Bailey, J.
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Robertson raises one issue for our review: whether the trial court erred when it overruled his Batson challenge contesting the State’s use of a peremptory challenge to strike a juror.
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Here, Robertson contends that the trial court erroneously concluded that he failed to establish a prima facie case of discrimination….
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Here, Venireperson Lisenbee was part of a cognizable racial group, and the State exercised a peremptory challenge to remove Venireperson Lisenbee—the only African American subject to voir dire to that point—from the pool of jurors. Robertson asserts that this is enough to establish a prima facie case, and directs us to this exchange among the State, the court, and his trial counsel:
THE COURT: Okay. There’s more to it than just because you strike a person who’s black off the jury that there’s a – that there’s an issue.
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[ROBERTSON]: But [] the defense only has the burden of proving a prima facie case in that they struck black jurors…
THE COURT: A black person?
[ROBERTSON]: [E]ssentially, yes. And – and then the burden shifts to the State to prove uh, the rest of the case. We only ha – at this point, we only have the burden of prima facie evidence…
***
[STATE]: Your Honor, I don’t think they have made a prima facie case. He said a hundred percent of the African-American jurors on the panel. She was the only African-American juror on the panel. Um, that was the – by chance that’s how it happened.
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THE COURT: There – I mean the – the purpose of Batson is making sure that there is not a systematic way uh, that the State has chosen to eliminate people who are of color on the – on the jury.
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THE COURT: And, there has to have been the – some showing that – that there has been that; that there has been some kind of systematic elimination of people. Now, she was not the only black person in the panel at the son [sic] – at the time.
(Tr. at 228-29.)
The court then overruled Robertson’s Batson challenge.
We agree with Robertson that this was error. Both parties acknowledge that, in this case, neither Robertson nor the State had an opportunity to conduct voir dire of the other African-American member of the venire. Because the trial court did not move to the second step in the Batson analysis—requiring the State to present a facially race-neutral reason for using a peremptory strike—the court did not conclude that Robertson had established a prima facie case of discrimination. Yet, as Robertson points out, the only African-American juror that was subject to voir dire—Venireperson Lisenbee—was stricken from the jury.
Thus, for all intents and purposes, the State used its peremptory challenges to strike the only African-American member of the venire. The Indiana Supreme Court has held clearly and on several occasions that striking from the venire the only African American juror that could have served on the petit jury is prima facie evidence of discriminatory intent and satisfies the initial burden under Batson. Cartwright v. State, 962 N.E.2d 1217, 1222 (Ind. 2012). This case is no exception. And because “the exclusion of even a sole prospective juror based on race, ethnicity, or gender violates the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause,” Addison, 962 N.E.2d at 1208, we conclude that Robertson’s rights under the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution were violated. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the trial court and remand the case for a new trial. [Footnote omitted.]
Reversed.
KIRSCH, J., and MAY, J., concur.