People v. Hazlett: The California Racial Justice Act Does Not Reach Peremptory Challenges (and Race-Inflected Trial Themes Require Prejudicial Effect for Relief)

1. Introduction

People v. Hazlett is an automatic appeal from a 2004 capital judgment arising out of the 1978 homicide of Tana Woolley in Kern County. Larry Kusuth Hazlett, Jr. (defendant), an African-American man, was convicted of first degree murder (Pen. Code, § 187) and the jury found true two felony-murder special circumstances under the 1977 death penalty law: murder during rape (former § 190.2, subd. (c)(3)(iii)) and during burglary (former § 190.2, subd. (c)(3)(v)). The jury returned a verdict of death.

The appeal presented (among many issues) three especially salient questions:

• Jury selection: whether the prosecutor’s first peremptory strike removing the sole remaining African-American prospective juror required a Batson/Wheeler inquiry (Batson v. Kentucky; People v. Wheeler).
• Trial proof: whether decades-old DNA evidence and Evidence Code section 1108 propensity evidence supported the felony-murder theories and special circumstances.
• Race and the RJA: whether asserted race-inflected arguments (including references to O.J. Simpson) and jury selection dynamics warranted relief under the California Racial Justice Act of 2020 (Pen. Code, § 745).

2. Summary of the Opinion

The court affirmed the judgment of death.

The majority held, in brief:

• No prima facie Batson/Wheeler showing: Although the prosecutor struck the only remaining African-American prospective juror, the totality of circumstances did not support an inference of discriminatory purpose because a record-apparent, race-neutral reason existed (the juror’s death-penalty hesitancy tied to fears of wrongful conviction/exoneration).
• Evidence Code § 1108 upheld (again): Admission of five prior rapes of four women and related CALJIC instructions (including CALJIC No. 2.50.01) did not violate due process and were not an abuse of discretion.
• Sufficiency of evidence: Substantial evidence supported felony murder (rape/attempted rape; burglary with intent to rape), deliberation/premeditation (notably via ligature strangulation and motive to avoid identification), and both 1977 special circumstances (including People v. Green’s “independent felonious purpose” requirement).
• Hearsay/time-of-death issues harmless: Any assumed error admitting time-of-death statements via a death certificate or expert reliance on an autopsy report was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt (Chapman v. California), because first-degree burglary depended on time of entry, not time of death, and other evidence supported nighttime entry.
• Penalty phase misdemeanor-conviction record was state-law error but harmless: Admitting a certified docket reflecting a 1971 misdemeanor assault conviction as aggravation was erroneous under the 1977 statute, but harmless.
• Key statutory holding on the RJA: The RJA does not apply to a prosecutor’s peremptory challenges (or related juror-directed voir dire), because the statute targets bias “towards the defendant” and because the Legislature chose to regulate peremptories through Code Civ. Proc., § 231.7 rather than Pen. Code, § 745.
• RJA claims about argument: Calling defendant “seething with racial hatred/resentment” was not racially discriminatory language under the RJA in context; O.J. Simpson references during voir dire were not violations; the rebuttal “O.J. Simpson defense” reference was at most assumed error and in any event harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.

Two dissents (Justices Evans and Liu) would have reversed: Evans on Batson/Wheeler (prima facie inference required); Liu emphasizing the RJA’s ban on implicitly race-priming language and characterizing the O.J. Simpson reference as a paradigmatic RJA violation.

3. Analysis

3.1. Precedents Cited (and How They Shaped the Decision)

A. Batson/Wheeler and the prima facie “inference” threshold

• Batson v. Kentucky (1986) 476 U.S. 79 and People v. Wheeler (1978) 22 Cal.3d 258 supplied the governing three-step framework and the constitutional stakes: discrimination in peremptories is structural error (People v. Gutierrez (2017) 2 Cal.5th 1150).
• Johnson v. California (2005) 545 U.S. 162 clarified the first-step standard (inference, not “strong likelihood”). For a pre-Johnson trial, the majority applied independent review per People v. Holmes, McClain and Newborn (2022) 12 Cal.5th 719 and People v. Rhoades (2019) 8 Cal.5th 393.
• People v. Taylor (2010) 48 Cal.4th 574, People v. Hamilton (2009) 45 Cal.4th 863, People v. Bonilla (2007) 41 Cal.4th 313, and People v. Bell (2007) 40 Cal.4th 582 were used to diminish the inferential weight of a “small sample” (one strike), emphasizing that removal of the only juror of a group, without more, is ordinarily insufficient.
• People v. Battle (2021) 11 Cal.5th 749 was central to the majority’s method: racial salience “raises concerns,” but is not dispositive; the totality must still show an inference of discriminatory purpose. The court analogized Battle to treat “racially charged case + all-White jury” as insufficient without additional indicia of discriminatory selection.
• The majority leaned on the appellate practice (developed in Rhoades and People v. Johnson (2019) 8 Cal.5th 475) of considering race-neutral reasons “apparent from and clearly established in the record” that “necessarily dispel any inference of bias.” That approach allowed the court to treat the struck juror’s expressed death-penalty reservations as an “obvious” nondiscriminatory basis.
• Paulino v. Castro (9th Cir. 2004) 371 F.3d 1083 appeared as a historical marker: the trial court later clarified it had applied the “inference” standard rather than the older “strong likelihood” gloss. The majority, however, independently reviewed the record “out of an abundance of caution.”

