Williams v. Superior Court

781 P.2d 537, 49 Cal. 3d 736, 263 Cal. Rptr. 503, 1989 Cal. LEXIS 2103

• Court: California Supreme Court
• Decided: October 31, 1989
• Docket: S002131. L.A. 32206
• Status: Published

Opinions

Opinion

PANELLI, J.

The issue in this case is whether jury selection procedures in Los Angeles County violate a criminal defendant’s right to an impartial jury, that is, a jury representative of a cross-section of the community. Specifically, we must decide whether, for purposes of cross-section analysis, “community” is defined as the county, the superior court (“judicial”) district, or an area extending 20 miles from the courthouse. As explained hereafter, we conclude that the appropriate definition of community for cross-section analysis is the judicial district.¹

Edward Williams (defendant) is charged with the first degree murder of Bruce Horton. Defendant is Black; Horton was White. The crime occurred in the West Superior Court District of Los Angeles County (West District); trial was scheduled for that district’s superior court, located in Santa Monica.²

Defendant moved to quash the venire on the ground that Black persons on jury panels in the West District were unconstitutionally underrepresentative of the Black population of Los Angeles County. Defendant sought transfer of the case to either the Central District in downtown Los Angeles or the South Central District in Compton, where a greater number of Blacks could reasonably be expected to appear in the venire.

At the hearing on the motions, defendant called Raymond Arce, Director of Juror Services for Los Angeles County, who testified that since 1981 the county has used its list of registered voters and the Department of Motor Vehicles list of licensed drivers to compile a master list of eligible jurors for both the superior and municipal courts. Arce testified that Black persons presumptively eligible to serve as jurors comprise 11.4 percent of the total county population; in the West District, 5.6 percent of the total population are Blacks presumptively eligible to serve as jurors.³ A survey of jurors in the Santa Monica courthouse for the three-month period preceding defendant’s trial indicated that 4.5 percent appearing for jury duty were Black.

Arce also described the Bullseye System, a computer program used by the county for assigning jurors: Although an eligible juror may be assigned to virtually any superior or municipal court in the county, the program assigns the prospective juror to the court nearest the juror’s residence. If that court does not require jurors, the juror is assigned to the next nearest courthouse in need of jurors. If that court is located over 20 miles from his residence, the juror is informed that, under Code of Civil Procedure section 203, he has a right to be excused.⁴

Defendant did not argue that the percentage of Blacks on his jury panels was unfair in relation to the percentage of Blacks within the West District or within a 20-mile radius of its courthouse. He argued only that Blacks were underrepresented on the panels in relation to the percentage of Blacks within the entire county.

The trial court denied defendant’s motions. The court found the county’s jury selection procedure to be “fair and reasonable” and further stated: “It appears . . . that Los Angeles County is making a reasonable and good faith effort to meet the constitutional requirements here, [¶] In any event, there is no showing of any significant underrepresentation of a cognizable group based on the figures presented here.”

Defendant then filed a petition for writ of prohibition and/or mandate in the Court of Appeal. The Court of Appeal denied the petition and agreed with the trial court’s finding that defendant had not made the required prima facie showing of systematic underrepresentation. Significantly, however, the Court of Appeal held that a criminal defendant in Los Angeles County, in order to establish systematic underrepresentation of a distinctive group, must show that representation of the group is not fair and reasonable in relation to the percentage of such persons residing within a 20-mile radius of that particular courthouse.

Representative Jury—Cross-section of Community.

In California, the right to trial by a jury drawn from a representative cross-section of the community is guaranteed equally and independently by the Sixth Amendment to the federal Constitution (Taylor v. Louisiana (1975) 419 U.S. 522, 530 [42 L.Ed.2d 690, 698, 95 S.Ct. 692]) and by article I, section 16 of the California Constitution. (People v. Wheeler (1978) 22 Cal.3d 258, 272 [148 Cal.Rptr. 890, 583 P.2d 748].)

Representative cross-section analysis developed as a response to the pernicious practice of eliminating identifiable groups from the jury pool, thus preventing them from being considered as petit jurors. (See, e.g., Duren v. Missouri (1979) 439 U.S. 357, 364-368 [58 L.Ed.2d 579, 586-590, 99 S.Ct. 664]; Ballard v. United States (1946) 329 U.S. 187, 193-194 [91 L.Ed. 181, 185-186, 67 S.Ct. 261] [women]; Taylor v. Louisiana, supra, 419 U.S. at p. 530 [42 L.Ed.2d at p. 698]; Peters v. Kiff (1972) 407 U.S. 493, 503-504 [33 L.Ed.2d 83, 94-95, 92 S.Ct. 2163] [Blacks]; Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co. (1946) 328 U.S. 217, 220 [90 L.Ed. 1181, 1184-1185, 66 S.Ct. 984, 166 A.L.R. 1412] [wage earners]; Glasser v. United States (1942) 315 U.S. 60, 84-85 [86 L.Ed. 680, 706-707, 62 S.Ct. 457] [women not members of League of Women Voters]; People v. White (1954) 43 Cal.2d 740, 749 [278 P.2d 9] [blue-collar workers].) Petit juries selected from these pools lacked the broad spectrum of attitudes and beliefs shared by members of the excluded groups.

