Title: State v. Lovejoy

State: ohio

Issuer: Ohio Supreme Court

Document:

THE STATE OF OHIO, APPELLANT AND CROSS-APPELLEE, v. LOVEJOY, APPELLEE AND 
CROSS-APPELLANT. 
[Cite as State v. Lovejoy (1997), 79 Ohio St.3d 440.] 
Criminal law — Indictments — Several counts of multi-count indictment are not 
interdependent — Inconsistency in verdict arises, when — Applicability of 
double jeopardy and collateral estoppel. 
1.  The several counts of an indictment containing more than one count are not 
interdependent and an inconsistency in a verdict does not arise out of 
inconsistent responses to different counts, but only arises out of inconsistent 
responses to the same count.  (Browning v. State [1929], 120 Ohio St. 62, 
165 N.E. 566;  State v. Adams [1978], 53 Ohio St.2d 223, 7 O.O.3d 393, 
374 N.E.2d 137, paragraph two of the syllabus, vacated on other grounds 
[1978], 439 U.S. 811, 99 S.Ct. 69, 58 L.Ed.2d 103;  State v. Brown [1984], 
12 Ohio St.3d 147, 12 OBR 186, 465 N.E.2d 889;  and State v. Hicks 
[1989], 43 Ohio St.3d 72, 538 N.E.2d 1030, approved and followed.) 
2.  When a jury finds a defendant not guilty as to some counts and is hung on other 
counts, double jeopardy and collateral estoppel do not apply where the 
inconsistency in the responses arises out of inconsistent responses to 
different counts, not out of inconsistent responses to the same count. 
(No. 96-686 — Submitted April 16, 1997 — Decided September 24 , 1997.) 
APPEAL and CROSS-APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Franklin County, No. 
95APA07-849. 
 
On August 16, 1993, Christa L. Curry and her husband, Nathan Curry, were 
at their apartment, which they shared with Nathan’s brother, Neil Curry.  Christa 
and Nathan were planning to go to a softball game.  Christa was upstairs getting 
ready, and Nathan was downstairs with their twin daughters.  Christa heard 
 
2
someone kicking on the back door.  Nathan yelled upstairs and asked Christa if 
she was making the noise.  She told him that she was not.  She heard Nathan say, 
“Hold up a minute,” or “Wait a minute,” and then she heard two gunshots. 
 
As Christa came downstairs, she saw her husband fall to the floor.  An 
armed man approached her and stuck a gun in the side of her face and then in the 
back of her head and forced her to lie down on the floor.  The first armed man told 
a second man to enter the apartment.  As the second man proceeded upstairs to the 
front bedroom, he tripped over Christa as she lay on the floor.  Christa heard a 
loud noise from upstairs.  Shortly thereafter, the second man came downstairs, and 
both men left the apartment and fled in a car. 
 
Both Nathan Curry (the victim) and Neil Curry were marijuana dealers.  At 
the time of the murder, the victim, Nathan Curry, had seven pounds of marijuana 
in the apartment, while his brother, Neil, had four pounds of marijuana in the 
apartment. 
 
Within twenty minutes of the first police dispatch, the police apprehended 
the defendant-appellee and cross-appellant, Mark E. Lovejoy, and Darrell 
Stepherson in the vicinity.  Their car had been abandoned, and several neighbors 
had reported seeing two young black men jumping fences and hiding in the bushes 
around houses in the neighborhood.  One neighbor saw the men discard two guns 
under a bush.  The guns were retrieved, and tests showed that one of those guns 
was the murder weapon.  When arrested, the appellee had in his possession a black 
bag containing marijuana, which was later identified by Neil Curry as his four 
pounds of marijuana that had been taken from Nathan Curry’s residence. 
 
A Franklin County Grand Jury indicted appellee on five counts relating to 
the August 16, 1993 murder of Nathan Curry.  The indictment included charges of 
aggravated murder with prior calculation and design in violation of R.C. 
 
3
2903.01(A), aggravated murder committed during the course of a felony, i.e., an 
aggravated robbery in violation of R.C. 2903.01(B), aggravated robbery in 
violation of R.C. 2911.01, kidnapping in violation of R.C. 2905.01, and having a 
weapon under a disability in violation of R.C. 2923.13(A)(2).  The aggravated 
murder with prior calculation and design and felony murder charges each included 
two death penalty specifications.  The first was that the appellee committed the 
offense of aggravated murder for the purpose of escaping detection, apprehension, 
trial, or punishment for another offense committed by the appellee, namely 
aggravated robbery, in violation of R.C. 2929.04(A)(3).  The second specification 
was that the offense was committed while the appellee was fleeing immediately 
after committing aggravated robbery and the appellee was either the principal 
offender in the commission of the aggravated murder or, if not the principal 
offender, committed the aggravated murder with prior calculation and design, in 
violation of R.C. 2929.04(A)(7).  Further, the charge of having a weapon while 
under a disability contained a specification in accordance with R.C. 2941.143, 
alleging that the appellee made an actual threat of physical harm to Christa Curry 
with a deadly weapon.  In addition, all charges contained a firearm specification in 
accordance with R.C. 2941.141. 
 
