Case Title: IN REGARD TO THE PROPERTY IN THE CUSTODY OF THE GILLETTE POLICE DEPARTMENT; NAMELY 330 PIECES OF DRUG PARAPHERNALIA (JEFFREY WAYNE DOLES, d/b/a/ HIP HOP HIPPIES); JEFFERY WAYNE DOLES v. THE STATE OF WYOMING

Citation: 

Docket Number: S-07-0002

State: wyoming

Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

Date: 2007-07-31T00:00:00Z

Document:
IN REGARD TO THE PROPERTY IN THE CUSTODY OF THE GILLETTE POLICE DEPARTMENT; NAMELY 330 PIECES OF DRUG PARAPHERNALIA (JEFFREY WAYNE DOLES, d/b/a/ HIP HOP HIPPIES); JEFFERY WAYNE DOLES v. THE STATE OF WYOMING2007 WY 119163 P.3d 819Case Number: No. S-07-0002Decided: 07/31/2007
APRIL TERM, A.D. 2007

 
 
IN REGARD TO THE PROPERTY IN THE CUSTODY OF THE GILLETTE 
POLICE DEPARTMENT; NAMELY, 330 PIECES OF DRUG PARAPHERNALIA (JEFFREYWAYNE DOLES, d/b/a HIP HOP HIPPIES):JEFFREY 
WAYNE 
DOLES,Appellant(Defendant),v.THE STATE OF WYOMING,Appellee(Plaintiff).

 
 
Appeal 
from the DistrictCourtofCampbellCounty

 
 

Representing 
Appellant:

Nicholas 
H. Carter of Carter Law Office, P.C., Gillette, Wyoming.

 
 

Representing 
Appellee:

Patrick 
J. Crank, Attorney General; Terry L. Armitage, Deputy Attorney General; and 
David L. Delicath, Senior Assistant Attorney General.

 
 
Before 
VOIGT, C.J., and GOLDEN, HILL, KITE, and BURKE, 
JJ.

 
 
VOIGT, 
Chief Justice.

 
 
[¶1]      This is an appeal 
from a district court's order of forfeiture, in which order the district court 
found certain items to be "drug paraphernalia" as defined by statute and ordered 
their forfeiture to the State of Wyoming.  The single issue is whether the 
appellant's acquittal on related criminal charges acts collaterally to estop the 
State from pursuing forfeiture.  We 
conclude that it does not, and we, therefore, affirm the district court. 

 
 
FACTS

 
 
[¶2]      The appellant 
operated a business in Gillette, Wyoming, known as "Hip Hop Hippies."  After authorities obtained and executed 
a search warrant at the business, the appellant was arrested and charged with 
three misdemeanor offenses:  one 
count of delivery of drug paraphernalia, and two counts of possession with 
intent to deliver drug paraphernalia.  
A jury acquitted the appellant on all three charges.  Nevertheless, the State later initiated 
this civil in rem proceeding, seeking 
statutory forfeiture of 330 items seized from Hip Hop 
Hippies.

 
 
[¶3]      The appellant's 
motion to dismiss the forfeiture proceedings on the ground that the acquittals 
collaterally estopped the State from pursuing forfeiture was denied by the 
district court.  After an 
evidentiary hearing, the district court found the seized items to be drug 
paraphernalia and ordered them forfeited to the State.  This appeal 
followed.

 
 
STANDARD 
OF REVIEW

 
 
[¶4]      We review de novo a district court's application 
of, or refusal to apply, the doctrine of collateral estoppel because such is a 
question of law.  Wilson v. Lucerne Canal & Power Co., 2007 
WY 10, ¶ 23, 150 P.3d 653, 662 (Wyo. 2007).

 
 
DISCUSSION

 
 
[¶5]      All three 
criminal charges against the appellant were based upon Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 
35-7-1056 (LexisNexis 2007), which provides in pertinent part that "[i]t is 
unlawful for any person to deliver, or possess with intent to deliver, drug 
paraphernalia. . . ."  Wyo. Stat. 
Ann. § 35-7-1049 (LexisNexis 2007) further provides that drug paraphernalia is 
subject to forfeiture.  "Drug 
paraphernalia" is defined in Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 35-7-1002(a)(xxvii)(LexisNexis 
2007)  as 
follows:

 
 
(xxvii)  "Drug paraphernalia" means all 
equipment, products and materials of any kind when used, advertised for use, 
intended for use or designed for use for manufacturing, converting, preparing, 
packaging, repackaging, storing, containing, concealing, injecting, ingesting, 
inhaling or otherwise introducing into the human body a controlled substance in 
violation of this act [. . .]. 

