case lies with the application of the Purkett appellate review standard to the trial court’s decision regarding the defendant’s reasons for striking the subject jurors. Under that standard, I agree that we must affirm the trial court and give great deference to its decision.