On November 19, 1994, the first jury acquitted the appellee of aggravated 
murder with prior calculation and design and its lesser included offenses of 
murder and involuntary manslaughter.  However, the jury was unable to reach a 
verdict on the felony murder, aggravated robbery, or kidnapping charges.  
Subsequently, the court declared a mistrial on those counts.  The charge of 
carrying a firearm while under disability was tried to the bench, and the court 
found the appellee guilty but decided to postpone sentencing until the other three 
counts were retried. 
 
4
 
After the trial court declared a mistrial, the appellee moved the trial court to 
dismiss the felony murder charge on which the jury had hung and to enter a 
judgment of acquittal on grounds of double jeopardy and collateral estoppel.  The 
court denied the appellee’s motion.  In a second trial, the state retried the appellee 
on the remaining charges, including the felony murder charge based on the 
aggravated robbery, and obtained convictions for each. 
 
The Franklin County Court of Appeals reversed the appellee’s felony 
murder conviction, holding that the appellee’s acquittal of aggravated murder with 
prior calculation and design and its lesser included offenses of murder and 
involuntary manslaughter in his first trial barred his subsequent prosecution on the 
felony murder charge.  The appellate court based its conclusion on collateral 
estoppel, determining that the jury had decided in the appellee’s favor in the first 
trial either of the common issues of his identity as a participant in these crimes or 
his purpose to kill.  The appellate court also remanded the weapons under 
disability charge for a retrial. 
 
The cause is now before this court pursuant to the allowance of a 
discretionary appeal and cross-appeal. 
__________________ 
 
Ronald J. O’Brien, Franklin County Prosecuting Attorney, and Joyce S. 
Anderson, Assistant Prosecuting Attorney, for appellant and cross-appellee. 
 
Dennis C. Belli, for appellee and cross-appellant. 
__________________ 
 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, J.  The issue presented to us in this case is whether 
the doctrines of double jeopardy and collateral estoppel apply when a jury finds a 
defendant not guilty as to some counts and is hung as to other counts.  We find 
that these doctrines do not apply where the inconsistency in the responses arises 
out of inconsistent responses to different counts, not out of inconsistent responses 
 
5
to the same count.  In such cases, we further find the prosecution is entitled to 
retry the hung-jury counts provided that other criteria, such as sufficiency of the 
evidence, are met to allow retrial. 
 
A review of the purpose and history of double jeopardy and collateral 
estoppel is useful in resolving this issue.  Double jeopardy was established by the 
Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, which states: “No 
person shall * * * be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of 
life or limb * * *.”  The Fifth Amendment has been made applicable to the states 
through the Fourteenth Amendment. 
 
It is well established that the Double Jeopardy Clause protects against 
successive prosecutions for the same offense.  United States v. Dixon (1993), 509 
U.S. 688, 696, 113 S.Ct. 2849, 2855, 125 L.Ed.2d 556, 567.  It protects a person 
who has been acquitted from having to run the gauntlet a second time.  Ashe v. 
Swenson (1970), 397 U.S. 436, 445-446, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 1195, 25 L.Ed. 2d 469, 
476-477.  As stated in Green v. United States (1957), 355 U.S. 184, 187-188, 78 
S.Ct. 221, 223, 2 L.Ed.2d 199, 204: 
 
“The underlying idea [embodied in the Double Jeopardy Clause], one that is 
deeply ingrained in at least the Anglo-American system of jurisprudence, is that 
the State with all its resources and power should not be allowed to make repeated 
attempts to convict an individual for an alleged offense, thereby subjecting him to 
embarrassment, expense and ordeal and compelling him to live in a continuing 
state of anxiety and insecurity, as well as enhancing the possibility that even 
though innocent he may be found guilty.” 
 
In addition to its primary function of safeguarding against governmental 
overreaching (see Justices of Boston Mun. Court v. Lydon [1984], 466 U.S. 294, 
307, 104 S.Ct. 1805, 1812, 80 L.Ed.2d 311, 324), the double jeopardy guarantee 
 
6
protects a defendant’s “‘valued right to have his trial completed by a particular 
tribunal.’”  Crist v. Bretz (1978), 437 U.S. 28, 36, 98 S.Ct. 2156, 2161, 57 L.Ed.2d 
24, 31, quoting Wade v. Hunter (1949), 330 U.S. 684, 689, 69 S.Ct. 834, 837, 93 
L.Ed. 974, 978.  Once a tribunal has decided an issue of ultimate fact in the 
defendant’s favor, the double jeopardy doctrine also precludes a second jury from 
ever considering that same or identical issue in a later trial.  Dowling v. United 
States (1990), 493 U.S. 342, 348, 110 S.Ct. 668, 672, 107 L.Ed.2d 708, 717. 
 
