Aspen v. Bissonnette

HOWARD, Circuit Judge.

In 1998, Massachusetts state prisoner Richard Aspen was convicted of raping and sexually assaulting his stepdaughter. During the selection of the petit jury, Aspen claimed that the prosecutor exercised her peremptory challenges to exclude potential male jurors in violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, as interpreted in Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 85, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986) (holding that the racially discriminatory use of peremptory challenges violates equal protection), and J.E.B, v. Alabama, 511 U.S. 127, 129, 114 S.Ct.…