Baker v. Commonwealth
| Decision Date | 30 April 2021 |
| Docket Number | NO. 2019-CA-0538-MR,2019-CA-0538-MR |
| Parties | DARRYL KEITH BAKER APPELLANT v. COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY APPELLEE |
| Court | Kentucky Court of Appeals |
NOT TO BE PUBLISHED
APPEAL FROM FAYETTE CIRCUIT COURT
During the late evening hours of March 27, 2018, police officers were investigating an automobile parked outside the Day's Motel on Versailles Road in Lexington. Police officers later described the Day's Motel as being in a "high call volume" area. Baker, a homeless black man, occupied the front passenger seat of the vehicle. While the officers were questioning Baker, they repeatedly directed him to keep his hands in view, because Baker kept placing his hands inside his jacket. The officers asked Baker for permission to search the vehicle. Baker declined, stating the vehicle did not belong to him and he only had the owner's permission to stay there.
After declining to give permission to search, Baker once again hid his hands, this time dropping them below the seat. To ensure Baker was not reaching for a weapon, an officer opened the door of the vehicle. When the door opened, Baker became aggressive, jumping out of the vehicle with his fists clenched and growling at the officers. At this point, the officers intended to arrest Baker formenacing1 and ordered him to get on the ground. When Baker did not comply, Officer David Smith of the Lexington Police Department tried to restrain Baker by grasping his right arm in order to handcuff him. Baker responded by punching Officer Smith several times, causing injuries to the officer's chin, left eye, and finger. After subduing Baker, the officers searched the vehicle and found a narcotics pipe and a used syringe.
Following Baker's arrest, the Fayette County grand jury indicted him on multiple charges stemming from the incident: third-degree assault,2 resisting arrest,3 possession of drug paraphernalia,4 and menacing.5 The grand jury later added a charge of being a first-degree persistent felony offender (PFO)6 to Baker's indictment. The Fayette Circuit Court held Baker's jury trial on November 13, 2018.7 The Commonwealth presented testimony from several Lexington policeofficers, including Officer Smith, conforming to the above narrative. The Commonwealth also introduced body camera video footage of the incident. Baker did not present witnesses or other evidence in his defense.
After deliberation, the jury found Baker guilty on all counts in the indictment and recommended a sentence of two years on the third-degree assault charge, enhanced to fifteen years by virtue of the PFO. For the remaining misdemeanor charges, the jury recommended a sentence of thirty-days' incarceration on each count. The trial court entered its final judgment on March 13, 2019, sentencing Baker in accordance with the jury's recommendation. This appeal followed.
Baker presents three arguments on appeal. First, he argues the trial court erroneously denied his motion to prohibit the Commonwealth from striking jurors in violation of Batson v. Kentucky. Second, Baker argues the trial court erroneously denied his right to present mitigating evidence in the penalty phase. Third, Baker argues the trial court erroneously permitted the Commonwealth to refer to the site of the incident where he was arrested as "a high crime area," in violation of the parties' agreed motion in limine to refrain from such language. We agree with Baker's first argument regarding Batson and note that such an error isstructural, requiring a new trial. For these reasons, we need not consider his other arguments at this time.
Baker argues the trial court erroneously denied his Batson challenge to the prosecutor's use of two peremptory strikes. At a bench conference during voir dire, Baker objected to the prosecutor's use of peremptory strikes against Juror 4696 and Juror 4079, both of whom were black men. By way of explanation, the prosecutor argued that Juror 4696 had disclosed that his father was charged with murder in Fayette County in 1986, when the juror was thirteen years old. Despite the juror's assertion he would be impartial during Baker's trial, the prosecutor argued she was uncertain what the juror's experience was with the court system. Notably, the prosecutor elected not to strike Juror 4718, a white woman, who disclosed that she had a brother who was prosecuted for fraud in federal court. Like the immediately preceding Juror 4696, Juror 4718 stated her family member was treated fairly and it would not affect her ability to sit as a juror. Next, regarding Juror 4079, the prosecutor stated the following reason for the strike:
I don't know if you caught this, but whenever his name was called, he stood up, shook his head, and was very disgruntled about it, and kind of gave off bad body language while we were asking questions—I don't know if you caught it or not. He stood up really quick and sat down . . . . It was pretty quick.