Collateral estoppel is the doctrine that recognizes that a determination of 
facts litigated between two parties in a proceeding is binding on those parties in all 
future proceedings.  Collateral estoppel “means simply that when an issue of 
ultimate fact has once been determined by a valid and final judgment, that issue 
cannot again be litigated between the same parties in any future lawsuit.  Although 
first developed in civil litigation, collateral estoppel has been an established rule 
of federal criminal law at least since this Court’s decision more than 50 years ago 
in United States v. Oppenheimer (1916), 242 U.S. 85 [37 S.Ct. 68, 61 L.Ed. 161].”  
Ashe, supra, 397 U.S. at 443, 90 S.Ct. at 1194, 25 L.Ed.2d at 475.  Collateral 
estoppel generally refers to the acquittal prong of double jeopardy. 
 
However, the United States Supreme Court has held that double jeopardy 
does not apply to cases involving inconsistent verdicts and, by implication, hung 
juries.  In Dunn v. United States (1932), 284 U.S. 390, 393, 52 S.Ct. 189, 190, 76 
L.Ed. 356, 358-359, the United States Supreme Court found that consistency in a 
verdict was not required and that where offenses were separately charged in counts 
of a single indictment, even though the evidence was the same in support of each, 
an acquittal on one count could not be pleaded as res judicata as to the other.  The 
court found that the sanctity of the jury verdict should be preserved and could not 
be upset by speculation or inquiry into such matters to resolve the inconsistency.  
 
7
The court stated: “‘The most that can be said in such cases is that the verdict 
shows that either in the acquittal or the conviction the jury did not speak their real 
conclusions, but that does not show that they were not convinced of the 
defendant’s guilt.  We interpret the acquittal as no more than their assumption of a 
power which they had no right to exercise, but to which they were disposed 
through lenity.’”  Id., quoting Steckler v. United States (C.A.2, 1925), 7 F.2d 59, 
60. 
 
This principle of law was further affirmed in United States v. Powell (1984), 
469 U.S. 57, 105 S.Ct. 471, 83 L.Ed.2d 461, where a defendant was charged with 
using the telephone to facilitate crimes of conspiracy and drug possession, crimes 
that were alleged in the indictment separately from the telephone solicitation 
charge, a compound indictment.  In that case, a jury found the defendant not guilty 
of possession or conspiracy, but guilty of telephone solicitation to distribute 
cocaine.  Even though possession and conspiracy were predicate felonies, the 
United States Supreme Court still held that the inconsistent verdicts could not be 
overturned.  The court refused to weaken the Dunn rule, finding that “a criminal 
defendant already is afforded sufficient protection against jury irrationality or error 
by the independent review of the sufficiency of the evidence undertaken by the 
trial and appellate courts.”  Id. at 67, 105 S.Ct. at 478, 83 L.Ed.2d at 470.  The 
court rejected attempts by the lower courts of appeals to carve out exceptions to 
the Dunn case, and rejected defendant’s argument that the principles of res 
judicata or collateral estoppel should apply to verdicts rendered by a single jury 
where the jury acquitted the defendant of the predicate felony.  The court held: 
“We believe that the Dunn rule rests on a sound rationale that is independent of its 
theories of res judicata, and that it therefore survives an attack based upon its 
 
8
presently erroneous reliance on such theories.”  Id. at 64, 105 S.Ct. at 476, 83 
L.Ed.2d at 468. 
 
The court analyzed why inconsistent verdicts may work against the 
government as well as the defendant, and thus should not be used to grant the 
defendant a windfall when one cannot know the basis of the jury’s conclusions.  
The court therefore decided that the jury verdicts must be accepted as they stand.  
To do otherwise is too speculative.  The court concluded:  “We also reject, as 
imprudent and unworkable, a rule that would allow criminal defendants to 
challenge inconsistent verdicts on the ground that in their case the verdict was not 
the product of lenity, but of some error that worked against them.  Such an 
individualized assessment of the reason for the inconsistency would be based 
either on pure speculation, or would require inquiries into the jury’s deliberations 
that courts generally will not undertake. * * * But with few exceptions, * * * once 
the jury has heard the evidence and the case has been submitted, the litigants must 
accept the jury’s collective judgment.  Courts have always resisted inquiring into a 
jury’s thought processes * * *; through this deference the jury brings to the 
criminal process, in addition to the collective judgment of the community, an 
element of needed finality.”  Id. at 66-67, 105 S.Ct. at 477-478, 83 L.Ed.2d at 469-
470. 
 
