Court Opinion

ID: 9528040
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:36:33.005831+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:26:25.571838
License: Public Domain

MARTONE, Justice,
dissenting.
The result achieved by the majority is not supported by our own cases, federal common law, or the rule adopted by most states. The majority’s reliance upon the doctrine of stare decisis is misplaced. An analysis of our cases, federal law, and the cases in other states indicates that the Arizona rule is contrary to that stated by the majority, and it ought to be.
We begin with the Arizona rule. As the court notes, ante, at 263, 855 P.2d at 777, the Arizona rule is stated in Encinas v. State, 26 Ariz. 24, 28-29, 221 P. 232, 233 (1923). We there held that an “order overruling [a] challenge for cause must amount to prejudicial error in order to require [a] reversal.” As long as a defendant is not forced to take an objectionable juror, there is no prejudice. Id.
The majority claims that the rule of En-cinas was expressly rejected by this court in State v. Thompson, 68 Ariz. 386, 206 P.2d 1037 (1949). Ante, at 263, 855 P.2d at 777. On the contrary, State v. Thompson has nothing at all to do with a court’s erroneous failure to remove a juror for cause. Instead, the clerk in Thompson erroneously kept on the jury three persons against whom the defendant exercised peremptory challenges. Thus, the defendant went to trial in front of a jury consisting of three persons whom he had struck. This is a far cry from Encinas and the case before this court. In Thompson, we held that “[t]he jury as formed was not a lawful jury” because it was constituted of persons the defendant removed. Id. 68 Ariz. at 393, 206 P.2d at 1041. We also held that “there is no constitutional right to peremptory challenges in this state,” id. at 390, 206 P.2d at 1039, and that “a defendant is not entitled to be tried by any particular jury, but merely by one which is fair and impartial.” Id. at 391, 206 P.2d at 1040. It is clear, therefore, that Thompson is a defectively constituted jury case, and not a case in which a judge erroneously overruled a challenge for cause requiring a party to exercise a peremptory strike. Thus, Thompson is no support for today’s decision.
In contrast to Thompson, Wasko v. Frankel, 116 Ariz. 288, 569 P.2d 230 (1977), on the surface at least, supports today’s decision. But Wasko is itself revisionist judicial decision making. Without even citing Encinas, the Arizona rule, the court, in a very cryptic opinion, turned to the law of Utah for its rule of decision. There is no indication that the court even knew that an Arizona rule existed. If we were to cling to the doctrine of stare decisis, we would be required to acknowledge the rule of Encinas, characterize Thompson as a case having nothing to do with challenges for cause, and characterize Wasko as a mistake. I do not share the court’s view that stare decisis requires us to do otherwise.
Let us turn next to federal law. The majority characterizes Ross v. Oklahoma, 487 U.S. 81, 108 S.Ct. 2273, 101 L.Ed.2d 80 (1988), as permitting Arizona to adopt a no prejudice, no foul rule. But the no prejudice, no foul rule is also the rule of federal criminal prosecutions. Hopt v. Utah, 120 U.S. 430, 436, 7 S.Ct. 614, 617, 30 L.Ed. 708 (1887); U.S. v. Farmer, 923 F.2d 1557 (11th Cir.1991); U.S. v. Mercer, 853 F.2d 630 (8th Cir.1988), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 996, 109 S.Ct. 566, 102 L.Ed.2d 591 (1988), and cert. denied, 490 U.S. 1110, 109 S.Ct. 3166, 104 L.Ed.2d 1028 (1989).
Other states, too, require a showing of prejudice under these circumstances. Pickens v. State, 301 Ark. 244, 783 S.W.2d 341 (1990), cert. denied, 497 U.S. 1011, 110 S.Ct. 3257, 111 L.Ed.2d 766 (1990); Dawson v. State, 581 A.2d 1078 (Del.1990), vacated on other grounds, — U.S.—, 112 S.Ct. 1093, 117 L.Ed.2d 309 (1992); People v. Gleash, 209 Ill.App.3d 598, 154 Ill.Dec. 348, 568 N.E.2d 348 (1991). Some states take the position that a defendant must show that he was disabled from using a peremptory strike on an additional unacceptable juror. Trotter v. State, 576 So.2d 691 (Fla.1990); Foster v. Commonwealth, 827 S.W.2d 670 (Ky.1992), cert. denied, — U.S.—, 113 S.Ct. 337, 121 L.Ed.2d 254 (1992); State v. Doleszny, 146 Vt. 621, 508 *271A.2d 693, 694 (1986); Johnson v. State, 713 S.W.2d 741 (Tex.App.1986).
It is plain, therefore, that under a mistaken understanding of stare decisis, the court today adopts a rule which has been rejected by most other courts. Let us now explore the court’s reasons for preferring such a rule. The court first says that peremptory challenges are important because they “protect the defendant from jury resentment to questions asked in attempting to exercise a challenge for cause.” Ante, at 265, 855 P.2d at 779. This ignores the fact that in Arizona the judge conducts voir dire in criminal cases. Rule 18.5(d), Ariz.R.Crim.P. And challenges are made “out of hearing of the jurors.” Rule 18.5(f), Ariz.R.Crim.P. The court says that peremptory challenges help ensure that the defendant holds no prejudice against any juror. Ante, at 265, 855 P.2d 779. But the reverse is true. Per-emptories are used by the defendant to strike persons whom the defendant thinks may be prejudiced against him. The court says that peremptories allow the exclusion of persons whose neutrality is threatened by their backgrounds, group affiliations, or unconscious biases not admitted during voir dire. Ante, at 265-66, 855 P.2d at 779-80. This, of course, is the vice of peremptories which led to the Batson case. Trial techniques treatises encourage lawyers to exercise group stereotyping when it comes to exercising peremptory challenges. An example follows:
Some advocates who specialize in the defense of criminal cases say they prefer Jews or Irishmen to Englishmen or Scandinavians. The former, they argue, because of their religious and national background and native temperament, put a greater burden on the prosecution and are more sympathetic to an unfortunate in the toils of the law. In the matter of religion, they argue that Catholics, Episcopalians and Presbyterians are to be preferred to Baptists and Methodists, because the tenets held and disciplines prescribed for the latter make them less tolerant of human frailty.
