Garris v. State

• Decision Date: 14 December 2020
• Docket Number: No. 1420,1420
• Citation: Garris v. State, No. 1420 (Md. App. Dec 14, 2020)
• Parties: ROBERT GARRIS v. STATE OF MARYLAND
• Court: Court of Special Appeals of Maryland

ROBERT GARRIS v. STATE OF MARYLAND

No. 1420

COURT OF SPECIAL APPEALS OF MARYLAND

September Term, 2019

December 14, 2020

Circuit Court for Baltimore City

Case No. 117331026

UNREPORTED

Fader, C.J., Shaw Geter, Zarnoch, Robert A. (Senior Judge, Specially Assigned), JJ.

Opinion by Fader, C.J.

*This is an unreported opinion, and it may not be cited in any paper, brief, motion, or other document filed in this Court or any other Maryland Court as either precedent within the rule of stare decisis or as persuasive authority.Md. Rule 1-104.

A jury in the Circuit Court for Baltimore City convicted Robert Garris, the appellant, of the second-degree murder of Lamontrey Tynes and related offenses.Mr. Garris contends that the trial court erred or abused its discretion in: (1) denying his Batson challenge; (2) calling three witnesses solely for the purpose of impeaching them; (3) admitting the prior recorded statements of those same witnesses; and (4) violating his confrontation rights by allowing one witness's prior statement to be played for the jury when the witness was not available for cross-examination.Finding no error or abuse of discretion by the trial court, we will affirm.

BACKGROUND¹

On August 5, 2017, two men robbed Malika Ben, Mr. Tynes's girlfriend, at gunpoint while she was seated in her car in Baltimore City.Shortly thereafter, Ms. Ben told Mr. Tynes that she had been robbed, and he drove them both to the scene of the robbery.As Mr. Tynes exited the car, an assailant shot and killed him.The State charged Mr. Garris with Mr. Tynes's murder and related offenses.

As relevant to the issues on appeal, at trial, the State called three witnesses who had identified Mr. Garris in connection with the incident in recorded statements, but who subsequently disavowed those statements or claimed to have forgotten key facts.The testimony and prior statements of those three witnesses—Ms. Ben, Darian Clark, and Jennifer Smith—are discussed below.

The jury found Mr. Garris guilty of second-degree murder, use of a handgun in the commission of a felony, and possession of a regulated firearm after a disqualifying conviction.This timely appeal followed.

DISCUSSION

I.THE TRIAL COURT DID NOT ERR IN DENYING MR. GARRIS'S BATSON CHALLENGE.

During jury selection, Mr. Garris challenged the prosecutor's use of peremptory strikes to remove five African American male jurors from the venire and failure "to articulate plausible, fact-based race-neutral reasons" for the strikes.Mr. Garris argues that the trial court erred in denying that challenge.The State counters that the trial court did not err in accepting the prosecutor's explanations for her strikes as race-neutral and nondiscriminatory.

In Batson v. Kentucky, the United States Supreme Court held that "[p]urposeful racial discrimination in selection of the venire violates a defendant's right to equal protection because it denies him the protection that a trial by jury is intended to secure."476 U.S. 79, 86(1986).The decision in Batson establishes a three-step process for determining when a strike is discriminatory.Seeid. at 96-98.The first step requires that the party raising the challenge make a prima facie showing that the peremptory challenge was made on "one or more of the constitutionally prohibited bases," including race.Ray-Simmons v. State, 446 Md. 429, 436(2016).Step one may be satisfied by showing a "pattern" of strikes against African American jurors in the venire.Batson, 476 U.S. at 97.

If the requisite showing is made under step one, "'the burden of production shifts to the proponent of the strike to come forward with' an explanation for the strike that is neutral as to race, gender, and ethnicity."Ray-Simmons, 446 Md. at 436(quotingPurkett v. Elem, 514 U.S. 765, 767(1995)).Any tendered explanation will be considered "race-neutral unless a discriminatory intent is inherent in the explanation."Ray-Simmons, 446 Md. at 436(quotingEdmonds v. State, 372 Md. 314, 330(2002)).In assessing the "facial validity" of the explanation, the persuasiveness of the reason given is not a factor.Edmonds, 372 Md. at 332.