The United States Supreme Court has applied the same principles to hung 
juries.  In Richardson v. United States (1984), 468 U.S. 317, 104 S.Ct. 3081, 82 
L.Ed.2d 242, the court reiterated its determination that neither a jury’s failure to 
reach a verdict nor a trial court’s declaration of a mistrial following a hung jury is 
an event that terminates jeopardy so as to bar a second trial on the mistried 
charges.  Id. at 325, 104 S.Ct. at 3086, 82 L.Ed.2d at 251.  The court explained the 
logic behind this conclusion as follows: 
 
9
 
“‘The double-jeopardy provision of the Fifth Amendment, however, does 
not mean that every time a defendant is put to trial before a competent tribunal he 
is entitled to go free if the trial fails to end in a final judgment.  Such a rule would 
create an insuperable obstacle to the administration of justice in many cases in 
which there is no semblance of the type of oppressive practices at which the 
double-jeopardy prohibition is aimed.  There may be unforeseeable circumstances 
that arise during a trial making its completion impossible, such as the failure of a 
jury to agree on a verdict.  In such event the purpose of law to protect society from 
those guilty of crimes frequently would be frustrated by denying courts power to 
put the defendant to trial again. * * * What has been said is enough to show that a 
defendant’s valued right to have his trial completed by a particular tribunal must in 
some instances be subordinated to the public’s interest in fair trials designed to 
end in just judgments.’”  Id., 468 U.S. at 324-325, 104 S.Ct. at 3085-3086, 82 
L.Ed.2d at 250, quoting Wade v. Hunter (1949), 336 U.S. 684, 688-689, 69 S.Ct 
834, 836-837, 93 L.Ed. 974, 978. 
 
The Richardson court reasoned that double jeopardy does not bar retrial on 
mistried counts unless there is some event that terminates the original jeopardy.  
Id., 468 U.S. at 325, 104 S.Ct. at 3086, 82 L.Ed.2d at 251.  The court specifically 
held that mistrial following a hung jury was not such an event. 
 
Having established that nothing in the federal Constitution bars a retrial 
after a hung jury, we now turn our attention to our own pronouncements on this 
issue.  The issue of inconsistent verdicts in response to different counts was 
addressed in State v. Adams (1978), 53 Ohio St.2d 223, 7 O.O.3d 393, 374 N.E.2d 
137, vacated on other grounds (1978), 439 U.S. 811, 99 S.Ct. 69, 58 L.Ed.2d 103.  
The court, in approving and following Browning v. State (1929), 120 Ohio St. 62, 
165 N.E. 566, stated, at paragraph two of the syllabus: 
 
10
 
“The several counts of an indictment containing more than one count are not 
interdependent and an inconsistency in a verdict does not arise out of inconsistent 
responses to different counts, but only arises out of inconsistent responses to the 
same count.  (Browning v. State, 120 Ohio St. 62 [165 N.E. 566], approved and 
followed.)” 
 
That proposition was reaffirmed in State v. Brown (1984), 12 Ohio St.3d 
147, 12 OBR 186, 465 N.E.2d 889, and most recently approved and followed in 
State v. Hicks (1989), 43 Ohio St.3d 72, 78, 538 N.E.2d 1030, 1037. 
 
In Brown, the defendant was indicted on three counts of rape, one count of 
gross sexual imposition, one count of kidnapping, and one count of robbery.  The 
jury found the defendant not guilty by reason of insanity as to two counts of rape 
and guilty as to the remaining counts in the indictment.  Clearly that fact pattern 
involved common issues to all counts.  The defendant argued that the jury could 
not consistently find the defendant sane as to some actions and insane as to others. 
 
Noting that the defendant did not contend that an inconsistency existed 
within a single count, the court found that the testimony in the case was that the 
defendant’s “borderline personality” could fade “in and out of sanity.”  Id. at 149, 
12 OBR at 188, 465 N.E.2d at 892.  The court held that the finding that the 
defendant was insane as to two of the rape charges but sane as to the remaining 
charges did not require reversal of the convictions. 
 
Turning to the fact pattern involved in this case, this case clearly fits within 
the parameters of Brown.  The defense argues that because the defendant was 
found not guilty of a lesser included offense in Count One, that finding is res 
judicata or collateral estoppel as to Count Two.  However, a basic understanding 
of how a case is sent to the jury and how the counts are presented to the jury is key 
to understanding why the Brown holding is still good law. 
 
