Tuesday, April 01, 2014


Mayes v. Premo, No. 12-35461 (3-27-14)(Murguia with Christen; dissent by Pregerson). 
The main issue here was Batson.  The 9th affirms a denial of a habeas petition under AEDPA, finding that the striking of African American prospective jurors did not violate Batson.  The reasons were found to be race neutral by the state court, and AEDPA deferred.  The reasons ranged from overly emotional (crying during voir dire) to attitudes of skepticism toward cooperating defendant ("snitch") or attitudes toward authority (describing himself as a "rational anarchist").  Dissenting, Pregerson took a wide approach, arguing that when four out of five African American prospective jurors are struck by the prosecutor, it was more than a coincidence.  Pregerson goes through each juror and questions whether the explanation was really racially neutral.  The 9th affirmed that the use of a codefendant statement did not violate Ohio v. Roberts (pre Crawford).

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