Edwards v. Semple

Filing 27

ORDER re 21 Petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus filed by Michael Anthony Edwards. See attached Ruling and Order for details. Signed by Judge Robert N. Chatigny on September 29, 2021. (Hann, L.)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF CONNECTICUT
:
MICHAEL A. EDWARDS,

:

Petitioner,

:
:

v.

: CASE NO. 3:16-cv-1278(RNC)
:

SCOTT SEMPLE,

:

Respondent.

:
:
RULING AND ORDER

Petitioner was found guilty by a state court jury of
assaulting a correction officer.

He brings this action for a

writ of habeas corpus pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2254 claiming that
the prosecutor used a peremptory challenge to exclude an
African-American woman from the jury in violation of the Equal
Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Petitioner’s

claim was rejected on the merits by the Connecticut Supreme
Court.

See State v. Edwards, 102 A.3d 52, 58, 66-75 (Conn.

2014).

Petitioner contends that the Connecticut Supreme Court

failed to correctly apply Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79
(1986), and its progeny. 1

However, he has not shown that the

Batson limits “the traditionally unfettered prerogative of exercising
peremptory strikes by forbidding certain discrimination in jury selection.”
Sorto v. Herbert, 497 F.3d 163, 169 (2d Cir. 2007); see Filozof v. Monroe
1

Court’s application of Batson is objectively unreasonable, as he
must in order to obtain federal habeas relief under § 2254.
Accordingly, the petition is dismissed.
Background
During voir dire at petitioner’s assault trial, the
prosecutor asked a venireperson, C.D., to explain why, in
response to an optional question concerning race on the juror
questionnaire, she had written “human.”

C.D. explained,

“Because that is the race I belong to.”

ECF 24-12 at 34.

The

prosecutor then used a peremptory challenge to exclude C.D. from
the jury.

Id. at 40.

Defense counsel objected, observing that

C.D. appeared to be “an African-American woman.”

Id. at 40-41.

In accordance with Batson, the trial court called upon the
prosecutor to offer a race-neutral explanation for the
peremptory challenge.

In response, the prosecutor explained

that C.D.’s answer to the question about race concerned him
because it “seemed outside of the norm” and “unusual.”
41-42.

Id. at

He added that he had never seen an answer like C.D.’s,

and it stuck out as “odd.”

Id. at 43.

He also noted that

Cmty. Coll., 411 F. App’x 423, 424 (2d Cir. 2011) (“In its landmark decision
of Batson, the Supreme Court held that the use of racially-motivated
peremptory challenges during jury selection is prohibited by the United
States Constitution.” (citation omitted)); Walker v. Girdich, 410 F.3d 120,
123 (2d Cir. 2005) (“[U]nder Batson and its progeny, striking even a single
juror for a discriminatory purpose is unconstitutional.”).

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another African-American woman had been selected as a juror.
Id. at 41.

The trial court found that the prosecutor had

proffered a “nondiscriminatory explanation” for the peremptory
challenge that was not pretextual and overruled the objection.
Id. at 44-45.
On appeal, the Connecticut Supreme Court analyzed
petitioner’s claim in accordance with Batson and its progeny and
upheld the trial court’s ruling.

Edwards, 102 A.3d at 66-75.

The Court agreed with the trial court that the prosecutor’s
explanation for the peremptory challenge was facially raceneutral.

Id. at 71.

The prosecutor’s explanation permissibly

divided the “venirepersons into two potential categories: (1)
those who answered the questionnaire in a normal or usual way;
and (2) those who, like C.D., answered the questionnaire with an
unusual response that the prosecutor and court had not seen
before.

Each of these categories could include, or not include,

racial minorities.”

Id. (relying on Hernandez v. New York, 500

U.S. 352, 360 (1991)(stating that “[u]nless a discriminatory
intent is inherent in the prosecutor’s explanation, the reason
offered will be deemed race neutral”).

Next, the Court

considered whether the prosecutor’s explanation should have been
rejected as merely a pretext for intentional discrimination.
The Court agreed with the State that petitioner had “not
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established even one of the factors . . . generally consider[ed]
in determining that a party’s explanation for a peremptory
challenge is pretextual.”

Id. at 73. 2

Therefore, there was no

basis for “second-guess[ing] the trial court’s findings.”

Id.

The Court added that the “prosecutor did not question C.D. in a
perfunctory manner,” there was “no evidence of a pattern of
discrimination or disparate treatment in the prosecutor’s
exercise of peremptory challenges,” and there was “insufficient
evidence to find any sort of disparate impact from the
prosecutor's proffered explanation.” Id. at 74.