Baker's counsel maintained his objection to the strikes, asserting these were insufficiently race-neutral reasons and did not comport with Batson. Withoutproviding analysis or commentary, the trial court simply stated,
Batson v. Kentucky forbids the use of peremptory strikes against a potential juror based on race because doing so results in a violation of equal protection principles in the federal constitution. "Exclusion of black citizens from service as jurors constitutes a primary example of the evil the Fourteenth Amendment was designed to cure." Batson, 476 U.S. at 85, 106 S. Ct. at 1716. A prosecutor may use a peremptory strike against a potential juror who happens to belong to a racial minority group, but the prosecutor must have a race-neutral reason for doing so. Id., 476 U.S. at 98, 106 S. Ct. at 1724. "[T]he Constitution forbids striking even a single prospective juror for a discriminatory purpose[.]" Snyder v. Louisiana, 552 U.S. 472, 478, 128 S. Ct. 1203, 1208, 170 L. Ed. 2d 175 (2008) (quoting United States v. Vasquez-Lopez, 22 F.3d 900, 902 (9th Cir. 1994)).
When a defendant alleges the prosecutor has struck a venire person based on race, the trial court must engage in a three-part test under Batson to evaluate the claim:
First, a defendant must make a prima facie showing that a peremptory challenge has been exercised on the basis of race. Second, if that showing has been made, the prosecution must offer a race-neutral basis for striking the juror in question. Third, in light of the parties' submissions, the trial court must determine whether the defendant has shown purposeful discrimination.
United States v. Atkins, 843 F.3d 625, 631 (6th Cir. 2016) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted); Mash v. Commonwealth, 376 S.W.3d 548, 555 (Ky. 2012). "[A] Batson violation is structural error not subject to harmless error review." Johnson v. Commonwealth, 450 S.W.3d 696, 706 (Ky. 2014), abrogated on other grounds by Roe v. Commonwealth, 493 S.W.3d 814 (Ky. 2015). However, "[b]ecause the trial court is the best 'judge' of the Commonwealth's motives in exercising its peremptory strikes, great deference is given to the court's ruling." Tunstull v. Commonwealth, 337 S.W.3d 576, 585 (Ky. 2011) (quoting Gray v. Commonwealth, 203 S.W.3d 679, 691 (Ky. 2006)). "On appellate review, a trial court's denial of a Batson challenge will not be reversed unless clearly erroneous." Id. (citations omitted).
In examining the issue through the three-part test outlined above, we have ascertained there is no need to analyze the first prong, that of prima facie discrimination, because the prosecutor volunteered an explanation for the peremptory strike. When "the prosecutor offered a race-neutral explanation for the peremptory challenge and the trial court has ruled on the ultimate issue of intentional discrimination, the preliminary issue of whether the defendant had made a prima facie showing . . . becomes moot." Commonwealth v. Snodgrass, 831 S.W.2d 176, 179 (Ky. 1992).
For the second prong of the test, Mash, 376 S.W.3d at 555 (quoting Hernandez v. New York, 500 U.S. 352, 360, 111 S. Ct. 1859, 1866, 114 L. Ed. 2d 395 (1991)). "This step sets a fairly low bar for the Commonwealth to meet." Id. Here, the prosecutor offered two separate explanations for striking the jurors. First, regarding Juror 4696, the prosecutor averred that the juror's father was previously charged with murder, and the juror may have retained some ill will against the court system. Next, regarding Juror 4079, the prosecutor allegedly viewed a momentary disgruntlement when the juror heard his name called. Both of the prosecutor's asserted explanations are facially race-neutral, in that they "could apply with equal force to a juror of any race." Id. Therefore, the second prong of Batson was met.
Finally, the third prong of the test required the trial court "to determine whether the prosecutor's race-neutral reason was actually a pretext for racial discrimination." Id. at 556. On this point, we rely...
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