Court Opinion

ID: 9536054
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 06:53:53.881662+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:26.390382
License: Public Domain

ZIMMERMAN, Chief Justice,
concurring:
I concur with the majority’s analysis, but I write separately to note that I think the trial court erred in denying defense counsel’s re*552quest to question the challenged juror about her allegedly “hostile expression.” I nonetheless concur with the result reached by the majority because Higginbotham has not demonstrated that the trial court’s error was prejudicial.
The party opposing a peremptory challenge on the ground that it is racially motivated bears the burden of proving purposeful discrimination. Purkett v. Elem, — U.S. -, -, 115 S.Ct. 1769, 1770-71, 131 L.Ed.2d 834 (1995) (per curiam). Accordingly, that party should be entitled to present relevant evidence supporting their charge of discrimination. As the majority recognizes, once the proponent of the strike articulates a nondiscriminatory reason for the strike, the determination of whether the opponent has proved purposeful discrimination “generally turns on the credibility of the proponent.” Because the credibility of the one exercising the strike is critical, one such as Higginbotham should be allowed to present evidence which would discredit the prosecutor’s explanation as to why the minority juror was stricken.
In response to Higginbotham’s opposition to the prosecutor’s peremptory challenge, the prosecutor explained that “this particular juror is the only one who constantly made eye contact with me in — with a facial expression that was very disturbing to me. It was apparently a — a hostile expression. She was looking right at me as if she was drilling holes through me. That’s the reason I took her off, pure and simple.” At that point, Higginbotham’s counsel requested that he be allowed to question the challenged juror about her alleged hostility. The trial court denied the request.
In response to defense counsel’s request to questión the juror, the trial court stated that it could be assumed that the juror would deny any hostility and therefore that her testimony would not be helpful. This statement may have been a candid depiction of how the trial judge would have weighed the credibility of the prosecutor against that of a particular juror after hearing the testimony, but it seems quite inappropriate for a trial judge to refuse to hear testimony because the judge has already made the categorical decision that the prosecutor will be believed and the prospective juror will not. Moreover, it seems possible that the prosecutor’s explanation could have been undermined if the juror denied feeling hostile and denied looking at the prosecutor in a hostile manner. Although such denials might not have convinced the trial judge that the prosecutor was intentionally lying (the prosecutor might have simply misinterpreted the juror’s expressions), the juror’s answers were nonetheless potentially relevant to the prosecutor’s credibility. Therefore, I think it was error not to allow Higginbotham’s counsel to question the challenged juror.
Having said that, I would still affirm because Higginbotham has not demonstrated that this error was prejudicial. As the appellant, Higginbotham bears the burden of showing not only that an error occurred, but that the error was prejudicial. See State v. Bell, 770 P.2d 100, 106 (Utah 1988). Although Higginbotham presented an affidavit of the challenged juror in support of her motion for a new trial, that affidavit is silent as to whether the juror felt hostility toward the prosecutor. Moreover, Higginbotham does not point to anything in the record that suggests what the juror’s answers would have been had Higginbotham’s counsel been allowed to question her about her alleged hostility. In fact, Higginbotham does not even proffer a guess as to what the juror would have said. Without knowing what the juror would have said, I cannot conclude that the trial court’s refusal to allow questioning of the juror was prejudicial.