Walker

MEMORANDUM *

Shavon Anthony Walker was convicted by a Los Angeles Superior Court jury of five counts of second degree robbery. During jury selection, Walker objected to the Los Angeles County Deputy' District Attorney’s use of a peremptory challenge to dismiss the one African-American potential juror in the venire. The trial court denied Walker’s Batson/Wheeler motion and on April 18, 2001, the California Court of Appeal affirmed. 1 Walker then filed this petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court claiming that the prosecutor’s peremptory strike violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Constitution. Batson, 476 U.S. 79 , 106 S.Ct. 1712 . After holding an evidentiary hearing, the district court denied Walker’s habeas petition on the grounds that the prosecutor presented a credible, race-neutral explanation for the peremptory strike. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and now affirm.

We review de novo the district court’s decision to deny Walker’s petition for a writ of habeas corpus, but review any factual findings for clear error. Frierson v. Woodford, 463 F.3d 982, 988 (9th Cir.2006); Fernandez v. Roe, 286 F.3d 1073, 1076 (9th Cir.2002). We give…