State v. Raynor

Summary

The court affirmed the Appellate Court's judgment rejecting the defendant's Batson challenge to the prosecutor's peremptory strike of a prospective juror. It adopted the Appellate Court's reasoning that the record was inadequate to assess the claimed disparate treatment and alternatively held that the trial court did not clearly err in finding no purposeful discrimination. The court declined to require prospective jurors to identify their race, leaving related policy questions to a forthcoming Jury Selection Task Force.