Pruitt v. State

• Decision Date: 24 July 2008
• Docket Number: No. 2007-KA-00499-SCT.,2007-KA-00499-SCT.
• Parties: Joe Solomon PRUITT v. STATE of Mississippi on Motion for Rehearing.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

986 So.2d 940

Joe Solomon PRUITT v. STATE of Mississippi on Motion for Rehearing.

No. 2007-KA-00499-SCT.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

July 24, 2008.

Office of Indigent Appeals by Benjamin A. Suber, attorney for appellant.

Office of the Attorney General by La Donna C. Holland, attorney for appellee.

EN BANC.

ON MOTION FOR REHEARING

WALLER, Presiding Justice, for the Court.

¶ 1. The appellant's motion for rehearing is denied. The previous opinions are withdrawn and these opinions are substituted therefor.

¶ 2. Joe Solomon Pruitt appeals from his conviction on a charge of armed robbery in the Circuit Court of Monroe County, Mississippi, alleging a Batson violation in the selection of the jury. Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986). Finding the trial court correctly found no purposeful discrimination, we affirm.

FACTS

¶ 3. Loomis Fargo fired Alonzo Jones from employment as a delivery driver. Jones recruited his friend Joe Solomon Pruitt and James Person to rob the Renasant Bank in Smithville, Mississippi, one of the banks on his former route. Jones knew the layout of the bank, the Loomis delivery schedule, and that two women staffed the bank during the day. Approximately a week after Jones was fired, Pruitt, Jones, and Person drove from Memphis, Tennessee, to the Renasant Bank in Smithville on the Loomis delivery day. Pruitt and Person, masked and gloved, entered the bank and forced the two employees to place the bank's cash into a backpack and a sack. Pruitt was armed with a handgun. Pruitt and Person left the bank and entered the car, where Jones waited. As they were leaving, a dye pack in Person's sack exploded, filling the car with smoke. He tossed the bag out the car window, and they fled back toward Memphis.

¶ 4. At a four-way stop near Fulton, Mississippi, a sheriff's deputy saw the bank robbers and followed them as they entered Highway 78. Next, a state trooper spotted them on the highway and crossed the median to tail them, along with the deputy. Jones exited the highway at the next exit. He discovered the exit had no outlet, and he stopped the car beside a wooded area. The three men left the car and fled into the woods. After wandering around, they came across a shed next to a white house, where they hid and slept. The following day, they tried to leave in a second car, which became stuck in a ditch. They returned to the white house and asked the resident for assistance. The resident's son was attempting to free the vehicle when law enforcement officers arrived at the house and surrounded it. The bank robbers surrendered. Some of the stolen cash was found hidden inside a couch in the house where the robbers were apprehended.

DISCUSSION

¶ 5. Pruitt argues one issue on appeal.¹

WHETHER THE TRIAL COURT ERRED IN ACCEPTING THE RACE-NEUTRAL REASONS GIVEN BY THE STATE AFTER A BATSON OBJECTION REGARDING THREE JURORS.

¶ 6. Pruitt's only issue raised on appeal is a challenge to the sufficiency of the State's race-neutral reasons for peremptorily striking three African-American members of the venire. After the circuit court struck some members of the venire for cause and held a brief discussion about the number of peremptory strikes available to each side, the court stated the following: "If you will, I will be in chambers. As soon as you get a jury selected, I want to — I want to seat the jury promptly at twelve o'clock, noon." The court then recessed.

¶ 7. After the recess, the court came back on the record with the question, "All right. Do we have a jury yet?" Pruitt immediately raised a Batson challenge, stating that the State had struck three African-Americans on the first panel of the venire: jurors 1, 2 and 14. Batson, 476 U.S. at 96-98, 106 S.Ct. 1712. The State responded by stating that it tendered the panel with four African-Americans among the twelve jurors and volunteered its reasons for the peremptory strikes. The circuit court ruled:

[T]hat the ... there is not a — or was not a pattern of discrimination by the State in Striking Jurors 1, 2, and 14.... There is no pattern of discrimination established to even require the State to give race-neutral reasons. However, they have given what the Court considers race-neutral reasons for these strikes. The Court does not see these reasons as pre-textual, not race-based.... So the defendant's motion is overruled.

The jury consisted of five white males, two white females, one African-American male, three African-American females, and one female juror whose race was not identified for the record. Two white males served as alternates.