 
 
[¶6]      The appellant 
contends that his acquittal on the criminal charges collaterally estops the 
State from pursuing this forfeiture action.  Collateral estoppel bars the 
relitigation of issues where:

 
 
1.    The issue decided in the 
prior adjudication was identical with the issue presented in the present 
action.

 
 
2.    The prior adjudication 
resulted in a judgment on the merits.

 
 
3.    The party against whom 
collateral estoppel is asserted was a party or in privity with a party to the 
prior adjudication;

 
 
4.    The party against whom 
collateral estoppel is asserted had a full and fair opportunity to litigate the 
issues in the prior proceeding.

 
 

Wilson, ¶ 22, 
150 P.3d  at 662.

 
 
[¶7]      The seminal case 
in this area of the law, and the case upon which the appellant relies most 
heavily, is Coffey v. United States, 
116 U.S. 436, 6 S. Ct. 437, 29 L. Ed. 684 (1886).  In a criminal proceeding, Coffey was 
acquitted of possessing certain distilling equipment and distilled spirits with 
the intent to defraud the United 
States by evading applicable 
tax laws.  Id., 116 U.S.  at 441, 6 S. Ct.  at 439.  Coffey lost a 
subsequent civil forfeiture action, however, and the property was ordered 
forfeited to the government.  
Id.  The order of forfeiture was reversed on 
appeal.  While not relying directly 
upon the equitable doctrine of collateral estoppel, the United States Supreme 
Court declared that the acquittals in the criminal case barred the government 
from pursuing civil forfeiture:

 
 
            
The principal question is as to the effect of the indictment, trial, 
verdict, and judgment of acquittal set up in the fourth paragraph of the 
answer.  The information is founded 
on sections 3257, 3450, and 3453; and there is no question, on the averments in 
the answer, that the fraudulent acts and attempts and intents to defraud, 
alleged in the prior criminal information, and covered by the verdict and 
judgment of acquittal, embraced all of the acts, attempts, and intents averred 
in the information in this suit.  
The question, therefore, is distinctly presented, whether such judgment 
of acquittal is a bar to this suit.  
We are of [the] opinion that it is.  
It is true that section 3257, after denouncing the single act of a 
distiller defrauding, or attempting to defraud the United States of the tax on 
the spirits distilled by him, declares the consequences of the commission of the 
act to be (1) that certain specific property shall be forfeited; and (2) that 
the offender shall be fined and imprisoned.  It is also true that the proceedings to 
enforce the forfeiture against the res named must be a proceeding in rem and a civil action, while that to 
enforce the fine and imprisonment must be a criminal proceeding, as was held by 
this court in The Palmyra, 12 Wheat. 
1, 14.  Yet where an issue raised, 
as to the existence of the act or fact denounced, has been tried in a criminal 
proceeding instituted by the United States, and a judgment of acquittal has been 
rendered in favor of a particular person, that judgment is conclusive in favor 
of such person on the subsequent trial of a suit in rem by the United States where, as 
against him, the existence of the same act or fact is the matter in issue as a 
cause for the forfeiture of the property prosecuted in such suit in rem.  It is urged as a reason for not allowing 
such effect to the judgment that the acquittal in the criminal case may have 
taken place because of the rule requiring guilt to be proved beyond a reasonable 
doubt, and that, on the same evidence, on the question of preponderance of 
proof, there might be a verdict for the United States in the suit in rem.  Nevertheless, the fact or act has been 
put in issue and determined against the United 
States; and all that is 
imposed by the statute, as a consequence of guilt, is a punishment 
therefor.  There could be no new 
trial of the criminal prosecution after the acquittal in it; and a subsequent 
trial of the civil suit amounts to substantially the same thing, with a 
difference only in the consequences following a judgment adverse to the 
claimant.  When an acquittal in a 
criminal prosecution in behalf of the government is pleaded or offered in 
evidence by the same defendant, in an action against him by an individual, the 
rule does not apply, for the reason that the parties are not the same; and often 
for the additional reason that a certain intent must be proved to support the 
indictment, which need not be proved to support the civil action.  But upon this record, as we have already 
seen, the parties and the matter in issue are the same.

 
 

Id., 116 U.S.  at 442-43, 6 S. Ct.  at 
440-41.