B. The RJA: scope, discriminatory language, and harmlessness

• The court treated the RJA’s operative text as focused on bias “towards the defendant” (Pen. Code, § 745, subd. (a)(1)–(2)) and on “racially discriminatory language” defined in § 745, subd. (h)(4).
• For prejudice, the opinion relied on its recent RJA harmlessness line for pre-RJA judgments: People v. Bankston (2026) 19 Cal.5th 786, People v. Chhuon and Pan (2026) 19 Cal.5th 1018, People v. Demolle (2026) 19 Cal.5th 1117, and People v. Barrera (2026) 19 Cal.5th 919, applying “harmless beyond a reasonable doubt” when reviewing asserted RJA violations on appeal from older judgments.
• The court also cited People v. Wilson (2024) 16 Cal.5th 874 for the RJA’s purpose and framing.

C. Propensity evidence in sex cases

• People v. Falsetta (1999) 21 Cal.4th 903 upheld Evidence Code section 1108’s constitutionality; People v. Reliford (2003) 29 Cal.4th 1007 validated CALJIC No. 2.50.01; People v. Loy (2011) 52 Cal.4th 46 rejected “instructional confusion” arguments with CALJIC Nos. 2.50.01/2.50.1 and reasonable doubt concepts.
• For Evidence Code section 352 balancing in sex propensity cases, the court drew from People v. Daveggio and Michaud (2018) 4 Cal.5th 790, People v. Baker (2021) 10 Cal.5th 1044, People v. Dworak (2021) 11 Cal.5th 881, and People v. Story (2009) 45 Cal.4th 1282.

D. Sufficiency of evidence and special circumstances under the 1977 law

• The 1977 felony-murder special circumstances required willful, deliberate, premeditated murder (People v. Robertson (1982) 33 Cal.3d 21), and the “independent felonious purpose” requirement came from People v. Green (1980) 27 Cal.3d 1.
• For premeditation analysis, the court referenced People v. Anderson (1968) 70 Cal.2d 15 (planning/motive/method) and subsequent authorities such as People v. Ghobrial (2018) 5 Cal.5th 250, People v. Lucero (1988) 44 Cal.3d 1006, People v. Hovarter (2008) 44 Cal.4th 983, People v. Solomon (2010) 49 Cal.4th 792, and People v. Stitely (2005) 35 Cal.4th 514 to explain why ligature strangulation can support deliberation/premeditation.

E. Confrontation and expert hearsay

• Crawford v. Washington (2004) 541 U.S. 36 governed testimonial hearsay; People v. Sanchez (2016) 63 Cal.4th 665 addressed experts conveying case-specific hearsay as true.
• Harmlessness standards were framed via Chapman v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 18 and People v. Watson (1956) 46 Cal.2d 818, with the majority applying Chapman given the claimed confrontation implications.

F. Penalty phase relevance and sympathy

• Victim impact admissibility relied on Payne v. Tennessee (1991) 501 U.S. 808 and California authority including People v. Edwards (1991) 54 Cal.3d 787.
• The “no sympathy for defendant’s family as such” instruction drew from People v. Ochoa (1998) 19 Cal.4th 353 and the relevance structure of the capital sentencing inquiry.
• The 1977 vs. 1978 death penalty law comparison invoked People v. Boyd (1985) 38 Cal.3d 762, People v. Brown (1985) 40 Cal.3d 512, and People v. Murtishaw (1989) 48 Cal.3d 1001.

3.2. Legal Reasoning

A. The Batson/Wheeler holding: “totality” + “record-apparent race-neutral reason” defeats inference

The majority acknowledged the most troubling fact: the prosecutor used his first peremptory challenge to remove the only remaining African-American prospective juror and the seated jury was described as all-White. It also acknowledged “racial elements” in the case. But it treated that constellation as insufficient at step one because (i) one strike is ordinarily an “impossible” statistical sample from which to infer discrimination, and (ii) the record itself contained an “obvious” nondiscriminatory explanation for the strike: the juror’s expressed reluctance to impose death due to concerns about wrongful conviction and later exoneration.

