Teague v. Lane

489 U.S. 288 (1989)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Teague (D), a black man, was convicted in an Illinois state court of attempted murder and other offenses by an all-white jury. The prosecutor used all 10 of his peremptory challenges to exclude blacks. D moved for a mistrial arguing that he was 'entitled to a jury of his peers.' The prosecutor stated that he was trying to achieve a balance of men and women on the jury. The mistrial was denied. D appealed and was unsuccessful. D then filed a habeas corpus petition presenting his fair cross section claim. D argued for the first time that under Swain a prosecutor could be questioned about his use of peremptory challenges once he volunteered an explanation. The District Court denied relief. A panel of the Court of Appeals agreed that the Sixth Amendment's fair cross-section requirement applied to the petit jury and held that petitioner had made out a prima facie case of discrimination. A majority of the judges on the Court of Appeals voted to rehear the case en banc, and the panel opinion was vacated. The rehearing was postponed until after the Supreme Court's decision in Batson v. Kentucky. Batson overruled that portion of Swain setting forth the evidentiary showing necessary to make out a prima facie case of racial discrimination under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment with respect to a peremptory challenge system. Batson held that a defendant can establish such a case by showing that he is a 'member of a cognizable racial group,' that the prosecutor exercised 'peremptory challenges to remove from the venire members of the defendant's race,' and that these 'facts and any other relevant circumstances raise an inference that the prosecutor used that practice to exclude the veniremen from the petit jury on account of their race.' The Court of Appeals held that D could not benefit from the Batson rule because Allen v. Hardy, 478 U.S. 255 held that Batson could not be applied retroactively to cases on collateral review. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.