Recent Batson Rulings from the North Carolina Supreme Court

Last April, the North Carolina Supreme Court decided two significant cases involving claims that prosecutors impermissibly exercised peremptory challenges against prospective black jurors based on their race:  State v. Hobbs, ___ N.C. ___, 884 S.E.2d 639 (2023) (Hobbs II), and State v. Campbell, ___ N.C. ___884 S.E.2d 674 (2023). This post reviews the framework for the review undertaken by the trial courts in those cases and the state supreme court’s opinions. The Batson framework. The Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and Article 1, Section 26 of the North Carolina Constitution prohibit the exercise of peremptory challenges to strike prospective jurors based on their race. See Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 89 (1986), as modified by Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S. 400 (1991). The United States Supreme Court in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (1986), established a three-step framework for trial courts to apply in determining whether a peremptory strike was impermissibly motivated by a juror’s race. Step one. At step one, the party objecting to the strike must present a prima facie showing of purposeful discrimination.  (For purposes of this post, I will assume that the objecting party is the criminal defendant and that the objection is based on the striking of one or more black prospective jurors.) Step one is not a high hurdle, see State v. Waring, 364 N.C. 443 (2010), and requires only that the defendant produce evidence sufficient to permit the trial court to draw an inference that discrimination has occurred, see Johnson [...]