11
 
The jury in this case was instructed that the case involved two counts. Count 
One charged the appellee with aggravated murder with prior calculation and 
design.  Count Two charged the appellee with felony murder based on aggravated 
robbery.  The lesser included offenses tracked each separate count and were not 
dependent on each other. 
 
In instructing the jury and reviewing the verdict forms on the track 
involving Count One, aggravated murder with prior calculation and design, the 
judge instructed the jury to first consider aggravated murder by prior calculation 
and design. 
 
The court then instructed on the lesser included charge of murder to Count 
One: 
 
“If you find the State failed to prove the element of prior calculation and 
design in the charge of aggravated murder, you may consider the lesser offense of 
murder as to Count 1.”  (Emphasis added.) 
 
The court later read the related verdict form to the jury as follows: 
 
“We the jury being duly impaneled upon our oaths and the law and evidence 
in this case, and having found the defendant Mark E. Lovejoy not guilty of 
aggravated murder as he is charged in Count 1 of the indictment, do further find 
the defendant guilty of murder.”   
 
The court next instructed on the second lesser included charge to Count 
One: 
 
“If you find that the State failed to prove purpose beyond a reasonable doubt 
that the defendant purposely caused the death of Nathan Curry, you must find the 
defendant not guilty of aggravated murder and not guilty of murder as to Count 1.  
You may then consider involuntary manslaughter.”  (Emphasis added.) 
 
The court later read the related verdict form to the jury as follows: 
 
12
 
“We the jury being duly impaneled and upon our oaths and law and 
evidence in this case, and having found the defendant Mark E. Lovejoy not guilty 
of aggravated murder, and not guilty of murder as he is charged in Count One of 
the indictment, do further find the defendant guilty of involuntary manslaughter.” 
 
Count Two, felony murder based on the aggravated robbery, had a similar 
track: 
 
“The defendant is charged with aggravated murder in Count 2 of the 
indictment.  Before you can find the defendant guilty in Count 2, you must find 
beyond a reasonable doubt that on or about the 16th day of August, 1993, in 
Franklin County, Ohio the defendant purposely caused the death of Nathan Curry 
while the defendant was committing or attempting to commit or fleeing 
immediately after committing or attempting to commit aggravated robbery.” 
 
The jury was asked to consider lesser included offenses of murder and 
involuntary manslaughter to the Count Two track, premised on aggravated 
robbery.  The jury instructions and verdict forms paralleled the format of Count 
One. 
 
The jury, in closing arguments, jury instructions and verdict forms, was 
advised that it had two tracks to consider, Count One, premised on aggravated 
murder with prior calculation and design and the two lesser included offenses 
based on Count One, and Count Two, felony murder while committing an 
aggravated robbery with its two lesser included offenses. 
 
The lesser included offenses merely flowed from the original.  The jury was 
not charged with only one set of lesser included offenses that could apply to either 
aggravated murder with prior calculation and design or felony murder based on the 
robbery.  They were given two different sets of lesser included offense verdict 
forms.  To find that collateral estoppel applies because the wording of the lesser 
 
13
included offenses of “murder” was the same in each count is to ignore the simple 
realities of the way the case went to the jury. 
 
Once the jury decided that prior calculation and design was not proven by 
the state, it could be considered logical for the jury to acquit the defendant of all 
charges in the track of Count One as the flow of the verdict forms guided them in 
that direction.  The jury consistently hung on all charged offenses in the track of 
Count Two, which involved the issue of robbery and its lesser included offenses.  
However, speculation as to why the jury failed to reach a verdict on the felony 
murder count only demonstrates the difficulty with trying to analyze a jury’s 
decision.  The Dunn court’s pronouncement that it is best to just “accept the jury’s 
collective judgment” so as to preserve the sanctity of the jury process is still sound 
public policy.  Powell, 469 U.S. at 67, 105 S.Ct. at 478, 83 L.Ed.2d at 470. 
 
This fact pattern is clearly distinguishable from State v. Liberatore (1983), 4 
Ohio St.3d 13, 4 OBR 11, 445 N.E.2d 1116.  In Liberatore, the victim was killed 
by a bomb placed in the car next to his, which was detonated by remote control.  
The defendant was charged with aggravated arson and aggravated murder with the 
aggravated arson as the predicate felony.  The jury acquitted the defendant of 
aggravated arson and hung on the aggravated murder charge.  The court found that 
since aggravated arson was the predicate crime for the aggravated murder, a 
judgment of acquittal on the aggravated arson foreclosed retrial of the defendant 
on aggravated murder.  Id. at 15, 4 OBR at 13, 445 N.E.2d at 1118.1 
 
In this case, had the jury acquitted the appellee of the robbery, and hung on 
Count Two, felony murder based on the aggravated robbery (an inconsistent 
verdict within a count), Liberatore would clearly apply and double jeopardy would 
attach.  Robbery was the underlying predicate for Count Two.2  However, 
Liberatore did not have two distinct tracks as in this case.  Murder, as a lesser 
 
14
included offense of each count, is not the same as a predicate felony for an 
aggravated murder conviction.  Thus, there is no need to reach the issues raised in 
Liberatore because Liberatore involved inconsistencies within the same count, an 
entirely different issue from that involved in this fact pattern. 
 
