Payne

MEMORANDUM **

Darvon T. Payne, a California state prisoner, appeals pro se from the district court’s judgment denying his 28 U.S.C. § 2254 petition, challenging his jury trial conviction for five counts of attempted murder. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1291 and 2253. We review de novo a district court’s ruling on the merits of a habeas corpus petition, Sandgathe v. Maass, 314 F.3d 371, 376 (9th Cir.2002), and we affirm.

Payne contends that the prosecutor violated his equal protection rights by excluding from the jury an African-American woman who lived in the city in which the *583 crime took place, citing United States v. Bishop, 959 F.2d 820, 825-26 (1992), to support his argument that residence can be used as a substitute for race in analyzing a violation under Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 , 106 S.Ct. 1712 , 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986). The state courts found, however, that the prosecutor relied on neither the potential juror’s race nor her residence when exercising the peremptory challenge, but instead questioned the veracity of the juror’s responses during voir dire.

Payne has not demonstrated that the state courts’ findings were an “unreasonable determination…