Court Opinion

ID: 9723424
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:14:12.962939+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:48.689655
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, J.
I concur in the result reached by the majority in view of Williams v. Superior Court (1989) 49 Cal.3d 736 [263 Cal.Rptr. 503, 781 P.2d 537]. That case held, for purposes of determining whether a jury represents a cross-section of the community, the “community” is the judicial district. There is no evidence in the case before us Blacks are underrepresented on Norwalk Superior Court juries in relation to the number of jury eligible Blacks within the Southeast Judicial District. (Cf. Williams v. Superior Court, supra, at p. 746.)
In light of the holding in Williams, everything in the majority opinion except footnote 5, (ante, p. 559) is dicta. However, because some of that dicta involves the county’s policy of reassigning jurors because of transportation difficulties in getting to their assigned court, I write separately to express my view that the current policy would not rebut a future defendant’s prima facie showing of a violation of the fair-cross-section requirement.
Once the defendant establishes a prima facie case, see majority opinion at page 558, the burden shifts to the state to demonstrate a sufficiently compelling interest to maintain that systematic exclusion. (Duren v. Missouri (1979) 439 U.S. 357, 367-368 [58 L.Ed.2d 579, 99 S.Ct. 664].)
According to Mr. Arce, Director of Juror Services for Los Angeles County, a person who objects to service at the assigned court because a lack of transportation, or reliance on public transportation, would create an inconvenience in getting to that court is reassigned to a more convenient court.1 Los Angeles’s legendary lack of adequate public transportation is the primary cause of juror transfers. Mr. Arce testified, “For example, let’s assume that a Black person from South Central is summoned to this court, and indicates that he or she relies on public transportation. Our experience has been that public transportation from the South Central area of Los Angeles to this court is very difficult. It takes upwards of two hours, as I recall, either one or two bus changes, and it’s just not easy to accomplish.”
*571He also pointed out, “A In as much [s/c] as the Rapid Transit District—Southern California Rapid Transit District has several lines from the outlying portion of the county—parts of the county, including the South Central area, traveling to the hub, that is downtown, the availability going on any one of the streets—major streets, such as Figueroa, Main Street, Vermont, Normandie, and getting to the South Central—to the downtown courthouse is much easier than it is going, say, for example, from—from the South Central area, the Compton/Carson area, than it is to this court.
“Also, bus lines such as the Torrence [s/c] bus line, or the Santa Monica bus line have as their objectives transportation between say Santa Monica— the City of Santa Monica, and points there in downtown, or from the City of Torrence [s/c], downtown, you don’t find the Torrence [s/c] bus line serving residents of Torrence [s/c], in taking them to Norwalk, for example.”
Mr. Arce testified his office does not record the race of jurors reassigned due to transportation problems. However, he did testify that between 20 and 25 percent of the jurors summoned to the Norwalk Superior Court are granted transfers based on transportation difficulties. Assuming all races are equally affected by inadequate public transportation, which may be a conservative assumption as to Blacks, the Norwalk Superior Court is losing 20 to 25 percent of its potential Black jurors as a result of the county’s juror transfer policy.
Under the holding in Duren, the state may justify the systematic underrepresentation of a cognizable class by proof “that a significant state interest [is] manifestly and primarily advanced by” its exemption criteria. (439 U.S. at p. 367 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 589].) The court did not further define what it meant by a “significant” interest except “ ‘[t]he right to a proper jury cannot be overcome on merely rational grounds.’ ” (Ibid., quoting Taylor v. Louisiana (1975) 419 U.S. 522, 534 [42 L.Ed.2d 690, 700, 99 S.Ct. 692].) A “significant” state interest appears to be something less than a “compelling” one but something more than a merely “rational” one. (See San Antonio School District v. Rodriguez (1973) 411 U.S. 1, 17 [36 L.Ed.2d 16, 33, 93 S.Ct. 1278].) Thus, applying Fourteenth Amendment equal protection analysis to Sixth Amendment fair-cross-section cases, I believe the showing the government must make to establish a “significant” state interest is analogous to the showing it must make when its classifications involve important but not “fundamental” rights or sensitive but not “suspect” classifications. (See, e.g., Craig v. Boren (1976) 429 U.S. 190 [50 L.Ed.2d 397, 97 S.Ct. 451] [classification based on gender]; Mills v. Habluetzel (1982) 456 U.S. 91 [71 L.Ed.2d 770, 102 S.Ct. 1549] [classification based on *572illegitimacy]; Plyler v. Doe (1982) 457 U.S. 202 [72 L.Ed.2d 786, 102 S. Ct. 2382] [classification based on alienage].) To withstand constitutional challenge, such classifications must serve “important governmental objectives and must be substantially related to achievement of those objectives.” (Craig v. Boren, supra, 429 U.S. 190, 197 [50 L.Ed.2d 397, 407].)
This heightened scrutiny of governmental objectives is consistent with the treatment the court gave gender-based juror exclusion rules in Taylor v. Louisiana, supra, 419 U.S. 522, 534 [42 L.Ed.2d 690, 700] and Duren v. Missouri, supra, 439 U.S. at pages 368-369 [58 L.Ed.2d at pages 589-590], While acknowledging the state could assert a rational basis for excluding women from juries,2 the court stated, in Taylor, “It is untenable to suggest these days that it would be a special hardship for each and every woman to perform jury service or that society cannot spare any women from their present duties.” (419 U.S. at pp. 534-535 [42 L.Ed.2d at pp. 700-701] [italics in original].) In Duren the court held that if it turned out on remand that exemptions for persons over 65, teachers and government workers caused the low percentage of women on jury venires the state would have to establish those exemptions “manifestly and primarily advanced” a “significant state interest.” (439 U.S. at pp. 367-368 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 589].)