In conclusion, we see no reason to distinguish the fact pattern in this case 
from that in Brown.  Browning, Adams, Brown, and Hicks remain good law and 
resolve the issues in this case.  Therefore, we hold that when a jury finds a 
defendant not guilty as to some counts and is hung on other counts, double 
jeopardy and collateral estoppel do not apply where the inconsistency in the 
responses arises out of inconsistent responses to different counts, not out of 
inconsistent responses to the same count. 
CROSS-APPEAL 
 
The appellate court held that the appellee had to be retried on the charge of 
having a weapon under disability because it was error for the trial court to reopen 
the evidence sua sponte after closing arguments and take judicial notice of prior 
proceedings in an earlier case to supply a crucial fact that the state had failed to 
prove.  The state did not appeal the appellate court’s ruling on the judicial notice 
issue.  However, the appellate court further found that in light of its resolution of 
the appellee’s first two assignments of error, the appellee’s third assignment of 
error which challenged the sufficiency of the evidence was moot and remanded the 
case to the trial court for a retrial on that charge.  The appellee challenges that 
remand and argues that once the erroneous evidence was omitted, the court of 
appeals was obligated to review the remaining evidence and pass on its 
sufficiency. 
 
App.R. 12(A)(1) provides: 
 
15
 
“On an undismissed appeal from a trial court, a court of appeals shall do all 
of the following: 
 
“* * *  
 
“(c) Unless an assignment of error is made moot by a ruling on another 
assignment of error, decide each assignment of error and give reasons in writing 
for its decision.” 
 
Because the appellate court ruled on the judicial notice issue as it did, the 
issue of the sufficiency of the evidence was not moot.  In fact, the sufficiency of 
the remaining evidence then became the key issue.  To simply remand the weapon 
under disability charge for a retrial would give the state a “second bite at the 
apple” and a chance to present evidence it failed to offer at the first trial.  After 
determining that the evidence of the conviction was erroneously considered by the 
trial judge, the appellate court should have reviewed the remaining evidence to 
determine whether it was sufficient to support a conviction. 
 
While the court of appeals found that the assignment of error regarding 
sufficiency of the evidence was moot, we find that the court did in fact pass on this 
issue when it stated at page 18 of the opinion, “If the court had not taken judicial 
notice of this critical fact, the documents offered by the state were insufficient to 
prove that appellant was under a disability.”  Therefore, because that assignment 
of error was resolved, the decision to remand was improper.  In this case, the 
Double Jeopardy Clause applies.  In fact, this is what the Double Jeopardy Clause 
was intended to prevent.  If the state fails to present sufficient evidence to prove 
every element of the crime, it should not get a second opportunity to do that which 
it failed to do the first time.  Therefore, the charge of having a weapon while under 
disability is dismissed. 
 
16
 
Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the court of appeals and reinstate 
the judgment of the trial court as to the felony murder, aggravated robbery, and 
kidnapping convictions.  Further, we dismiss the charge of having a weapon under 
disability. 
Judgment reversed 
and cause dismissed in part.  
 
DOUGLAS, RESNICK and F.E. SWEENEY, JJ., concur. 
 
MOYER, C.J., PFEIFER and COOK, JJ., dissent. 
FOOTNOTES: 
1. 
Justice Holmes dissented, arguing that since the defendant was not accused 
of placing the bomb himself, but rather was accused of being part of the organized 
crime murder scheme, the jury could have found the defendant not guilty of 
aggravated arson, but still guilty of being part of the conspiracy that directed the 
murder.  Id. at 15-16, 4 OBR at 13-14, 445 N.E.2d at 1118-1119. 
2. 
The Liberatore decision is, however, contrary to the United States Supreme 
Court’s holding in Dunn, which did not reverse a conviction even though the 
defendant was found not guilty of the predicate offense. 
 
 
COOK, J., dissenting.  Because I believe that the Double Jeopardy Clause 
should have barred Lovejoy’s retrial for felony murder, I respectfully dissent. 
 
Unlike the defendants in the cases cited by the majority to support its 
position, Lovejoy did not seek to overturn a conviction on the grounds that the 
jury reached an inconsistent acquittal verdict in the same trial.  Instead, Lovejoy 
asserted that double jeopardy barred a second trial before a second jury after his 
acquittal on a lesser included offense of the mistried count. 
 
