Commonwealth v. Benoit

The defendant was convicted of murder in the second degree by a jury in the Superior Court. On appeal, he argues that (1) the Commonwealth’s peremptory challenge to the only eligible African-American juror violated his Federal and State constitutional rights because the prosecutor’s proffered reasons supporting the challenge were inadequate; (2) the judge erred in denying his request for an instruction on self-defense; (3) the judge erred in excluding prior recent acts of aggression by the victim that were relevant to the issue of provocation, and therefore relevant to whether the defendant…