Francis X. Busch, Trial Procedure Materials § 93 (1961).
Is this what we want? I had thought we were trying to discourage people from excluding jurors based upon stereotypes which are, in turn, based upon the “backgrounds and group affiliations” described by the court. The use of peremptories in this way guarantees that our juries will not be cross sections of the community. We should discourage this use, not elevate it to a legitimate practice.
The court says that the adoption of a harmless error test would lead to bizarre results. Ante, at 266, 855 P.2d at 780. There are no bizarre results unless you subscribe to the game theory of advocacy. Absent a showing of prejudice, one should no more count the number of peremptory strikes than one should count the number of witnesses, the length of their examination, or any other quite accidental characteristic of the trial process. What matters is the fairness and impartiality of the jury. When a party cannot show prejudice, there is no prejudice. The court engages in arithmetic as though fairness were a game of chance. But the calculus of our rule on challenges in criminal cases does not equate numerical equivalence with fairness. For example, when more than one defendant is tried, each is allowed one half the number of peremptory challenges allowed to one defendant. Rule 18.4(c)(2), Ariz.R.Crim.P. Under the court’s reasoning, this would be unfair to a defendant, because he gets one half the peremptories the state gets. Our rule even acknowledges that a party may waive a right to exercise a challenge for cause by failing to make it on a timely basis. Rule 18.4(b), Ariz.R.Crim.P. This would mean that a defendant could actually be tried by a jury which includes a person against whom a challenge for cause may exist, and the trial would not be scuttled. Yet, today, the court scuttles a trial in which no disqualified juror sat. The court says that the adversary system demands a level playing field to work properly. Ante, at 266, 855 P.2d at 780. The “level playing field” metaphor supports the game theory of advocacy in which the objective is victory rather than truth. In what mischievous ways must the playing field be leveled? The same number of witnesses? Lawyers of equal talent? Parties of equal economic staying power? A trial is not a game to be won or lost, the fairness of which is mea*272sured by weighing collateral characteristics. A trial is an effort to find the truth. When a fair and impartial jury has returned a verdict, and a lawyer has been able to accomplish with a peremptory challenge that which a judge should have accomplished with a challenge for cause, no harm has been done, the process has been vindicated, and the outcome is the product of fair and impartial decision making.
The court complains that a party might make a greater effort to show bias on the part of other jurors. Ante, at 266, 855 P.2d at 780. The court refers to “gamesmanship,” but it is a game that I do not understand. Parties always have a legitimate interest in developing the bias of jurors before a jury is sworn. It is hard to imagine why the adoption of a harmless error rule would encourage such a practice, but even if it did, what is the harm of that? There is either a basis for a challenge for cause or there is not.
The court says that it cannot presume that a trial is fair when a trial judge erroneously fails to dismiss a biased juror for cause even where the juror is dismissed peremptorily. But the fairness of a trial is judged by the fairness of the jury which hears the case. Once the exercise of the peremptory strike excuses the juror who should have been excused for cause, a court can not only presume that the trial is fair, but it will know that it is. The offending juror will have been removed.
The court is concerned that by being forced to use a peremptory challenge when a challenge for cause should have been honored a party has one less peremptory strike. But this case affords us no opportunity to consider that issue. Here it was undisputed that even if the defendant had a peremptory strike, he would not have used it on any of the remaining venire persons. Thus, there is no “waste” in this case. Ante, at 266, 855 P.2d at 780. But, were it otherwise, it would not matter. Once counsel passes a panel for cause, by definition, the parties will have a fair and impartial jury. Peremptory strikes are gravy. One of their purposes is to make up for the errors of the trial judge. So for example, as in this case, when the trial judge fails to properly honor a challenge for cause, the peremptory strike can be used. The trial can be saved. A provision for peremptory strikes is not unlike a provision for alternate jurors. They both promote the efficient administration of justice.
Peremptory strikes no longer enjoy the exalted position once described in Swain v. Alabama, 880 U.S. 202, 85 S.Ct. 824, 13 L.Ed.2d 759 (1965), overruled by Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986). Batson reflects a more contemporary view. Indeed, Justice Marshall proposed abandoning peremptories altogether in criminal trials. 476 U.S. at 107-08, 106 S.Ct. at 1729 (Marshall, J., concurring). Accord James H. Kemper, Let’s Do Away With Voir Dire, Arizona Attorney, June 1993, at 7, 10. Our approach to trials, and juries, is no longer wooden. Cf. B. Michael Dann, “Learning Lessons” and “Speaking Rights”: Creating Educated and Democratic Juries, 68 Ind.LJ. (forthcoming 1993). Today’s decision fails to reflect this new reality. Here, there was neither prejudice nor an allegation of prejudice. Thus, today’s decision does not vindicate the right to a fair trial. We just promote an artificially sacrosanct understanding of a peremptory challenge. For all these reasons, I dissent.