17
 
The cases cited by the majority demonstrate that the Double Jeopardy 
Clause is aimed at protecting defendants against multiple prosecutions for the 
same offense and safeguards a defendant’s valued right to have his trial completed 
by a particular tribunal. Yet the majority concludes that cases involving 
inconsistent jury verdicts reached in a single trial control this case. 
 
The majority is undoubtedly correct that the several counts of an indictment 
are not interdependent and follow different tracks during the course of a trial.  
Both this court and the United States Supreme Court consistently have reached 
that conclusion. See, e.g., Dunn v. United States (1932), 284 U.S. 390, 52 S.Ct. 
189, 76 L.Ed. 356; Browning v. State (1929), 120 Ohio St. 62, 165 N.E. 566.  That 
line of authority, however, does not answer the question presented here (i.e., 
whether Lovejoy’s acquittal on the charge of murder prevents his retrial for felony 
murder — a count on which the first jury hung).3  Enforcement of inconsistent 
verdicts in a single trial does not implicate the constitutional concerns present 
where the state obtains a conviction following successive prosecutions. See 
Nesbitt v. Hopkins (C.A.8, 1996), 86 F.3d 118, 121. 
 
Similarly, the issue presented in this case is not resolved by Richardson v. 
United States (1984), 468 U.S. 317, 104 S.Ct. 3081, 82 L.Ed.2d 242.  Richardson 
did not involve an analysis of whether a jury verdict of acquittal that accompanies 
the declaration of a mistrial after jury deadlock on a related count may bar 
reprosecution under the Double Jeopardy Clause of the United States Constitution.  
The Richardson court simply resolved that judicial declaration of a mistrial in 
response to a jury’s failure to reach a verdict is not an event that, by itself, 
terminates jeopardy so as to trigger the protections embodied in the Double 
Jeopardy Clause.  Id. at 326, 104 S.Ct. at 3086, 82 L.Ed.2d at 251.  In so holding, 
however, the Richardson court acknowledged that events such as an acquittal, or 
 
18
an appellate court’s finding of insufficient evidence to convict, act to terminate 
jeopardy.  Id. at 325, 104 S.Ct. at 3086, 82 L.Ed.2d at 251. 
 
Having explained why the cases cited by the majority do not mandate its 
conclusion, I next consider the arguments and authority presented by the parties.  
Additionally, because of the nature of this case, it is necessary to expand our 
constitutional analysis to include not only the protections embodied in the 
collateral estoppel (issue preclusion) prong of the Double Jeopardy Clause, but the 
concomitant protections present in its “same-offense” preclusion prong, as 
determined under the test enunciated in Blockburger v. United States (1932), 284 
U.S. 299, 304, 52 S.Ct. 180, 182, 76 L.Ed. 306, 309.  Compare State v. Broughton 
(1991), 62 Ohio St.3d 253, 581 N.E.2d 541. 
Applicability of Collateral Estoppel 
 
The state’s preliminary argument for reversal of the appellate court’s 
decision focuses on dicta found in the United States Supreme Court’s opinion in 
Ohio v. Johnson (1984), 467 U.S. 493, 500, 104 S.Ct. 2536, 2541, 81 L.Ed.2d 425, 
434, fn. 9, implying that the protections implicit in the doctrine of collateral 
estoppel are applicable only where the state prosecutes factually linked charges 
seriatim.  The state argues that the court’s statement in Johnson supports the 
distinction between cases of government overreaching — where a defendant is 
purposefully subjected to successive prosecutions that allegedly arise out of the 
same facts — and retrial of a defendant on grounds of manifest necessity 
occasioned by a jury’s inability to arrive at a verdict.  The state concedes that the 
doctrine of collateral estoppel is applicable to prevent the former scenario, but 
argues that the doctrine is inapplicable to the latter, as the concerns underlying the 
collateral estoppel doctrine are not present. 
 
19
 
Lovejoy relies on this court’s decision in State v. Liberatore (1983), 4 Ohio 
St.3d 13, 4 OBR 11, 445 N.E.2d 1116, and federal circuit court authority to 
demonstrate that the state’s interpretation of the Johnson footnote is erroneous. 
 
While, at first blush, the Johnson footnote appears to be directed to the 
situation presented in this case, closer analysis reveals that it is not.  The Johnson 
court reviewed a case where a criminal defendant entered guilty pleas to lesser 
included offenses of the crimes charged, which the court accepted over the state’s 
objection.  The defendant then attempted to use his convictions on the guilty pleas 
as a sword to strike down the state’s attempt to prosecute him on the other crimes 
for which he was indicted. 
 