It is well settled that no litigant has the right to a jury that mirrors the demographic composition of the population, or necessarily includes members of his own group, or indeed is composed of any particular individuals. (People v. Wheeler, supra, 22 Cal. 3d at p. 277; People v. White, supra, 43 Cal.2d at p. 749; People v. Hines (1939) 12 Cal.2d 535, 539 [86 P.2d 92].) What the representative cross-section requirement does mean, however, is that a litigant “is constitutionally entitled to a petit jury that is as near an approximation of the ideal cross-section of the community as the process of random draw permits.” (People v. Wheeler, supra, 22 Cal.3d at p. 211 f

5

Defendant argues that his right to a jury panel drawn from a representative cross-section of the community is abridged by the jury selection procedures in Los Angeles County. Defendant cites the testimony of Raymond Arce {ante, pp. 739-740) that Blacks comprise 11.4 percent of the countywide, juror-eligible population. Defendant did not argue that the jurors called in his case were not representative of the juror-eligible Black population of the West District, which Arce testified averaged 5.6 percent in the three months preceding defendant’s trial. In fact, Blacks comprised 8.6 percent of the jurors appearing for defendant’s case.

Under Duren v. Missouri, supra, 439 U.S. 357, in order to establish a prima facie violation of the fair cross-section requirement, “the defendant must show (1) that the group alleged to be excluded is a ‘distinctive’ group in the community; (2) that the representation of this group in venires from which juries are selected is not fair and reasonable in relation to the number of such persons in the community; and (3) that this underrepresentation is due to systematic exclusion of the group in the jury-selection process.” (Id. at p. 364 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 587]; People v. Harris (1984) 36 Cal.3d 36, 50 [201 Cal.Rptr. 782, 679 P.2d 433].)

We are not concerned with the first prong of the Duren test for the People concede that Blacks are a cognizable, distinctive group for purposes of fair cross-section analysis. (People v. Harris, supra, 36 Cal.3d 36, 51; Hovey v. Superior Court (1980) 28 Cal. 3d 1, 20, fn. 45 [168 Cal.Rptr. 128, 616 P.2d 1301].)

To meet the second prong of the Duren test, defendant must show that Blacks were underrepresented in jury venires in relation to the number of such persons in the community. Before this court can evaluate the statistical showing of underrepresentation made by defendant, however, we must first determine what community the jury venire must fairly represent. It is here that we confront the central issue of this case.

Defendant argues that community is defined as the entire county. The People argue that community means the judicial district. As noted, the Court of Appeal rejected both definitions, preferring instead a provocative compromise that defines community as that area within a 20-mile radius of the courthouse.⁶ Inasmuch as the basis for the decision of the Court of Appeal has been eliminated, no purpose is served by an extended discussion of the propriety of using the 20-mile-radius community in determining the population for cross-section analysis.⁷ We turn, instead, to the arguments of the People and defendant who, respectively, propose the judicial district and county. We conclude that the judicial district best serves the constitutional and statutory considerations at issue in the determination of the appropriate community for cross-section analysis as well as the practical problems posed by a far-flung megapolis—Los Angeles County.

County as Community. 8

Defendant contends that the relevant community is the county. In O’Hare v. Superior Court (1987) 43 Cal.3d 86 [233 Cal.Rptr. 332, 729 P.2d 766], we addressed the issue whether the Sixth Amendment entitled a defendant to a venire drawn from, and representative of, the entire county. We squarely held that it does not.

O’Hare was to be tried on a felony charge in the North County Branch of the San Diego Superior Court, which drew its jurors from an area limited by the boundaries of the North County Municipal Court Judicial District. O’Hare complained that the limited venire contained a significantly lower percentage of jury-eligible Blacks than did the county as a whole.