The court’s step-one analysis thus did two things at once:

• It declined to treat “striking the sole juror of a cognizable group” as dispositive; and
• It relied heavily on the appellate practice of finding “record-apparent” race-neutral reasons that “necessarily dispel” an inference of bias.

The dissents viewed the same facts as triggering an inference that required step two (a race-neutral explanation on the record), emphasizing the race-salience of the case and the structural dangers of an all-White capital jury judging a Black defendant accused of raping and killing White women.

B. The RJA’s most consequential construction: peremptory challenges are outside § 745

The opinion’s most novel and practically important rule is its conclusion that the RJA “does not apply to the questioning of or exercise of a peremptory challenge of a prospective juror.”

The majority’s reasoning proceeds in two layers:

• Textual/structural layer: § 745, subd. (a)(2) addresses bias or discriminatory language “towards the defendant” because of the defendant’s race. Peremptory strikes are actions against prospective jurors (not the defendant), so, “standing alone,” they do not fit within the statute’s described mechanism.
• Legislative-design layer: the Legislature considered, then removed, draft RJA language explicitly regulating peremptories; instead it enacted Code Civ. Proc., § 231.7 (effective prospectively) as the specialized statutory response. The omission was treated as “most persuasive” evidence the RJA should not be read to cover peremptories.

This is a narrowing construction of the RJA’s remedial reach: it channels jury-selection race claims into Batson/Wheeler (for older cases) and Code Civ. Proc., § 231.7 (for newer cases), while treating the RJA as not providing an additional or retroactive route to challenge race-tainted peremptory practices.

Justice Evans’s dissent rejected this limitation as inconsistent with the RJA’s broad purpose and legislative findings about jury selection bias, and as based on an unduly “cramped” conception of bias “towards the defendant.”

C. RJA “discriminatory language” in argument: context and prejudice control outcomes

On the merits of alleged race-coded trial language, the majority made two notable moves:

• It treated the prosecutor’s “seething with racial hatred/resentment” argument as a permissible inference from defendant’s own racial epithets during other rapes—i.e., the prosecutor was arguing motive and context, not deploying race-coded stereotypes about Black defendants.
• It treated O.J. Simpson references as not inherently racially coded in every use (voir dire reference permissible), and treated the rebuttal “O.J. Simpson defense” reference as, at most, assumed error—but harmless beyond a reasonable doubt given the brevity and the strength of the evidence.

Justice Liu’s dissent argued the Simpson comparison was a paradigmatic implicit-bias trigger banned by the RJA irrespective of intent, and cautioned that reluctance to formally identify a violation risks diluting the RJA’s prohibition on language that “implicitly appeals to racial bias.”

D. Evidence Code § 1108 and the “propensity + limiting instruction” model remains intact

The court continued California’s settled line that Evidence Code section 1108 is constitutional (People v. Falsetta), and that CALJIC No. 2.50.01 properly limits propensity’s role: prior sex offenses may support an inference of disposition and, from that, an inference of likely commission, but the preponderance finding is “not sufficient by itself” to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

Notably, the opinion treated similarity as relevant but not required: § 1108 is about category-of-offense propensity, with § 352 serving as the safeguard. The court also accepted that racially charged epithets by defendant during prior rapes were admissible as contextual details that underscored nonconsent and supported witness credibility, and not so “unusual” as to inevitably bias a jury (People v. Quartermain).

E. Sufficiency: “hidden entry” rape/burglary theory + strangulation as deliberation

On sufficiency, the majority held the evidence supported:

• Felony murder (rape/attempted rape): nude body position and circumstances; defendant’s DNA in semen stains on the bedspread; defendant’s DNA as possible minor contributor on the sock ligature; and other-rape propensity evidence.
• Felony murder (burglary): entry via kitchen window opening with intent to rape; burglary complete upon entry with felonious intent; and nighttime entry inferred from surrounding facts rather than time-of-death testimony.
• Deliberation/premeditation: motive to avoid identification and the prolonged, force-sustained nature of ligature strangulation providing time for reflection.
• 1977 special circumstances: premeditation/deliberation plus People v. Green’s “independent felonious purpose” (rape/burglary not merely incidental to murder).