It is not contended the government lacks a significant interest in providing prospective jurors exemptions for “undue hardship.” Such exemptions clearly promote significant political and practical interests of the state and have been approved in principle in numerous cases. (See, e.g., Taylor v. Louisiana, supra, 419 U.S. at p. 534 [42 L.Ed.2d at p. 700] [approving exemptions “in case of special hardship”]; Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co. (1946) 328 U.S. 217, 224 [90 L.Ed. 1181, 1186-1187, 66 S.Ct. 984, 166 A.L.R. 1412] [approving exemptions for “undue financial hardship”]; People v. Milan (1973) 9 Cal.3d 185, 196 [107 Cal.Rptr. 68, 507 P.2d 956] [approving excusing jurors for “economic hardship”].) But even though the government has a significant interest in providing exemptions in cases of undue hardship, these exemptions must be tailored to “manifestly and primarily advance” that interest. (Duren v. Missouri, supra, 439 U.S. at p. 367 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 588].) Mere administrative convenience does not justify a blanket exclusion which results in the underrepresentation of a cognizable class. (Taylor v. Louisiana, supra, 419 U.S. at pp. 534-535 [42 L.Ed.2d at pp. 700-701].) The court, in Taylor, rejected the argument a “special hardship” resulting from a woman’s duty in the home justified excluding women from juries. The court responded to this argument by stating, “This may be the case with many, and it may be burdensome to sort out those who should be exempted from those who should serve. But . . . the administrative *573convenience in dealing with women as a class is insufficient justification for diluting the quality of community judgment represented by the jury in criminal trials.” (Id. at p. 535 [42 L.Ed.2d at p. 701].)
Furthermore, the standards for applying the exemption must be substantially related to achievement of the exemption’s objective. (Craig v. Boren, supra, 429 U.S. at p. 197 [50 L.Ed.2d at pp. 406-407].) In Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co., supra, 328 U.S. at page 224 [90 L.Ed.2d at page 1187], the court held the permissible objective of excusing daily wage earners from jury service, where such service would constitute an undue financial hardship, could not be achieved by a blanket exclusion of all daily wage earners. “Here,” the court observed, “there was no effort, no intention, to determine in advance which individual members of the daily wage earning class would suffer an undue hardship.. . . All were systematically and automatically excluded.” In Duren v. Missouri, supra, the court held exempting all women from jury service “because of the preclusive domestic responsibilities of some women is insufficient justification of their disproportionate exclusion on jury venires.” (439 U.S. at p. 369 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 590].) If the state wished to excuse men or women responsible for the care of children “[a]n exemption appropriately tailored to this interest would . . . survive a fair-cross-section challenge.” (Id. at p. 370 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 590].)
There is no basis in logic for concluding every bus rider would incur “undue hardship” if required to serve as a juror at the Norwalk Superior Court. Yet, the county policy, as explained by Mr. Arce, makes this assumption because it allows any juror to opt out of service in Norwalk by merely asserting “it would be a hardship for me to get to that court.” (Cf. Duren v. Missouri, supra, 439 U.S. at p. 369 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 590].) A juror making such an assertion is asked, “Which courts would be easiest [for you to go to]?” The juror is transferred to the court she names as easiest to go to. Nothing in the record before us suggests the county’s transfer policy is limited to cases of excessive travel time or unreasonable difficulty in using public transportation. On the contrary, the county’s policy appears to be based on inconvenience, not undue hardship.3 The juror is allowed to serve at whichever court is “easiest” for her. So far as I can ascertain from the record the transfer is self-executed by the juror. No written verification is required. No check of bus routes or times is made.
*574Avoiding mere inconvenience to jurors is not a significant state interest justifying denial of the constitutional right to a jury drawn from a fair cross-section of the community. As the court stated in Thiel, supra, “Jury service is a duty as well as a privilege of citizenship; it is a duty that cannot be shirked on a plea of inconvenience . . . .” (328 U.S. at p. 224 [90 L.Ed.2d at p. 1187].) (See also Adams v. Superior Court (1972) 27 Cal.App.3d 719, 728 [104 Cal.Rptr. 144] observing policies arrived at minimizing inconvenience to jurors must give way to compliance with the constitutional requirement of a fair cross-sectional jury selection.) By allowing jurors to transfer to the “easiest” courthouse the government has abdicated its responsibility to set and follow standards appropriately tailored to its legitimate interest in avoiding undue hardship to jurors. This transfer policy could, in a future case, result in the denial of a defendant’s constitutional right to a jury which represents a fair cross-section of the community.
Appellant’s petition for review by the Supreme Court was denied March 1, 1990.

 Technically, such a person is not excused from jury service, only reassigned. However, for purposes of the fair-cross-section requirement the result is the same.

 See Hoyt v. Florida (1961) 368 U.S. 57, 62-63 [7 L.Ed.2d 118, 122-123, 82 S.Ct. 159].

 At the hearing on Harmon’s motion the prosecutor argued, “I think what [the county is] doing is the best [it] possibly can, under the circumstances. Jurors are human beings. They don’t want to drive any farther than they have to. They don’t want to be on the bus any longer than they have to. They don’t want to be away from their homes and jobs anymore than they have to.”