2

The Connecticut Supreme Court has
identified several specific factors that may indicate that [a
party’s removal] of a venireperson through a peremptory challenge
was . . . motivated [by race]. These include, but are not
limited to: (1) [t]he reasons given for the challenge were not
related to the trial of the case . . . (2) the [party exercising
the peremptory strike] failed to question the challenged juror or
only questioned him or her in a perfunctory manner . . . (3)
prospective jurors of one race . . . were asked a question to
elicit a particular response that was not asked of other jurors
. . . (4) persons with the same or similar characteristics but
not the same race . . . as the challenged juror were not struck
. . . (5) the [party exercising the peremptory strike] advanced
an explanation based on a group bias where the group trait is not
shown to apply to the challenged juror specifically . . . and (6)
the [party exercising the peremptory strike] used a
disproportionate number of peremptory challenges to exclude
members of one race . . . .

Id. at 68 (alterations in original) (quoting State v. Latour, 886 A.2d 404,
411 (Conn. 2005)).

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Discussion
Congress has limited the authority of a federal court to
grant habeas relief to a state prisoner based on a claim that
has been adjudicated on the merits in state court.

Relief may

be granted only if the state decision is “contrary to, or
involve[s] an unreasonable application of, clearly established
federal law, as determined by the Supreme Court of the United
States.”

28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(1). 3

The Supreme Court has

clarified that under the “contrary to” clause, a federal court
may grant habeas relief when the state court applied “a rule
different from the governing law set forth in [Supreme Court]
cases, or . . . decide[d] a case differently than [the Supreme
Court] ha[s] done on a set of materially indistinguishable
facts.”

Bell v. Cone, 535 U.S. 685, 694 (2002).

A federal

court may grant relief under the “unreasonable application”
clause “if the state court correctly identifie[d] the governing
legal principle . . . but unreasonably applie[d] it to the facts
of the particular case.”

Id.

“The focus of the latter inquiry

is on whether the state court's application of clearly
established federal law is objectively unreasonable, and . . .
A federal court may also grant habeas relief when the state court’s
decision is “based on an unreasonable determination of the facts in light of
the evidence presented in the State court proceeding.” Carmichael v.
Chappius, 848 F.3d 536, 544 (2d Cir. 2017) (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(2)).
This prong of the statute is not at issue here.
3

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an unreasonable application is different from an incorrect one.”
Id.

As the Second Circuit has recognized, this inquiry embodies

a “highly deferential standard for evaluating state-court
rulings, which demands that state-court decisions be given the
benefit of the doubt.”

Carmichael, 848 F.3d at 544–45 (quoting

Cullen v. Pinholster, 563 U.S. 170, 181 (2011)).
To overcome the bar posed by this highly deferential
standard, petitioner must show that the state courts failed to
reasonably apply Batson.

He cannot make this showing.

Rather,

the record shows that the state courts properly followed Batson.
When a party objects to a peremptory challenge as racially
motivated, Batson prescribes a three-step procedure:
First, the moving party — i.e., the party challenging
the other party’s attempted peremptory strike — must
make a prima facie case that the nonmoving party’s
peremptory is based on race. Second, the nonmoving
party must assert a race-neutral reason for the
peremptory challenge. The nonmoving party’s burden at
step two is very low . . . . [A]lthough a race-neutral
reason must be given, it need not be persuasive or
even plausible. Finally, the court must determine
whether the moving party carried the burden of showing
by a preponderance of the evidence that the peremptory
challenge at issue was based on race.
Sorto, 497 F.3d at 169 (2d Cir. 2007) (alterations in
original)(quoting McKinney v. Artuz, 326 F.3d 87, 97-98 (2d Cir.
2003)). 4
The Connecticut Supreme Court has “eliminated the requirement, contained in
the first step of [the Batson] process, that the party objecting to the
4

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Here, the trial court correctly identified defense
counsel’s objection as a Batson challenge, required the
prosecutor to articulate an explanation for the challenge,
deemed the explanation facially race-neutral, and concluded that
petitioner’s objection to the challenge as a pretext for
discrimination was insufficiently supported.

On appeal, the

Connecticut Supreme Court reviewed the trial court’s ruling in
light of the requirements of Batson and its progeny.

It agreed

with the trial court that the prosecutor’s proffered explanation
constituted a facially nondiscriminatory reason for the
peremptory challenge and declined to disturb the trial court’s
permissible finding that intentional discrimination based on
race had not been shown.

Both determinations reflect a

reasonable application of Batson to the facts of this case.
There is no basis for rejecting either determination as
objectively unreasonable.
Conclusion
Accordingly, the petition is hereby dismissed.
certificate of appealability will be issued.

No

The Clerk may

enter judgment and close the case.

exercise of the peremptory challenge establish a prima facie case of
discrimination.” Edwards, 102 A.3d at 67 n.16.

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So ordered this 29th day of September 2021.

_________/s/ RNC____________
Robert N. Chatigny
United States District Judge

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