3.3. Impact

A. RJA doctrine: narrowing in the jury-selection domain

The most immediate impact is doctrinal: the decision effectively removes peremptory challenges from the RJA’s reach, cementing a bifurcated regime:

• Older cases: jury-selection race claims remain largely Batson/Wheeler territory (intent-focused, three-step, prima facie inference required).
• Newer cases: Code Civ. Proc., § 231.7 supplies the Legislature’s forward-looking framework for peremptory discrimination (with presumptively invalid reasons).

Practically, defendants seeking to challenge race-tainted jury selection may have fewer avenues under § 745 than they might have expected from the RJA’s broad purpose language—especially in legacy cases where § 231.7 is inapplicable.

B. Batson step one: continued resistance to “single strike = inference” rules

The opinion reinforces the court’s consistent reluctance to treat “strike of the only juror of a cognizable group” as automatically establishing a prima facie case. That matters in counties and venires where minority representation is low: the removal of one juror can eliminate representation entirely, yet the court continues to require “more” unless an inference is supported by additional circumstances or unless discrimination cannot be dispelled by record-apparent nondiscriminatory reasons.

C. Trial advocacy under the RJA: “implicit bias” language scrutiny remains, but prejudice is pivotal

Although the majority found (or assumed) no reversible RJA error from O.J. Simpson references, the dissent signals litigation risk: prosecutors are on notice that analogies to racially polarizing cases may be argued as implicit-bias triggers under § 745, subd. (a)(2) and (h)(4), especially near deliberations and in racially charged prosecutions.

D. Cold-case sex-homicides: DNA + § 1108 can bridge evidentiary gaps

The opinion illustrates how old biological evidence—if accepted as untampered—can interact with propensity evidence to sustain felony-murder rape/burglary theories despite missing swabs and the victim’s inability to testify. The court’s chain-of-custody and § 352 rulings are likely to be cited by prosecutors in other “cold case” prosecutions where preservation conditions are imperfect but no affirmative tampering evidence exists.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

4.1. Batson/Wheeler in three steps

• Step 1 (prima facie): Does the totality raise an inference the strike was discriminatory?
• Step 2 (race-neutral reason): If yes, the prosecutor must state a race-neutral reason.
• Step 3 (purposeful discrimination): The court decides whether the reason is genuine or pretextual.

Here, the majority stopped at step 1: no inference found because the juror’s death-penalty hesitancy was treated as an obvious nonracial explanation apparent from the record.

4.2. Evidence Code section 1108 (“propensity evidence” in sex cases)

Normally, character evidence is inadmissible to show a person acted “in character” on the charged occasion. Section 1108 creates a sex-offense exception: prior sex offenses can be used to suggest the defendant has a disposition to commit sex offenses, which can make it more likely the defendant committed the charged sex offense. Courts still must exclude the evidence if its unfair prejudice substantially outweighs its probative value (Evidence Code, § 352).

4.3. Felony murder and “continuous transaction”

In felony murder, the prosecution need not prove intent to kill; it must prove intent to commit the underlying felony (e.g., rape or burglary) and that the killing and felony were part of one continuous transaction.

4.4. 1977 felony-murder special circumstances and People v. Green

Under the 1977 death penalty law, rape-murder and burglary-murder special circumstances required: (i) the murder occurred during the felony (or attempt), (ii) the murder was willful, deliberate, and premeditated, and (iii) the felony was not merely incidental to the killing—there must be an “independent felonious purpose.”

4.5. Crawford/Sanchez and “expert hearsay”

Crawford v. Washington restricts testimonial hearsay unless the declarant is unavailable and was previously cross-examined. People v. Sanchez limits experts from repeating case-specific out-of-court statements as true to support their opinions (that’s hearsay). Even when such errors occur, convictions stand if the reviewing court finds the error harmless beyond a reasonable doubt under Chapman v. California.

5. Conclusion

People v. Hazlett affirms a cold-case capital conviction and death sentence while delivering a consequential statutory holding: the California Racial Justice Act does not provide a vehicle to challenge peremptory strikes, leaving jury-selection race issues to Batson/Wheeler (legacy cases) and Code Civ. Proc., § 231.7 (prospective cases). On Batson/Wheeler’s first step, the court reemphasizes that removal of the only juror of a cognizable group—though relevant—is not ordinarily enough by itself to require the prosecutor to explain, particularly where the record reveals an obvious race-neutral basis.

The dissents underscore a competing vision: that, in a capital case saturated with racial dynamics, striking the last Black prospective juror should itself raise an inference requiring explanation; and that the RJA should be read to address (not exclude) discriminatory peremptory practices and implicit-bias-triggering rhetoric. The divide signals continuing doctrinal tension in California between intent-focused jury-selection doctrine and the RJA’s broader aspiration to eradicate race effects “in any form or amount.”