Court Opinion

ID: 9722428
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 09:30:28.579835+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:06:51.002968
License: Public Domain

POCHÉ, J.
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s conclusion that no Wheeler1 error occurred below.
A.
As the People and this court in essence concede (see majority opn., ante, p. 931, fn. 4) there can be no question but that a prima facie case of group bias was established when the defense showed that three of the four peremptory challenges exercised by the prosecutor removed all the Blacks from the venire. (Accord People v. Motton (1985) 39 Cal.3d 596, 605 [217 Cal.Rptr. 416, 704 P.2d 176] [prima facie case found where five of eight challenges used to remove all Black jurors]; People v. Hall (1983) 35 Cal.3d 161, 168 [197 Cal.Rptr. 71, 672 P.2d 854] [same]; People v. Moss (1986) 188 *936Cal.App.3d 268, 275 [233 Cal.Rptr. 153] [prima facie case found where two peremptory challenges used to remove all Black jurors].)
Once the trial court finds a prima facie case has been made, as it did here, “the burden shifts to the other party to show if he can that the peremptory challenges in question were not predicated on group bias alone.” (People v. Wheeler, supra, 22 Cal.3d at p. 281, fn. omitted.) In determining whether the prosecutor has satisfied this burden the trial court must review the proffered reasons not in terms of “judgment’ or ‘sincerity’ ” but in terms of whether the “ground of challenge was a specific bias on the part of the individual juror.” (Id. at p. 284, fn. 32; accord People v. Trevino (1985) 39 Cal.3d 667, 688 [217 Cal.Rptr. 652, 704 P.2d 719].) Bias, in the Wheeler context, is defined as “a bias relating to the particular case on trial or the parties or witnesses thereto.” (People v. Wheeler, supra, at p. 276; accord People v. Trevino, supra, at p. 689.)
On review of a trial court’s determination that the prosecutor has met his burden of proof, my colleagues see an appellate court’s role as limited to giving great deference to the trial court’s findings. (See majority opn., ante, pp. 932-933.) Ordinarily that is the rule. (People v. Turner (1986) 42 Cal.3d 711, 720, fn. 6 [230 Cal.Rptr. 656, 726 P.2d 102], citing Batson v. Kentucky (1986) 476 U.S. 79, 98, fn. 21 [90 L.Ed.2d 69, 89].) But refusing to give absolute deference to the trial court is precisely what the California Supreme Court has done in three of its more recent Wheeler cases: Hall, Trevino and Turner. Each case was a reversal. If those nondeferential actions by the high court were not sufficient to make the rule for reviewing courts clear, the Supreme Court has spelled matters out by explaining that ordinarily giving deference does not mean inevitably giving deference. (People v. Turner, supra, at p. 720, fn. 6.) The court went into detail: “in some cases the reviewing court may conclude that the explanation is inherently implausible in light of the whole record. . . . [T]he issue whether a given explanation constitutes a constitutionally permissible—i.e., nondiscriminatory—justification for the particular peremptory challenge remains a question of law.” (Ibid.)
Thus, as I understand the directions given by the California Supreme Court, the function of the appellate court is to do more than recite the mantra—Kiefer to the trial court—defer to the trial court—defer to the trial court. Instead, our function is (a) to independently determine whether a given explanation is inherently implausible, and (b) to do so in light of the entire record.
The whole record shows the prosecutor to have been both explicit and clear in his sole reason for challenging Mr. Prescott, a Black prospective *937juror: “With regard to Mr. Prescott, who was an older man, ... I excused him for the same reasons I excused Mr. Small and Mr. Panelo, who were both older men, both Mr. Small and Mr. Panelo being retired individuals. [1Í] Given the nature of this case I don’t feel it’s in the best interest of the People to have older men on the jury, regardless of what race they are.’’ (Italics added.)
On its face the prosecutor’s explanation for this challenge of Juror Prescott appears to meet the definition of specific bias relating to a particular witness, here the victim. Were that the entire record before this court, I would find the prosecutor had sufficiently rebutted the inference of impermissible group bias.2 But that is not the whole record before this court, and it is the whole record that we are required to review to determine whether the prosecutor’s explanation is inherently implausible. (People v. Turner, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 720, fn. 6.)
What the whole record reveals is that things changed once the prosecutor hurdled the Wheeler motion by explaining it was not Mr. Prescott’s race but rather his age—and solely his age—which had triggered the challenge. Suddenly, age did not matter anymore and a retired White man, Juror Hanley, was allowed to remain on the jury. Thus, the characteristic trait had been explained at the time of the Wheeler motion to be universally disqualifying—(“Given the nature of this case I don’t feel it’s in the best interest of the People to have older men on the jury, regardless of what race they are”)—suddenly became qualifying. What a difference a White man makes.
The majority refuses to consider evidence of the retention of Juror Hanley because that occurred after the denial of the Wheeler motion. (See majority opn., ante, pp. 934-935.) As I have attempted to make clear, however, Turner mandates that we consider the handling of Juror Hanley because that is part of the whole record.
*938A prosecutor’s disparate treatment of the members of the excluded group and the unchallenged jurors who have the same characteristics has been deemed strong indicia of group bias. (People v. Hall, supra, 35 Cal.3d at p. 168; accord People v. Turner, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 721; People v. Trevino, supra, 39 Cal.3d at pp. 690-693.) As I review this prosecutor’s words as measured against his actions, his disparate treatment of the older jurors failed to rebut, as a matter of law, the defense’s prima facie case of group bias. Stated another way, the prosecutor’s reason for challenging Mr. Prescott was, in the polite words of the California Supreme Court, “inherently implausible.”3
Because Wheeler error is prejudicial per se (People v. Turner, supra, 42 Cal.3d at p. 728; People v. Wheeler, supra, 22 Cal.3d at p. 283), I would reverse.
A petition for a rehearing was denied November 18, 1987, and appellant’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied January 7, 1988.

People v. Wheeler (1978) 22 Cal.3d 258 [148 Cal.Rptr. 890, 583 P.2d 748].

 An issue yet to be resolved by the California Supreme Court is whether age groupings— e.g., young persons, or retired persons—can be deemed cognizable groups for purposes of jury composition. If I were writing on a clean screen, I would find that age groupings are cognizable classes which cannot be systematically excluded from the venire by the arbitrary use of peremptory challenges.
However, I have no quarrel with the exercise of a peremptory challenge premised on a juror’s age—young or old—where the prosecutor is able to demonstrate a specific bias arising out of that age. Thus in this case, had the prosecutor been consistent in his challenges of older men, I would be inclined to find that the prosecutor had rebutted the prima facie case of group discrimination based on age because the prosecutor had identified a specific bias against his victim. However, if the prosecutor merely challenges older people on a jury because he believes them as a class to be lazy or dull, then, in my view, the prima facie case would not have been rebutted.

I therefore have no occasion to consider whether the trial court had a sua sponte obligation to reopen its consideration of the Wheeler motion once the prosecutor retained a juror who so obviously exhibited the characteristic the prosecutor just a little earlier has described as absolutely disqualifying. Nor need I consider whether defense counsel’s failure to renew the Wheeler motion at that time constituted ineffective assistance of counsel.