California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from People v. Mason, 277 Cal.Rptr. 166, 52 Cal.3d 909, 802 P.2d 950 (Cal. 1991):
For the record, defense counsel named those prospective jurors whose answers, in his opinion, showed that they "were opposed to the death penalty." Included in this group were each of the Black prospective jurors whom the prosecutor had peremptorily challenged. Although the court correctly declined to hold that counsel had made out a prima facie case based upon exclusion of death penalty skeptics (People v. Zimmerman (1984) 36 Cal.3d 154, 160-161, 202 Cal.Rptr. 826, 680 P.2d 776), the prosecutor nevertheless insisted on putting into the record his reasons for excluding such persons.
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