Mejia v. State

• Decision Date: 01 September 1992
• Docket Number: No. 15,15
• Citation: 328 Md. 522,616 A.2d 356
• Parties: , 61 USLW 2406 Ivan Antonio MEJIA v. STATE of Maryland. ,
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

Page 522

328 Md. 522

616 A.2d 356, 61 USLW 2406

Ivan Antonio MEJIA v. STATE of Maryland.

No. 15, Sept. Term, 1992.

Court of Appeals of Maryland.

Dec. 9, 1992.

Bradford C. Peabody, Asst. Public Defender (Stephen E. Harris, Public Defender, on brief), Baltimore, for petitioner.

Mary Ellen Barbera, Asst. Atty. Gen. (J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Atty. Gen., on brief), Baltimore, for respondent.

Argued before MURPHY, C.J., and ELDRIDGE, RODOWSKY, McAULIFFE, CHASANOW, KARWACKI and ROBERT M. BELL, JJ.

ROBERT M. BELL, Judge.

Ivan Antonio Mejia, the petitioner, on trial in the Circuit Court for Montgomery County for rape and related sexual offenses, challenged, as discriminatory, the State's use of one of its peremptory challenges to exclude a venireperson the petitioner alleged to be Hispanic. The court overruled his objection and the trial proceeded, resulting in the petitioner's conviction of attempted rape in the second degree and second degree sexual offense. The petitioner's appeal to the Court of Special Appeals raised one issue: whether, when he objected below, he presented a prima facie case of purposeful discrimination, requiring the State's response. The intermediate appellate court affirmed the trial court's judgment. Mejia v. State, 90 Md.App. 31, 599 A.2d 1207 (1992). We granted certiorari to consider what proof a moving party is required to produce to establish a prima facie case of purposeful discrimination against Hispanics.

I.

The jury voir dire began on January 7, 1991. Although the record does not reflect any discussion of an "Hispanic problem" prior to its start, early in the voir dire proceedings, the petitioner's counsel noted his failure to submit a question concerning whether any venirepersons spoke Spanish. Agreeing to ask the question, the court volunteered that, "[W]hen I get to it, [I am going to ask] whether they have prejudices caused by the fact that he needs an interpreter." ¹

Juror No. 131, Peter Estrada, responded to a question concerning legal training and informed the court that he had once worked as a legal clerk in a law office in New York City and, about four or five years earlier, attended Antioch Law School for a semester. The following colloquy between counsel and the court then occurred:

[The Petitioner's Counsel]: As far as I can tell, I noticed that that is the only juror with a[n] Hispanic background. I wanted to note that for the record in terms of jury strikes later that Mr. Estrada, as far as I can tell, is the only juror with an Hispanic background.

THE COURT: You noticed that?

[The Petitioner's Counsel]: I don't know what will come of it, but I just wanted to mention it.

Subsequently, the court inquired whether any member of the venire had been the victim of, a witness to, or charged with, either a crime of violence or a crime against property. A Ms. Porto reported that she had been robbed at gunpoint in Bethesda, which prompted the petitioner's counsel to ask if she remembered "if the person was white or black or Hispanic?" No motion to strike Ms. Porto for cause was made when she responded that the perpetrator was "black."

At the end of the bench conferences that that question generated, the following occurred:

THE COURT: ... All right, now we will--I am about ready to go to the Hispanic problem.

[Prosecutor]: Do you want us to stay up here?

THE COURT: You might as well. Tell me after I finish this, be thinking ahead--I don't go down the list. Tell me what you think I should cover if I haven't done it.

(Whereupon, the bench conference was concluded.)

THE COURT: Ladies and gentlemen of the prospective jury panel, as you can see, the defendant, Mr. Mejia, does not speak English or does not speak it fluently enough to be able to understand all of the proceedings that are taking place in English.

He, therefore, has a Spanish interpreter. Is there any member of the panel who feels that this is so prejudicial to you that you would be unable to give Mr. Mejia a fair and impartial trial?

Does anyone here speak and understand Spanish? Mr. Estrada? ²

The final relevant occurrence in the unfolding of the "Hispanic problem" came during the empaneling of the jury. The State peremptorily struck Mr. Estrada, whereupon the petitioner's counsel requested a bench conference, at which the following occurred [The Petitioner's Counsel]: I am going to object to this on the grounds of the [Batson ³] case: We have an Hispanic defendant charged with raping a non-Hispanic or white woman. There is only one Hispanic person on the jury panel. The State has used its strike to strike that person.

There have been three strikes used by the State. Now there is this one and one earlier one that was used to strike a potential black juror.

Basically, I'm going to object to his strike on the surface as a racially motivated strike that is taking out the only Hispanic juror in a panel of 50 people.

