In an opinion issued Thursday, a five-judge panel said Gregory Duplessis deserved to have the trial court fully consider his Batson challenge to the state's use of peremptory strikes to dismiss a juror who, like Duplessis, was Black.
Originating in the 1986 U.S. Supreme Court case Batson v. Kentucky
, a Batson challenge is a legal objection that can be made during jury selection to argue one side is using peremptory strikes to exclude potential jurors solely on the basis of race, ethnicity, sex or religion.The panel said prosecutors tried to strike the only two Black jurors who could have served. However, since Duplessis withdrew the Batson challenge as it pertained to one of the jurors who ended up on the panel, the trial court must only now review the Batson challenge for the remaining Black juror.
The challenge had to be reexamined because the trial court didn't follow the proper procedure for examining the Batson challenge, the panel said.
"Although the prosecutor offered a race-neutral reason for [striking] each juror at step two, County Court merged the step two and three requirements by immediately denying the [defense] objection without first allowing defense counsel to make an argument that the reasons were pretextual," the panel said.
As a result, Duplessis never had meaningful consideration of his allegations that the juror was wrongly dismissed. He was convicted in 2023.
"While we are mindful of defense counsel's failure to preserve this issue, given the magnitude of the error, we take corrective action in the interest of justice because the process here was woefully inadequate to satisfy the safeguards enshrined by Batson to every defendant," the panel said.
As a result, the court said the trial court had to return to the issue "to assess the prosecutor's credibility against the challenged juror's demeanor and language capabilities," since prosecutors claimed the juror was stricken due to communication issues.
"We withhold decision and remit this case to [County] Court to enable the trial judge who presided over this matter to determine whether the race-neutral reason proffered by the People was pretextual," the panel said.
Representatives for the parties did not immediately respond to requests for comments on Friday.
Justices Molly Reynolds Fitzgerald, Andrew G. Ceresia, Lisa M. Fisher, Mark L. Powers and L. Michael Mackey sat on the panel.
Duplessis is represented by Martin J. McGuinness.
The state is represented by Peter H. Willis of the Schenectady County District Attorney's Office.
The case is People of the State of New York v. Gregory Duplessis, CR-23-2024, in the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Third Department.
--Editing by Linda Voorhis.
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