Court Opinion

ID: 2965636
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2015-09-21 21:42:58.661217+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:43:07.405718
License: Public Domain

USCA1 Opinion

	

                  United States Court of Appeals
                      For the First Circuit
                       ____________________

No. 97-2217

                          UNITED STATES,

                            Appellee,

                                v.

                         ANTHONY SERINO,

                      Defendant, Appellant.

                       ____________________

           APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

                FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS

           [Hon. William G. Young, U.S. District Judge]

                       ____________________

                              Before

                      Boudin, Circuit Judge,

Bownes and Reavley, Senior Circuit Judges.

                      _____________________

     Frederick R. Ford, by appointment of the Court, for appellant.
     Geoffrey E. Hobart, Assistant United States Attorney, with
whom Donald K. Stern, United States Attorney, was on brief, for
appellee.

                       ____________________

                       December 30, 1998
                       ____________________          REAVLEY, Circuit Judge.  Anthony Serino was convicted of
conspiracy to distribute cocaine and of possession with intent to
distribute cocaine; he was sentenced to three years imprisonment. 
We reverse and remand for retrial because he was erroneously denied
a peremptory juror challenge.
          Serino was apprehended as the result of an intensive
investigation by the Drug Enforcement Administration of the Salem
chapter of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club.  He was not a club
member but served its drug trafficking as a courier.  A DEA special
agent posed as a buyer desiring to purchase thirty ounces of
cocaine.  He was told to meet ten different couriers at ten
different locations each half hour, and that each courier would
deliver three ounces of the drug in a brown paper bag.  At 3:00
p.m. he was to meet "Anthony," a "skinny little kid" who would know
the intended buyer's car.  Defendant Serino drove alongside the
buyer's car at the appointed time and place, introduced himself as
"Anthony" and, without invitation, entered the car and produced
three ounces of cocaine in an unsealed brown paper bag.  Serino
watched, without comment, as the buyer activated a secret latch and
placed the bag in a hidden compartment, and then he parted by
agreeing that he and the buyer would probably see each other in the
near future.
          The evidence supported the conviction.  The extra-
judicial statements of the co-conspirators were admissible under
Fed. R. Evid. 801(d)(2)(E), and Serino's agreement about the future
meetings was proof of his knowledge that multiple crimes were
intended.  A new trial, however, is necessitated by the court's
seating of a juror despite the defendant's peremptory challenge.
                 The Peremptory Challenge Ruling
The Record
          The district judge conducted the voir dire of the jury
panel by general questions and asked Ching Cheung only to state the
occupations of herself and her husband.  We know nothing about her
except her name, her Asian appearance, and this response to the
court:  "I am a social worker, work with Union Square Nursing
Center.  My husband works as a financial analyst."
          When the defense attorney challenged Ms. Cheung, the
judge disapproved.
            THE COURT:  Ms. Cheung, she's our only
            Asian American, why are you challenging
            her?

            MR. BURNS:  Social worker; background.

            THE COURT:  Why should that be a ground of
            challenge?  I mean, you understand what
            I'm doing, I have a Batson problem with
            her.  I think you may be challenging her
            because of her ethnic heritage.

            MR. BURNS:  I'm not.  I told you, her
            background, what she does, what her
            husband does.

            THE COURT:  And what's that?  When you say
            a social worker, why don't you want a
            social worker?

            MR. BURNS:  Financial analyst, her husband
            is.

            THE COURT:  What does that have to do with
            anything pertaining to drugs?  I just
            don't see the connection.  No, I'm
            disallowing that challenge.

          Counsel for the defendant renewed his objection after the
jury was seated and moved for a mistrial.  In the hearing on that
motion, counsel explained that he was confused by the court's
inquiry of his reason for asking that Ms. Cheung be excused; and
that when the judge mentioned Batson, counsel thought that case had
no applicability to his challenge.  The judge then explained his
ruling:
            THE COURT:  [W]ell, here's what it has to
            do, here's the logic of Batson.  Because
            every citizen has a right equally to serve
            on the juries of this nation.  Jury
            service is as I explain to juries that
            most vital expression of direct democracy
            that exists.  No one can be denied, in the
            view of this Court, the right.  It's their
            right.  You don't have to have racial
            issues in a case.  I don't suggest that
            there were.  I suggest that every single
            person qualified for jury service has a
            constitutional right, which I think is
            within the Sixth and Seventh Amendments,
            to serve on the nation's juries.  They
            cannot be denied that right on the grounds
            of gender, race, or national origin.

