Hector Ayala v. Robert Wong

Opinion by Judge REINHARDT; Dissent by Judge CALLAHAN.

OPINION

State prisoner Hector Juan Ayala (“Ayala”) appeals the denial of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. During the selection of the jury that convicted Ayala and sentenced him to death, the prosecution used its peremptory challenges to strike all of the black and Hispanic jurors available for challenge. The trial judge concluded that Ayala had established a prima facie case of racial discrimination under Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 , 106 S.Ct. 1712 , 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986), but permitted the prosecution to give its justifications for the challenges of these jurors in an in camera hearing from which Ayala and his counsel were excluded. The trial judge then accepted the prosecution’s justifications for its strikes without disclosing them to the defense or permitting it to respond. We hold that this procedure violated the Constitution and, together with the state’s later loss of a large portion of the record, adversely affected Ayala’s substantial rights. We therefore reverse the district court’s denial of Ayala’s petition and remand with instructions to grant the writ.

I.

On April 26, 1985, Jose Luis Rositas,…

dissenting:

In 1985, Hector Juan Ayala shot and killed three men. In 1989, he was convicted on three counts of murder, and the jury returned a verdict of death. On direct appeal his conviction and sentence were affirmed by the California Supreme Court in 2000. People v. Ayala, 24 Cal.4th 243 , 99 Cal.Rptr.2d 532 , 6 P.3d 193 (2000). The Supreme Court of the United States denied his petition for certiorari in 2001. Ayala v. California, 532 U.S. 908 , 121 S.Ct. 1235 , 149 L.Ed.2d 143 (2001). Ayala filed his initial petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Southern District of California in 2002. This appeal is from the district court’s February 17, 2009, final order denying the petition.

The majority holds, based primarily on law developed after Ayala’s trial, that Ayala must be released or retried because it cannot tell whether the prosecutor in recusing seven jurors might have had a ra *974 cial motive for doing so. It does so by extending each supporting argument just slightly beyond its limitations, in order to reach a conclusion that appears reasonable but nonetheless does not withstand scrutiny. The majority reaches its goal by ruling…

FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

HECTOR JUAN AYALA,  No. 09-99005 Petitioner-Appellant, D.C. No. v.  3:01-CV-01322- ROBERT K. WONG, Warden, IEG-PLC Respondent-Appellee.  OPINION

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of California Irma E. Gonzalez, Chief District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted February 9, 2012—Pasadena, California

Filed August 29, 2012

Before: Stephen Reinhardt, Kim McLane Wardlaw, and Consuelo M. Callahan, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Reinhardt; Dissent by Judge Callahan

10085 AYALA v. WONG 10089

COUNSEL

Robin L. Phillips and Anthony J. Dain of Procopio, Cory, Hargreaves & Savitch LLP, San Diego, California, for petitioner-appellant Hector Juan Ayala.

Robin H. Derman, Deputy Attorney General of California, San Diego, California, for defendant-appellee Robert K. Wong, Warden. 10090 AYALA v. WONG

OPINION

REINHARDT, Circuit Judge:

State prisoner Hector Juan Ayala (“Ayala”) appeals the denial of his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. During the selection of…