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People v. Rizo4/24/2002
413, 419.) Ivan was accused of homicide, and the likelihood Juror B. would tend to identify with the defense based on the fact his brother also had been prosecuted for homicide made him presumptively an undesirable juror for the prosecution. Again, we find adequate support for the trial court's ruling.
Ivan argues it was improper for the prosecutor to excuse Juror B. based on a "blanket decision" that he would be biased against the prosecution because his brother had been convicted of manslaughter, citing People v. Gonzalez (1989) 211 Cal.App.3d 1186. In Gonzalez, however, the prosecutor challenged the juror in question based merely on the presumption that naturalized citizens have difficulty understanding the law. (Id., at p. 1200.) As the court noted, "the peremptory challenge was based on [the juror's] status as a Mexican-born naturalized citizen. The challenge was not equally applicable to any juror regardless of his or her origin, since by definition it was based on the foreign birth of the juror." (Id., at p. 1201.) Here, in contrast, the challenge was not based on a presumption founded on Juror B.'s race, but on his individualized background which included a close relative who had been convicted of homicide.
Ivan also argues that given the large numbers of black males arrested and imprisoned, permitting the prosecution to exclude jurors based on the arrest or conviction of their relatives would lead to exclusion of many or most blacks from large or extended families. We do not share Ivan's assumption that many or most African-American jurors have relatives who have been arrested or convicted. In any event, even if the assumption were accurate, exclusion on the basis of relatives' unfavorable contacts with the criminal justice system would still be a race-neutral determination as long as it were based, as it was here, on individual jurors' experiences rather than on a race-based presumption about their backgrounds.
Ivan finally argues that other jurors with similar backgrounds but not identified as coming from a protected class were permitted to remain on the jury. He asserts that, when a prosecutor leaves jurors on the jury who demonstrate characteristics similar to jurors struck from the venire, it demonstrates the hollowness of the prosecutor's professed rationale for excusing jurors. However, the Supreme Court has expressly and repeatedly disavowed the use by reviewing courts of a "`comparative juror analysis'" under which the genuineness of the prosecutor's stated reasons is tested by comparing the responses of the excluded juror with those of nonminority jurors who were not excluded. Such an approach "`would undermine the trial court's credibility determinations'" and discount the variety of subjective factors which may legitimately influence peremptory challenges. (People v. Jackson, supra, 13 Cal.4th 1164, 1197; accord, People v. Box, supra, 23 Cal.4th 1153, 1190; People v. Turner, supra, 8 Cal.4th 137, 169-170; People v. Montiel, supra, 5 Cal.4th 877, 909; People v. Arias (1996) 13 Cal.4th 92, 136, fn. 16.)
B. Blue Jury (Defendants Other Than Ivan)
During selection of the blue jury, the prosecutor excused three African-American panelists. Defendants made a Wheeler motion. The court found a prima facie case of discrimination and asked the prosecutor to explain the reasons for the challenges. After the prosecutor did so, the court found the reasons sufficient and denied the motion.
Subsequently, the prosecutor excused the one remaining African-American panelist. Defendants renewed their Wheeler motion. The court found a prima facie case of group bias and asked the prosecutor to explain. This time, the court found the explanatio
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