 
 
[¶8]      Citing the 
following cases, the appellant contends that the holding of Coffey endures:  Lowther v. United States, 480 F.2d 1031, 
1034 (10th Cir. 1973) (acquittal on charge of firearms possession bars 
forfeiture action where the firearms were not illegal per se); United 
States v. One 1956 Ford Fairlane Tudor Sedan, 
272 F.2d 704, 704-05 (10th Cir. 1959) (acquittal on charge of transporting sugar 
intended for use in unlawful manufacture of distilled spirits barred forfeiture 
proceedings); Bramble v. Kleindienst, 
357 F. Supp. 1025, 1028 (D. Colo. 1973) (deferred prosecution arguably the 
equivalent of an acquittal in legal effect, therefore barring subsequent 
forfeiture proceeding); United States v. 
86.9 Cases, 337 F. Supp. 1355, 1356 (S.D. Fla. 1971) (acquittal on charge of 
failure to pay taxes on certain liquor barred subsequent forfeiture action, Coffey never having been overruled); United States v. One De Soto Sedan, 85 F. Supp. 245, 245-48 (D.N.C. 1949), aff'd, 180 F.2d 583 (4th Cir. N.C. 1950) 
(acquittal on charge of possession of distilled spirits upon which taxes had not 
been paid barred government from pursuing forfeiture of automobile in which the 
distilled spirits allegedly had been concealed, inasmuch as "the Coffey case has 
not been overruled.").

 
 
[¶9]      The one Wyoming 
case in which the doctrine of collateral estoppel was applied to forfeiture 
proceedings after a criminal action is State v. Eleven Thousand Three Hundred 
Forty-Six Dollars & No Cents in United States Currency, 777 P.2d 65 
(Wyo. 1989).  The particular facts 
of that case limit its precedential value in answering the question of the 
effect of a criminal case acquittal upon a subsequent civil forfeiture.  The facts were these:  After a drug investigation, a large sum 
of money was seized from Terry Jaeger and he was arrested for and charged with 
conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance.  Id. at 66.  He filed a motion to suppress in which 
he challenged the probable cause for both the search and seizure, and the 
arrest.  That motion was 
granted.  Id.  In the civil forfeiture proceeding that 
followed, Jaeger filed a motion for summary judgment based upon the premise 
that, it already having been judicially determined that probable cause did not 
exist to seize the money as controlled substance proceeds, the State was 
collaterally estopped from arguing under the forfeiture statute that probable 
cause existed to find that the money was used or intended to be used in 
violation of the controlled substance act.  
Id. at 
66-68.  That motion was granted and 
the State appealed.  In affirming 
the summary judgment, this Court carefully limited its opinion as to the extent 
of the effect of collateral estoppel.  
We held that the State was barred from relitigating the issue of whether 
the law enforcement officers had probable cause at the time of the seizure and 
arrest, but that the State was not barred from attempting to prove, under 
another subsection of the forfeiture statute, that the State Board of Pharmacy 
or the Attorney General otherwise had probable cause to believe that Jaeger's 
money was traceable to violations of the controlled substances act.  Id. 
at 68.  Thus, the case did not 
involve the direct issue of the effect of an acquittal upon a forfeiture 
action.1

 
 
[¶10]   Primarily, the State counters the 
appellant's arguments by noting that Coffey has, indeed, been overruled and 
is no longer the law of the land.  
In United 
States v. One Assortment of 89 Firearms, 465 U.S. 354, 361, 104 S. Ct. 1099, 1104, 79 L. Ed. 2d 361 (1984), overruled in part as stated in Ferguson v. 
United States, 911 F. Supp. 424 (C.D. Cal. 1995), the United States Supreme 
Court said the following about Coffey:

 
 
            
In focusing on Coffey v. United 
States, the Court of Appeals appears to have overlooked the significance of 
[Helvering v.] Mitchell[, 303 U.S. 391, 58 S. Ct. 630, 82 L. Ed. 917 (1938)] and 
One Lot Emerald Cut Stones [& One Ring v. United States, 409 U.S. 232, 93 S. Ct. 489, 34 L. Ed. 2d 438 (1972)].  
At the very least, Mitchell 
signaled that an acquittal of a criminal charge does not automatically bar 
an action to enforce sanctions by way of forfeiture of goods or other civil 
penalties.  Whatever the validity of 
Coffey on its facts, its ambiguous 
reasoning seems to have been a source of confusion for some time.  As long ago as Mitchell, this Court was urged to 
disapprove Coffey so as to make clear 
that an acquittal in a criminal trial does not bar a civil action for forfeiture 
even though based on the identical facts.  
Indeed, for nearly a century, the analytical underpinnings of Coffey have been recognized as less than 
adequate.  The time has come to 
clarify that neither collateral estoppel nor double jeopardy bars a civil, 
remedial forfeiture proceeding initiated following an acquittal on related 
criminal charges.  To the extent 
that Coffey v. United States suggests 
otherwise, it is hereby disapproved.

 
 
(Internal 
footnote omitted.)  See also Payne v. Tennessee, 501 U.S. 808, 828, 111 S. Ct. 2597, 2610, 
115 L. Ed. 2d 720 (1991).