¶ 8. This Court reviews a trial court's ruling on a Batson challenge with great deference and will not overturn the trial court's ruling unless it is clearly erroneous or against the overwhelming weight of the evidence. Flowers v. State, 947 So.2d 910, 917 (Miss.2007). See also Batson, 476 U.S. at 98 n. 21, 106 S.Ct. 1712; Chisolm v. State, 529 So.2d 630, 633 (Miss. 1988); Lockett v. State, 517 So.2d 1346, 1352 (Miss.1987). When addressing a Batson challenge, a trial court employs a three-step procedure: (1) the defendant must make out a prima facie case by showing that the totality of the relevant facts gives rise to an inference of discriminatory purpose; (2) once the defendant has made out a prima facie case, the burden shifts to the State to explain adequately the racial exclusion by offering permissible, race-neutral justifications for the strikes; and (3) if a race-neutral explanation is tendered, the trial court must then decide whether the opponent of the strike has proved purposeful racial discrimination. Johnson v. California, 545 U.S. 162, 168, 125 S.Ct. 2410, 2416, 162 L.Ed.2d 129, 138 (2005). The burden remains on the opponent of the strike to show that the race-neutral explanation given is merely a pretext for racial discrimination. Hicks v. State, 973 So.2d 211, 219 (Miss.2007) (citing Berry v. State, 802 So.2d 1033,1042 (Miss.2001)).

¶ 9. Pruitt argues the State's reasons for striking the three jurors were pretexts for racial discrimination. The State responds by arguing the reasons are immaterial because the trial court ruled Pruitt failed to make a prima facie showing of purposeful discrimination. In the alternative, the State argues the reasons offered by the prosecutors are race-neutral and demonstrate no pretext for racial discrimination. We will examine each of the State's arguments.

¶ 10. This Court must first determine whether the issue of Pruitt establishing a prima facie case was dispositive. In Hernandez v. New York, a plurality opinion, the United States Supreme Court considered "the proper application of Batson." Hernandez, 500 U.S. 352, 355, 111 S.Ct. 1859, 114 L.Ed.2d 395 (1991). The defendant made a Batson objection; the State volunteered its race-neutral reasons before the trial court ruled on whether the defendant had established a prima facie case; and the trial court rejected the defendant's challenge. Id. at 356-58, 111 S.Ct. 1859. The Supreme Court explained that with regard to the Batson three-step procedure, "where the [State] has done everything that would be required of him if the [defendant] had properly made out a prima facie case, whether the [defendant] really did so is no longer relevant." Id. (citing U.S. Postal Serv. Bd. of Governors v. Aikens, 460 U.S. 711, 715, 103 S.Ct. 1478, 75 L.Ed.2d 403 (1983)). The Supreme Court specified that:

[o]nce a prosecutor has offered a race-neutral explanation for the peremptory challenges and the trial court has ruled on the ultimate question of intentional discrimination, the preliminary issue of whether the defendant had made a prima facie showing becomes moot.

Hernandez, 500 U.S. at 359, 111 S.Ct. 1859, 114 L.Ed.2d 395.

¶ 11. The State argues that Hernandez is inapplicable to the case at hand because in Hernandez, the trial court never ruled on whether the defendant had established a prima facie case. In the case at hand, the trial court did rule that Pruitt had not established a prima facie case. While this distinction is accurate, it does not render Hernandez inapplicable. Under the same facts as the case at hand, this Court has either effectively or explicitly followed the Hernandez procedure.

¶ 12. In Foster v. State, this Court effectively followed Hernandez. Foster, 639 So.2d 1263, 1279-1280 (Miss.1994). In Foster, the trial court ruled that the defendant had failed to establish a prima facie case, required the State to give race-neutral reasons and found that there was no intentional discrimination. Id. at 1279-80. Foster noted that the trial court had ruled that the defendant had failed to establish a prima facie showing of discrimination. Id. at 1279. However, this Court declined to review the trial court's ruling on the defendant's prima facie case. Id. Instead, this Court proceeded to address the State's race-neutral reasons and the trial court's ruling on the ultimate question of intentional discrimination.² Id. at 1279-80. Foster did not cite Hernandez, but in accord with Hernandez, it declined to address the trial court's determination of whether the defendant had established a prima facie case, focusing on the propriety of the trial court's ruling with regard to the ultimate question. Id. at 1279-80.

¶ 13. In Manning v. State, this Court explicitly followed Hernandez. Manning v. State, 726 So.2d 1152 (Miss.1998), overruled on other grounds by Weatherspoon v. State, 732 So.2d 158, 162 (Miss.1999). In Manning, the trial court ruled that the defendant had failed to establish a prima facie case, required the State to give race-neutral reasons, and found that there was no intentional discrimination. Id. at 1182. On appeal, this Court held that whether the defendant had established a prima facie case was moot under Hernandez, since the State had offered race-neutral reasons and the trial court had ruled on the ultimate question of intentional discrimination. Id. at 1182-83. Li...