Court Opinion

ID: 9482271
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 08:45:12.950145+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:48:52.442587
License: Public Domain

STEPHEN H. ANDERSON, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent because I think the majority opinion is not based upon proper constitutional analysis, and creates an erroneous rule of constitutional law.
We examine habeas challenges to state court proceedings, including voir dire of jurors, only for constitutional error, not for infractions of rules imposed on federal courts through the exercise of supervisory authority. Mu’min v. Virginia, — U.S. -, 111 S.Ct. 1899, 114 L.Ed.2d 493 (1991). The Constitution permits state trial courts great latitude in conducting voir dire, including inquiry into subjects which might tend to show juror bias. See id. Ill *1160S.Ct. at 1904, 1906. “To be constitutionally compelled, however, it is not enough that such questions might be helpful. Rather, the trial court’s failure to ask these questions must render the defendant’s trial fundamentally unfair.” Id. at 1905 (citing Murphy v. Florida, 421 U.S. 794, 799, 95 S.Ct. 2031, 2035-36, 44 L.Ed.2d 589 (1975)).
Contrary to arguments advanced in this case, the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment does not require state court judges to question jurors individually, or to question jurors in private, or to ask detailed, content based questions of jurors, or to question jurors or permit the questioning of jurors for any particular length of time, or even to permit peremptory challenges of jurors. Id.
Thus, it is clear at the outset that the voir dire examination conducted in this case did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment. There was extensive inquiry of the prospective jurors, and the general subject of abuse was raised, although inartfully. The jurors were all given an opportunity to express reservations either openly, or in a private meeting with the judge. That process was constitutionally sufficient.
The court below and the majority opinion both base their conclusions on a presumption of a bias, reasoning first that anyone who has experienced some sort of abuse personally or in their family is constitutionally disqualified from sitting on a case where some sort of abuse is raised as a defense. Second, the court below and the majority reasoned that the juror in question here, a “Mrs. G”, “was dishonest in her response to questions on voir dire," Maj. Op. at 1159 (emphasis added); therefore, she was constitutionally disqualified because of bias, and the dishonesty resulted in her not being stricken for cause. These arguments intertwine Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment considerations. I have no problem with that since the constitutional analysis as to bias is the same for each. In each instance, however, the court below and the majority have failed to address directly the right threshold question. Mu’min is instructive on the point.
The petitioner in Mu’min claimed that the trial court’s failure to examine jurors individually regarding their exposure to pretrial publicity violated his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. He contended that the harm from possible pretrial knowledge of incriminating facts not admissible in evidence was even greater than the possible existence of racial or ethnic prejudice from the standpoint of necessary voir dire. In support, the petitioner cited the American Bar Association Standards for Criminal Justice. The Supreme Court rejected the premise of prejudice and disqualification underlying the Standards, pointing out that the wrong question was being asked. The court stated:
But, more importantly, the standards relating to voir dire are based on a substantive rule that renders a potential juror subject to challenge for cause, without regard to his state of mind, if he has been exposed to and remembers ‘highly significant information’ or ‘other incriminating matters that may be inadmissible in evidence.’ That is a stricter standard of juror eligibility than that which we have held the Constitution to require. Under the ABA standard, answers to questions about content, without more, could disqualify the juror from sitting. ‘Under the constitutional standard, on the other hand, [t]he relevant question is not whether the community remembered the case, but whether the jurors ... had such fixed opinions that they could not judge impartially the guilt of the defendant’
Id. 111 S.Ct. at 1907-08, (quoting Patton v. Yount, 467 U.S. 1025, 1035, 104 S.Ct. 2885, 2891, 81 L.Ed.2d 847 (1984) (emphasis added)).
Under this analysis, then, the majority opinion is clearly wrong to begin with when it states that “[h]ad Mrs. G responded honestly [that there had been some abuse in her family], she would have been excused for cause”. Maj. Op. at 1159. She should only have been disqualified on constitutional grounds if questioning disclosed that “she had such fixed opinions that she could not judge impartially the guilt of the defendant.” Id.
*1161The same is true of implied bias. The court below and the majority presume disqualification without at least asking and directly analyzing the relevant question: Did Mrs. G in fact have such fixed opinions that she could not judge impartially? She indicated she could. The state courts found she could, and, neither the court below nor the majority even begin to demonstrate convincing proof of actual bias.
Of course, “[ijn those extraordinary situations involving implied bias, state-court proceedings resulting in a finding of ‘no bias’ are by definition inadequate to uncover the bias that the law conclusively presumes.” Smith v. Phillips, 455 U.S. 209, 223 n.*, 102 S.Ct. 940, 949 n.* (O’Connor, J., concurring). But, if the majority is fashioning a conclusive presumption of bias on constitutional grounds in abuse cases, it does so without support, and I believe it to be bad constitutional law. Justice O’Con-nor described constitutional presumptions correctly, I believe, as follows:
[tjhere are some extreme situations that would justify a finding of implied bias. Some examples might include a revelation that the juror is an actual employee of the prosecuting agency, that the juror is a close relative of one of the participants in the trial or the criminal transaction, or that the juror was a witness or somehow involved in the criminal transaction.