In the third and final step, the trial court must decide whether the complaining party has met the burden of proving "purposeful racial discrimination."Ray-Simmons, 446 Md. at 437(quotingPurkett, 514 U.S. at 767)."[T]he decisive question will be whether counsel's race-neutral explanation for a peremptory challenge should be believed."Hernandez v. New York, 500 U.S. 352, 365(1991)(plurality opinion).This determination rests largely on the court's assessment of the credibility of the striking party.Id.Because the trial court's resolution of a Batson challenge is essentially a factual determination, the court's decision is afforded great deference and will not be reversed unless it is clearly erroneous.Id.;accordRay-Simmons, 446 Md. at 437;see alsoKhan v. State, 213 Md. App. 554, 568(2013)("In reviewing [a] trial judge's [Batson ] decision, appellate courts do not presume to second-guess the call by the 'umpire on the field' either by way of de novo fact finding or by way of independent constitutional judgment."(quotingBailey v. State, 84 Md. App. 323, 328(1990)))."[I]f any competent material evidence exists in support of the trial court's factual findings, those findings cannot be held to be clearlyerroneous[.]"Spencer v. State, 450 Md. 530, 548(2016)(quotingWebb v. Nowak, 433 Md. 666, 678(2013)).It is "generally[] for the trial court—not an appellate court—to determine""the credibility of the proponent offering the reasons" for the strikes.Ball v. Martin, 108 Md. App. 435, 456(1996).

Toward the end of jury selection, Mr. Garris objected that the prosecutor had exercised peremptory strikes to remove only "black males and most of them haven't answered questions."The court noted that the prosecutor had indeed used five of its six strikes to remove African American males from the venire, which the court found to be "a pattern" satisfying the first step of the Batson test and requiring further inquiry.The court thus asked the prosecutor to provide "race-neutral reasons" for the strikes.This colloquy ensued:

[PROSECUTOR]: Juror . . . 4422, had tattoos and one appeared to be a tear.Juror . . . 4435, when I made my first strike he mumbled, "Of course."Juror No. - in reference to Juror . . . 4499, when I stated, "Acceptable to the State."He yelled out, "For Defense" -

THE COURT: So -

[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: I didn't hear that.

[PROSECUTOR]: - and looked at Defense indicating to me that he was confused.And 4494 . . . was late and then late to respond during jury panel.

[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: And, Your Honor, I respect the Court's ruling, but I just want to make the record clear, none of the jurors - I didn't hear any of that from any of these jurors and none of these jurors answered a question and I'll just submit.

[PROSECUTOR]: Your Honor -

[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: Yes, thank you.

[PROSECUTOR]: - may I make a record just for Juror 4434 mumbled, of course he was closest to me when he said it in the line.

THE COURT: Right.In the future though, you're going to have to put it on the record because if nobody else notices it, how do - you know, it's - okay.So what about 4548 who was also a black male?

[PROSECUTOR]: 4548?

THE COURT: Right.

[PROSECUTOR]: This is the one who indicated that he - if you remember, he was the one who was late and off when he approached.He said, "I don't want to be a juror."

THE COURT: Okay.

[PROSECUTOR]: And was late when you called him up.

THE COURT: Okay.So you said 4435 said, "Of course," when you struck him or -

. . . .

[PROSECUTOR]: When I made my first strike he said, "Of course."

THE COURT: I don't know what that means, "when you made your first strike."

[PROSECUTOR]: When I made my first strike with the woman with the pink hair.The - . . .

. . . .

4435 commented about my first strike.He was standing-

THE COURT: Okay.

[PROSECUTOR]: - closest to me.

THE COURT: All right.I will accept those race neutral reasons, but please know it is a pattern so be careful.

Shortly after this exchange, and after the selection of all of the jurors other than the alternates, the court asked both attorneys if they accepted the empaneled jury.The prosecutor and defense counsel both confirmed that the jury was acceptable.Mr. Garris made no further objections during or following selection of the alternate jurors and accepted each alternate individually.

Later that day, the court further explained its reasoning for rejecting Mr. Garris's Batson challenge:

Prior to the break, [defense counsel] made a [Batson][c]hallenge and because I found that there were six African-American jurors stricken by the State and five of them were men, I did find there to be a pattern and therefore requested that [the prosecutor] place her race-neutral reasons on the record.

I'm afraid that my findings were not as explicit as they should have been, so what I'm going to say is this.The reason that I accepted her race-neutral reasons is, number one, I found that she was being candid with the Court as to the reasons that she struck the jurors she did.I noted that she was looking at notes that she had recorded with respect to each juror number at the time that she gave me the reason for having stricken them.

So despite the fact that there were some reasons that could not be verified by other folks because, frankly, they were utterances made by the jurors as [the prosecutor] pointed out, closest to her, she would have been the only one in a position to hear them.So based on that, based on my evaluation of [the prosecutor's] credibility with respect to her race-neutral reasons, I did find that her reasons for striking the jurors were race-neutral.

I also will note . . . [n]umber one, [defense counsel] struck every - I think every white male there was.I wanted to state that for the record.I'm not making a Batson challenge.I'm just observing what I saw and I will also note that

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