 
 
[¶11]   Even before 89 Firearms, in Helvering v. Mitchell, 303 U.S. 391, 397, 58 S. Ct. 630, 632, 82 L. Ed. 917 (1938), the Supreme Court determined that Coffey did not apply to estop the 
government from pursuing a tax deficiency after an acquittal on related criminal 
charges because the recovery action required a different burden of proof.  Specifically, the Court said the 
following:

 
 
The 
acquittal was merely an adjudication that the proof was not sufficient to 
overcome all reasonable doubt of the guilt of the accused.  It did not determine that Mitchell had 
not willfully attempted to evade the tax.  
That acquittal on a criminal charge is not a bar to a civil action by the 
Government, remedial in its nature, arising out of the same facts on which the 
criminal proceeding was based has long been settled.

 
 

Id.  (Internal quotation marks and citations 
omitted.)

 
 
[¶12]   Helvering was reaffirmed in One Lot Emerald Cut Stones & One Ring v. 
United States, 409 U.S. 232, 235, 93 S. Ct. 489, 492, 34 L. Ed. 438 (1972), 
where the Supreme Court found that the differences in the burden of proof 
precluded application of the doctrine of collateral estoppel to bar the 
government from pursuing civil forfeiture where the defendant/claimant had been 
acquitted of smuggling in a previous criminal action.  Similar reasoning obtained a similar 
result in 89 Firearms, 465 U.S.  at 
361-62, 104 S. Ct.  at 1104, where acquittal on a charge of dealing firearms 
without a license did not bar the government from seeking civil forfeiture of 
the same firearms, because "the difference in the relative burdens of proof in 
the criminal and civil actions precludes the application of the doctrine of 
collateral estoppel."

 
 
[¶13]   We accept and adopt the reasoning 
of 89 Firearms, One Lot Emerald, and Helvering.  A general verdict of not guilty in a 
criminal case simply does not answer the same question asked in a civil 
forfeiture action under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 35-7-1049.  Because the jury returned a general 
verdict of not guilty on the three charges in the present case, we do not know 
what element of the crimes it found unproven beyond a reasonable doubt, and 
therefore, we do not know whether the jury determined that the seized items were 
not drug paraphernalia.  See United States v. Watts, 
519 U.S. 148, 155, 117 S. Ct. 633, 637, 
136 L. Ed. 554 (1997) ("the jury cannot be said to have necessarily rejected' 
any facts when it returns a general verdict of not guilty."); 89 Firearms, 465 U.S.  at 
361, 104 S. Ct.  at 1104 ("acquittal on criminal charges does not prove that the 
defendant is innocent; it merely proves the existence of a reasonable doubt as 
to his guilt.").2

 
 
CONCLUSION

 
 
[¶14]   The district court correctly 
determined that the acquittal of the appellant in the criminal case that 
preceded this forfeiture proceeding did not collaterally estop the State from 
pursuing forfeiture.

 
 
[¶15]   Affirmed.

FOOTNOTES

 
 

1For a 
similar case cited by the appellant, see 
State ex rel. Edmondson v. Two Hundred Thousand Four Hundred Ninety Dollars 
& No Cents in United 
 States Currency, 39 P.3d 160 (Okla. Civ. App. 
2001).

 
 

2We 
acknowledge that 89 Firearms has, in 
turn, been overruled in part.  In United States v. Halper, 490 U.S. 435, 
446-49, 109 S. Ct. 1892, 1900-02, 104 L. Ed. 2d 487 (1989), the Supreme Court held 
that a civil forfeiture that is grossly disproportionate to the criminal 
violation may, under double jeopardy analysis, be considered punitive rather 
than remedial, and may violate an appellant's constitutional rights in that 
regard.  The appellant in the 
instant case has not presented a double jeopardy claim and, in any event, we 
find that the forfeiture of drug paraphernalia does not resemble the facts of Halper, when a false claim totalling 
$585.00 resulted in a civil penalty of $130,000.00.  Id., 490 U.S.  at 437-38, 
109 S. Ct.  at 1896.  See also Austin v. United States, 509 U.S. 602, 113 S. Ct. 2801, 125 L. Ed. 2d 488 (1993) (civil forfeiture may also violate Eighth Amendment's excessive fines 
clause).  But see Hudson v. United States, 522 U.S. 93, 101-02, 118 S. Ct. 488, 
493-94, 139 L.Ed.2d. 450 (1997), where much of Halper's reasoning is disavowed because 
the double jeopardy clause does not apply to civil actions, and because Halper abandoned traditional standards 
of double jeopardy analysis.