THE COURT: Motion denied.

When challenging the State's use of its peremptories to strike Mr. Estrada, the petitioner stated explicitly what previously may have been only implicit, that he was Hispanic and that the State was striking the only person on the venire identified by anyone as Hispanic.

The record is clear; at no time during the proceedings did the prosecutor voice the view that there really was no "Hispanic problem," that the petitioner was not Hispanic, that Mr. Estrada did not have an Hispanic background, or that other panel members did, or may have. Neither does the record reflect any remarks by the court that suggested that it was concerned that the record did not adequately chronicle sufficient facts for Batson purposes. The court's ruling was made immediately after the petitioner's counsel had argued in support of his Batson motion. Not only was the ruling made before the State offered an explanation for striking Mr. Estrada, but it was made without affording the State the opportunity to do so.

II.

In Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986), the Supreme Court of the United States held, for the first time, that a defendant "may establish a prima facie case of purposeful discrimination in selection of the petit jury solely on evidence concerning the prosecutor's exercise of peremptory challenges at the defendant's trial." Id. at 96, 106 S.Ct. at 1723, 90 L.Ed.2d at 87. The Court said

To establish such a case, the defendant first must show that he is a member of a cognizable racial group and that the prosecutor has exercised peremptory challenges to remove from the venire members of the defendant's race. Second, the defendant is entitled to rely on the fact, as to which there can be no dispute, that peremptory challenges constitute a jury selection practice that permits "those to discriminate who are of a mind to discriminate." Finally, the defendant must show that these facts and any other relevant circumstances raise an inference that the prosecutor used that practice to exclude the veniremen from the petit jury on account of their race. This combination of factors in the empaneling of the petit jury, as in the selection of the venire, raises the necessary inference of purposeful discrimination.

Id. at 96, 106 S.Ct. at 1723, 90 L.Ed.2d at 87-88 (citations omitted).

The cognizable racial group at issue in Batson, as in our cases applying the Batson rule, see State v. Gorman, 324 Md. 124, 596 A.2d 629 (1991); Gray v. State, 317 Md. 250, 562 A.2d 1278 (1989); Chew v. State, 317 Md. 233, 562 A.2d 1270 (1989); Tolbert v. State, 315 Md. 13, 553 A.2d 228 (1989); Stanley v. State, 313 Md. 50, 542 A.2d 1267 (1988), was blacks. Blacks are not the only cognizable group to which the Batson rule applies, however. ⁴ The Supreme Court has recognized its application to "Latinos" and "Hispanics." ⁵ Hernandez v. New York, 500 U.S. 352, 111 S.Ct. 1859, 114 L.Ed.2d 395 (1991). In that case, the issue was the adequacy of the prosecution's explanation for its striking of "Latino" or "Hispanic" jurors. While they disagreed on that point, not one of the justices expressed the belief that the State properly could peremptorily strike all Hispanics from the venire. See also Castaneda v. Partida, 430 U.S. 482, 97 S.Ct. 1272, 51 L.Ed.2d 498 (1977), in which the Supreme Court observed, "it is no longer open to dispute that Mexican-Americans are a clearly identifiable class.... [and, in that context,] Spanish surnames are just as easily identifiable as race...." Id. at 495, 97 S.Ct. at 1280, 51 L.Ed.2d at 511. The State does not disagree.

III.

The Court of Special Appeals held that, since the petitioner failed to present a prima facie case of discriminatory use of peremptory challenges, the trial court properly overruled the petitioner's motion. It explained that (1) the petitioner made no sufficient showing of a "predicate 'pattern of strikes' from which an inference, permissible or impermissible, could even arise," Mejia, 90 Md.App. at 41, 599 A.2d at 1212; (2) "[t]he prosecutor's questions and statements during voir dire examination and in exercising his challenges [did not] support ... an inference of discriminatory purpose," id., quoting Batson, 476 U.S. at 97, 106 S.Ct. at 1723, 90 L.Ed.2d at 88; and (3) the petitioner failed to prove that either he ⁶ or Mr. Estrada was "Hispanic," and, in addition, did not prove that the remaining members of the venire were not. 90 Md.App. at 43-46, 599 A.2d at 1213-14.

Defining an Hispanic as one who speaks Spanish as a native language, has a Spanish surname, and is of Latin-American origin, a definition it characterized as "amorphous and imprecise," 90 Md.App. at 44, 599 A.2d at 1213, the intermediate appellate court elaborated on why it concluded that the evidence was insufficient to prove that there was an "Hispanic problem". In particular, while assuming that the petitioner met the first two criteria, i.e. speaks Spanish as a native language and has a Spanish surname, the court noted a total absence of evidence, and hence,...