Id. at 222, 102 S.Ct. at 948 (O’Connor, J., concurring). A case like the one before us hardly falls in the categories described, any more than a situation similar to Mu’min where a juror has been exposed to incriminating information about the defendant. People are capable of judging fairly on the evidence in these situations.
Cases cited by the majority such as Irvin v. Dowd, 366 U.S. 717, 81 S.Ct. 1639, 6 L.Ed.2d 751 (1961) and United States v. Gillis, 942 F.2d 707 (10th Cir.1991) have either been distinguished in Mu’min, or have failed, as does the majority opinion here, to take Mu’min into account in their analysis. Other cases cited by the majority, including Gillis, are intertwined with federal supervisory standards and do not present a pure constitutional analysis.1 In short, there is no convincing authority which supports a constitutional presumption of bias in abuse cases.
Finally, I strongly disagree with the majority’s “finding” that Mrs. G was dishonest, and its use of that finding to support an inference of actual bias. Honesty is a pure credibility finding which the state trial court which examined Mrs. G on the subject, had the right to make. It is not enough for the majority to recognize the rule that state court findings are entitled to a presumption of correctness, 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d); Sumner v. Mata, 449 U.S. 539, 551, 101 S.Ct. 764, 771, 66 L.Ed.2d 722 (1981); Case v. Mondragon, 887 F.2d 1388 (10th Cir.1989), and then to override that presumption because the majority thinks it can read the record better than the state courts can determine credibility first hand. The statutory presumption of correctness accorded to state court findings “may be overcome only by convincing evidence.” Smith v. Phillips, 455 U.S. 209, 218, 102 S.Ct. 940, 946, 71 L.Ed.2d 78 (1982) (emphasis added). And, issues of witness credibility, and findings based upon the court’s opportunity to observe and evaluate the demeanor of the witness, are particularly subject to the presumption of correctness. See Case v. Mondragon, 887 F.2d 1388 (10th Cir.1989). “Demeanor plays a fundamental role not only in determining juror credibility, but also in simply understanding what a potential juror is saying.” Patton v. Yount, 467 U.S. 1025, 1038 n. 14, 104 S.Ct. 2885, 2892 n. 14, 81 L.Ed.2d 847 (1984).
An examination of the voir dire conducted in this case discloses that at best it was ambiguous with respect to the subject of physical abuse, as opposed to sexual abuse, or sexual abuse coupled with other physical abuse. Mrs. G testified at the post-trial hearing that her situation did not involve sexual abuse.
As the majority opinion acknowledges, at the hearing Mrs. G testified that when the *1162panel of prospective jurors was asked about child abuse she did not connect her own experiences with the discussion. She denied deliberately withholding any requested information and, in fact, did not recall ever being asked on voir dire whether she had been a victim of wife abuse. She stated that she just did not connect her situation with the questions asked. She stated further that she never felt she had been asked a question on voir dire that called for an answer on the subject of abuse in her own family. She also said that she believed she would have responded had she thought that a response was called for.
In short, the most that can be said about the voir dire inquiry is that it was ambiguous with respect to putting Mrs. G in a position of a required response on the subject of abuse in her own family. She certainly gave no dishonest answer, since she remained silent. And, her silence, as found by the trial court which had an opportunity to observe her demeanor, and had first hand knowledge of the voir dire inquiry, was not dishonest. See Baca v. Sullivan, 821 F.2d 1480 (10th Cir.1987); Brown v. United States, 356 F.2d 230 (10th Cir.1966).
Following the hearing, as the majority opinion notes, the state trial court specifically found that “no juror, after being asked, withheld relevant information during voir dire.” The court further found that “none of the jurors was incapable of performing his or her duties as a juror.” On direct appeal, the New Mexico Supreme Court upheld those determinations, and further found that their was no evidence demonstrating prejudice.
I believe it to be indefensible, on these facts, for the federal courts to make a finding on the honesty of this juror, directly at odds with the state court findings, and then to draw conclusions from that finding. Certainly there is no “convincing evidence” to support the majority’s finding, as required by Smith v. Phillips. See 455 U.S. at 218, 102 S.Ct. at 946-47.
Stripped of extraneous trappings, the majority opinion in this case stands only for the proposition, as a matter of constitutional law, that prospective jurors who have been abused in any way or who have had abuse in their families in some way at some time are automatically disqualified from sitting on cases in which abuse might arise as a defense, on the presumption that such prospective jurors are incapable of being impartial within the meaning of the Sixth Amendment. I disagree with such a rule, and with this supervisory/evidentiary resort to presumptions. “[T]he remedy for allegations of juror partiality is a hearing in which the defendant has the opportunity to prove actual bias.” Smith v. Phillips, 455 U.S. at 215, 102 S.Ct. at 945 (emphasis added). “[P]reservation of the opportunity to prove actual bias is a guarantee of a defendant’s right to an impartial jury.” Id. at 216, 102 S.Ct. at 945 (quoting Dennis v. United States, 339 U.S. 162, 171-72, 70 S.Ct. 519, 523, 94 L.Ed. 734 (1950) (emphasis added)).2 Except in the most egregious circumstances, federal habeas courts ought to stay out of the business of speculating and presuming as to the state of mind of state court jurors, and overriding the first hand judgment of state courts on the actual facts of the subject.

. In Gillis, moreover, the pertinent subject was not even addressed on voir dire. Here, it was.

. Decisions to hold hearings, of course, and the conduct of such hearings, must be consistent with the rules of evidence applicable to post-verdict inquiry of jurors. See, e.g., Tanner v. United States, 483 U.S. 107, 107 S.Ct. 2739, 97 L.Ed.2d 90 (1987).