Unzueta v. Akopyan
Annotate this Case
In this medical malpractice action against an anesthesiologist, the jury found that defendant breached the duty of care she owed plaintiff, but that the breach did not cause plaintiff's paralysis. On appeal, plaintiff argued that the trial court erred in denying the Batson/Wheeler motion the trial court made sua sponte after defendant's attorney exercised peremptory challenges to six Hispanic prospective jurors out of his seven total challenges.
The Court of Appeal agreed with plaintiff that the trial court erred in not requiring defense counsel to offer nondiscriminatory reasons for his first four challenges that formed the basis of the trial court's prima facie finding of racial bias. Therefore, the court reversed for the limited purpose of conducting the second and third steps of the Batson/Wheeler inquiry as to all six challenged Hispanic jurors. The court held that the prohibition against the exercise of peremptory challenges to exclude prospective jurors on the basis of race or other group bias applies to civil as well as criminal cases. The court remanded with instructions. The court affirmed as to plaintiff's claim of error regarding the trial court's exclusion of evidence of defendant's dishonesty; motion to exclude expert testimony; and assertion that defense counsel's closing argument was improper.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.