California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Mitchell, B268501 (Cal. App. 2018):
"[A]n appellate court properly reviews the first-stage ruling if the trial court has determined that no prima facie case of discrimination exists, then allows or invites the prosecutor to state reasons for excusing the juror, but refrains from ruling on the validity of those reasons." (People v. Scott (2015) 61 Cal.4th 363, 386.)5 "A trial judge who asks a prosecutor to respond to a [Batson/]Wheeler motion is not required to forcibly interrupt the prosecutor when the response concerns not whether a prima facie case was made, but the prosecutor's reasons for exercising his peremptory challenges, in order to retain his or her discretion to determine whether a prima facie case was established. 'Thus, when an appellate court is presented with such a record, and concludes that the trial court properly determined that no prima facie case was made, it need not review the adequacy of counsel's justifications for the peremptory challenges.'" (People v. Davenport (1995) 11 Cal.4th 1171, 1200-1201, overruled on another ground in People v. Griffin (2004) 33 Cal.4th 536, 555, fn. 5.)
The record shows the trial court restricted the prosecutor to addressing the question whether the defendants had made a
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