We held that “the constitutional cross-section requirement is a procedural and not a substantive requirement” (O’Hare, supra, 43 Cal.3d at p. 100) and found no constitutional limitation on the government’s power to define the “community” against which the demographics of the venire is measured. The drafters of the Sixth Amendment intended there should be no limitation on the legislative power to define the boundaries of the federal district from which jurors in criminal trials are drawn. (See Williams v. Florida (1970) 399 U.S. 78, 96 [26 L.Ed.2d 446, 458, 90 S.Ct. 1893].) Most significantly, as stated in O’Hare, the federal courts have approved the constitutionality of juries drawn from subdivisions of districts against challenges that the venire did not match the demographics of the districtwide community. (United States v. Gottfried (2d Cir. 1948) 165 F.2d 360, 364; United States v. Florence (4th Cir. 1972) 456 F.2d 46, 49.) Based on the foregoing authorities, we concluded in O’Hare that the Sixth Amendment imposes no limitation on the legislative definition of community for the cross-section requirement: “What the Sixth Amendment does guarantee to every defendant, regardless of his personal characteristics, is a jury drawn from a venire from which no member of the local community was arbitrarily or unnecessarily excluded.” (43 Cal. 3d at p. 101.)

Albeit in another context, in People v. Harris, Justice Mosk noted the balkanized nature of Los Angeles County and the “significant deceptiveness” of the use of countywide statistical data. (36 Cal.3d at p. 73.) “Our code uses the term ‘area served by the court’ (Code Civ. Proc., § 197), not the county in which the court is situated. It takes only a cursory knowledge of the demography of Southern California to realize that Long Beach courts serve an area completely distinct in population characteristics from the totality of Los Angeles County. . . . Figures for the entire County of Los Angeles are not only irrelevant but in this instance significantly deceptive.”

Judicial District as Community.

Having concluded that there is no constitutional limitation on the Legislature to create a relevant community for cross-section purposes, we must determine whether in creating superior court (or “judicial”) districts in Los Angeles County, the Legislature intended to define community in that county as the judicial district where the case is tried.

Sections 69640-69650 of the Government Code, enacted in 1959, set out the guidelines for the creation of superior court districts in Los Angeles County. Of particular relevance to this case are sections 69641,⁹ 69643,¹⁰ 69644,¹¹ and 69645.¹²

The considerations that prompted the legislation shed some light on the goals sought to be achieved. Following World War II and the population explosion in California, in 1957 the Legislature created the Joint Judiciary Committee on the Administration of Justice (Joint Committee) to deal with the urgent need to improve judicial efficiency in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. At the time, the backlog of cases in Los Angeles County Superior Court was particularly acute, having doubled from 6,300 cases in 1952 to 14,700 in 1958.

In the period from 1923 through 1957, a series of legislative enactments (“branch court” bills) had enabled cities to obtain branch courts. To check the proliferation of Los Angeles County one-judge branch courts, the Legislature in 1953 and again in 1957 passed laws increasing the mandatory minimum distance between a projected new court of an otherwise eligible city and the nearest city that had an existing branch court. By 1959, only the 14-mile rule of the 1957 legislation was holding back the flood of otherwise mandatory courts in the Los Angeles area. (Joint Com. Rep., at p. 28.)

The Joint Committee did not encounter objections to the branch courts as such; rather, objections focused on the legislative formulas for their creation. The branch court system, the Joint Committee was told, should be replaced by a system of courts located by districts based on population, need, and convenience, regardless of city boundary lines. Consistent with this view, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors recommended the development of branch superior court operations “according to a master plan, in the interest of service and economy.”

The Joint Committee, in turn, recommended the enactment of legislation “authorizing the Board of Supervisors of Los Angeles County to divide the county into 9 or 10 superior court districts, with power to designate, with the approval of the judges, one or more locations in each district for the holding of court sessions.” (Joint Com. Rep. at p. 33.) Senate Bill No. 992, authorizing the creation of such districts in Los Angeles, unanimously passed the Legislature in 1959. The bill was codified as sections 69640-69650 of the Government Code. (Stats. 1959, ch. 1371, § 1, p. 3642.)

While the Legislature did not explicitly designate the superior court districts as communities for the purpose of assessing the representativeness of jury panels, the considerations that prompted creation of the districts in the first place—the practical realities of the county’s unique demographics, its geographical expanse, and the need for judicial efficiency—convince us that the Legislature intended that the districts serve as the community for determination of jury impartiality. In a sense, the districts were to be microcosms of an entity—the Los Angeles Superior Court—that had become unmanageable and inefficient as a single unit.

The code sections relating to the establishment of superior court judicial districts and the sections relating to jury selection and management are easily harmonized. Read together, the statutes manifest an unmistakable legislative intent that the courts of the district serve the population within its boundaries.¹³ Use of the superior court judicial district as the appropriate “community” in Los Angeles County effectuates this legislative purpose.¹⁴

Having defined the community which the jury venires must fairly represent, we return to the second prong of the Duren test which the defendant must satisfy to establish a prima facie violation of the fair cross-section requirement. The defendant must show that the representation of the excluded group in venires from which juries are selected is not “fair and reasonable in relation to the number of such persons in the community.” (Duren v. Missouri, supra, 439 U.S. at p. 364 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 587].)