                            . . . . .

            MR. BURNS: . . . I submit to the Court
            that the reason was, in a drug case, she
            was a social worker and we didn't want her
            on the jury and you told me that that
            wasn't sufficient.

                            . . . . .

            THE COURT:  I understand that's the
            position.  There is a factual piece to
            fill in.

               Let me be clear.  I did not credit your
            explanation from your demeanor and the
            interchange in the record.  I thought you
            were in fact challenging her because she
            was different than the other jurors,
            different because she was an Asian
            American.  I ordered her seated. . . .

                            . . . . .

            MR. BURNS:  I gave you the valid reason
            and then you told me that was not
            sufficient.  I believe the record will
            reflect it.

            THE COURT:  I don't believe it.  I didn't
            then, I don't now.

          The Government argues here that the judge simply made a
credibility finding, a finding that is not clearly erroneous.
Discussion
          While the entitlement to peremptory challenges is
restricted by the equal protection rights of defendants and the
challenged jurors, it remains an essential factor in securing
fairness and impartiality of trial by jury.  This court has said
that this "is one of the most important rights of the accused." 
United States v. Gonz lez Vargas, 585 F.2d 546, 547 (1st Cir.
1978).  The restriction imposed by the Supreme Court in Batsoncases goes no further than to prevent purposeful invidious
discrimination and assure selection of jurors pursuant to
nondiscriminatory criteria.  Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 86,
106 S. Ct. 1712, 1717, 90 L. Ed. 2d 69 (1986).
          Implementation of the restriction against discrimination
is by looking, first, for a prima facie showing of discrimination;
second, calling for a race-neutral explanation for the tendered
challenge; and, finally, decision by the trial court on whether the
objection to the challenge meets the burden of proving the reason
given to be pretexual for purposeful racial discrimination. 
Purkett v. Elem, 514 U.S. 765, 767, 115 S. Ct. 1769, 1770-71, 131
L. Ed. 2d 834 (1995).  We will pass the question of whether a prima
facie case of ethnic discrimination was presented when a man named
Serino challenges the only Asian American on the jury venire in a
Boston trial and go to the question of whether all of the
circumstances proved purposeful discrimination.  The defendant's
lawyer gave a perfectly understandable reason for the challenge; he
preferred not to have a social worker decide a drug charge.  We are
at a loss to find any evidence to prove that this reason was a
pretext for actual discrimination against Asian-Americans.  SeeCaldwell v. Maloney, --- F.3d ---, ---, 1998 WL 7571651, at *7-*8
(1st Cir. Nov. 2, 1998) (noting various indications that might
demonstrate a pretextual Batson explanation, such as if the
proffered reason is equally applicable to a non-challenged juror of
a different race; the facts in the record are objectively contrary
to the proffered race-neutral explanation; counsel inadvertently
admits that race played some role in striking the juror; there is
direct evidence of racial bias; or a series of strikes considered
together suggest racial bias, though taken separately each
explanation is race-neutral); see also United States v. Prez, 35
F.3d 632, 636 (1st Cir. 1994) (noting that the trial court must
make express findings of fact when it decides to discredit a given
explanation).
          If the judge disbelieved defense counsel, it was because
the judge did not accept an objection to a social worker as a valid
reason for not wanting that person on the jury.  The only reason
apparent to the judge was the difference between Ms. Cheung and the
other jurors, a difference in ethnicity, rather than occupation or
background.  The judge simply saw no connection between the social
worker experience of Ms. Cheung and her decision as a juror in a
drug case.  But the defense attorney did see a connection
(obviously, that a social worker might be especially sensitive to
the harm wrought by drugs), and it was race- and ethnicity- and
gender-neutral.  If the judge found that reasoning to be
pretextual, there is no support for the finding and it was clearly
erroneous.
          To enforce the entitlement to the peremptory challenge,
we reverse the conviction without proof of prejudice or proceeding
to consider harmlessness.  See United States v. Schneider, 111 F.3d
197, 204 (1st Cir. 1997); United States v. Annigoni, 96 F.3d 1132,
1134 (9th Cir. 1996) (en banc).
          Judgment reversed.  Case remanded.