Defendant challenged the jury venires as underrepresentative of the Black population of Los Angeles County. At no time did he argue that the percentage of Blacks on the jury panels in the West District was unfair in relation to the percentage of Blacks in the jury-eligible population of the West District. Accordingly, defendant has failed to show that the representation of Blacks in venires from which juries are selected is not fair and reasonable in relation to the number of such persons in the community.

Finally, absent a finding of underrepresentation, we do not reach the third prong of Duren, i.e., whether the “underrepresentation is due to systematic exclusion of the group in the jury selection process.” {Duren, supra, 439 U.S. at p. 364 [58 L.Ed.2d at p. 587].)

Conclusion

The judgment of the Court of Appeal is affirmed. The Court of Appeal is directed to remand the cause to the West Superior Court District for trial.

Lucas, C. J., Eagleson, J., Kaufman, J., and Arguelles, J.,* concurred.

1 We note at the outset that this case presents no issue concerning the requirement of a jury of the vicinage. In a companion case filed on this day (Hernandez v. Municipal Court, ante, page 713 [263 Cal.Rptr. 513, 781 P.2d 547]), we hold that boundaries of the county define the vicinage.

2 Pursuant to the provisions of Government Code sections 69640-69650, Los Angeles County has been divided into 11 superior court or judicial districts.

3 Arce estimated that Blacks comprise over 11.4 percent of the Central District jurors and approximately 25 percent of the South Central District jurors.

4 After we granted review in this case, the Legislature repealed former section 203. (Stats. 1988, ch. 1245, § 1.)

5 The fair cross-section principles set forth in Wheeler were codified by the Legislature in 1980. As amended in 1988, section 197, subdivision (a), requires in part that jurors be selected “at random, from a source or sources inclusive of a representative cross section of the population of the area served by the court.” Section 204 (former section 197.1) prohibits exclusion from jury service “by reason of occupation, race, color, religion, sex, national origin, or economic status, or for any other reason.”

6 The Court of Appeal found support for its definition of community in the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure relating to jurors (§ 190 et seq.), especially section 203 which provided that persons listed for service as trial jurors “shall be fairly representative of the population of the area served by the court, and shall be selected upon a random basis. ... In counties of more than one court location, the rules shall reasonably minimize the distance traveled by jurors. In addition, in the County of Los Angeles no juror shall be required to serve at a distance greater than 20 miles from his or her residence.” Section 203 has been repealed in the Trial Jury Selection and Management Act, Statutes 1988, chapter 1245.

7 Suffice it to say that the appellate court found evidence of legislative intent to make particular provisions for the jury draw in Los Angeles County in the provision that “. . . no juror shall be required to serve at a distance greater than 20 miles from his or her residence.” Given the plain language of the statute, however, we may infer that the 20-mile-radius provision was simply intended to facilitate jury convenience by giving jurors an elective exemption if they resided outside the 20-mile radius.

8 The definition of community (no matter what it is) establishes a standard of comparison, not a method of selection. Jurors, selected from a countywide draw, will serve at various courthouse locations and with varying frequencies depending on where they reside in the county, no matter what method is used to determine the representativeness of the resulting jury venires. Cross-section analysis does not address where the jurors are sent to serve, but rather examines the relevant community for determination of its composition.

9 Section 69641 reads: “The board of supervisors of any county, which has a population of not less than 4,000,000 as determined upon the basis of the last preceding census taken under the authority of the Congress or the Legislature, by ordinance may divide such county into not more than nine superior court districts within which one or more sessions of the superior court shall be held.”

10 Section 69643 reads: “Whenever the board of supervisors finds that changes in population make necessary or expedient the change of boundaries of any district, the change of, addition of, or elimination of any location at which sessions of the superior court are to be held, or the creation of new districts, it may make such changes by ordinance.”

11 Section 69644 reads: “An ordinance creating or changing the boundaries of any district shall not result in any district having an estimated population of less than 250,000.”

12 Section 69645 reads: “An ordinance creating additional districts shall not result in more than 11 districts in the county.”

13 Although the statutes no longer contain an express provision prescribing that local rules shall minimize distance traveled by jurors in the county (Code Civ. Proc., former § 203), Code of Civil Procedure, section 204 provides for exemption for undue hardship which implies that distance traveled by jurors is to be a consideration in their selection.

14 Although the instant case does not involve municipal court juries, we note that our definition of “community” for purposes of cross-section analysis in superior courts is equally applicable to trial in the municipal courts in Los Angeles County. The Legislature has made it clear in section 200 of the Code of Civil Procedure that municipal courts in Los Angeles County are to use the same jury pool as the superior court.

Retired Associate Justice of the Supreme Court sitting under assignment by the Chairperson of the Judicial Council.