Johnson involved prosecution following conviction without trial.  In 
contrast, the state subjected Lovejoy to two trials — an initial trial and a later trial 
on the counts on which the first jury had been unable to agree on a verdict.  In a 
literal sense, trial after a hung jury mistrial represents reprosecution of the 
defendant — seriatim prosecution.  Jeffers v. United States (1977), 432 U.S. 137, 
152, 97 S.Ct. 2207, 2217, 53 L.Ed.2d 168, 181.  Accordingly, the collateral 
estoppel branch of the double jeopardy doctrine, which relates solely to 
prosecutions following an acquittal verdict, while wholly inapplicable to the 
Johnson facts, remains potentially applicable in the present case. 
 
In Ashe v. Swenson (1970), 397 U.S. 436, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 25 L.Ed.2d 469, 
the court recognized that the Double Jeopardy Clause incorporates the doctrine of 
collateral estoppel.  In defining the rule of collateral estoppel, the Ashe court 
stated:  “[W]hen an issue of ultimate fact has once been determined by a valid and 
final judgment, that issue cannot again be litigated between the same parties in any 
future lawsuit.”  Id. at 443, 90 S.Ct. at 1194, 25 L.Ed.2d at 475.  As a component 
of the Double Jeopardy Clause, collateral estoppel “protects a man who has been 
 
20
acquitted from having to ‘run the gantlet’ a second time.”  Id. at 445-446, 90 S.Ct. 
at 1195, 25 L.Ed.2d at 476-477.  The rule dictates that once a tribunal has decided 
an issue of ultimate fact in the defendant’s favor, a second jury may not reach a 
directly contrary conclusion in a later trial.  Dowling v. United States (1990), 493 
U.S. 342, 348, 110 S.Ct. 668, 672, 107 L.Ed.2d 708, 717. 
 
Courts analyzing the issue presently under consideration have consistently 
held collateral estoppel applicable as a mandate of the federal Constitution’s 
Double Jeopardy Clause.  See, e.g., United States v. Shenberg (C.A.11, 1996), 89 
F.3d 1461, 1479; United States v. McLaurin (C.A.9, 1995), 57 F.3d 823, 826; 
United States v. Bailin (C.A.7, 1992), 977 F.2d 270, 275-276; United States v. 
Frazier (C.A.6, 1989), 880 F.2d 878, 883; State v. Crate (1996), 141 N.H. 489, 
686 A.2d 318; Ferrell v. State (1990), 318 Md. 235, 248-256, 567 A.2d 937, 944-
948.  In reaching that conclusion, those courts have recognized that “‘[a]llowing a 
second jury to reconsider the very issue upon which the defendant has prevailed 
serves no valuable function.  To the contrary, it implicates concerns about the 
injustice of exposing a defendant to repeated risks of conviction for the same 
conduct, and to the ordeal of multiple trials, that lie at the heart of the double 
jeopardy clause.’” Bailin, supra, at 277, quoting United States v. Mespoulede 
(C.A.2, 1979), 597 F.2d 329, 336-337.  I would approve Liberatore, supra, as this 
court’s acknowledgment that the doctrine of collateral estoppel is applicable to bar 
retrial of mistried counts in criminal cases involving partial verdicts of acquittal.4 
Defendant’s Burden of Establishing a Factual Predicate 
 
A determination that the doctrine of collateral estoppel is potentially 
applicable to bar retrial of mistried counts, however, does not end the inquiry.  
Instead, it is proper next to review the appellate court’s decision to determine 
whether it correctly concluded that the bar attaches in this case.  In making that 
 
21
determination, a court must “‘examine the record of the prior proceeding, taking 
into account the pleadings, evidence, charge, and other relevant matter, and 
conclude whether a rational jury could have grounded its verdict upon an issue 
other than that which the defendant seeks to foreclose from consideration.’”  Ashe, 
397 U.S. at 444, 90 S.Ct. at 1194, 25 L.Ed.2d at 475-476, quoting Mayers & 
Yarborough, Bis Vexari: New Trials and Successive Prosecutions (1960), 74 
Harv.L.Rev. 1, 38-39.  It is the defendant’s burden “to demonstrate that the issue 
whose relitigation he seeks to foreclose was actually decided in the first 
proceeding.”  Dowling v. United States (1990), 493 U.S. 342, 350, 110 S.Ct. 668, 
673, 107 L.Ed.2d 708, 719.  The court has termed this burden a “factual predicate 
for the application of the doctrine.”  Schiro v. Farley (1994), 510 U.S. 222, 232, 
114 S.Ct. 783, 790, 127 L.Ed.2d 47, 58. 
 
Upon review of the record, I am unconvinced that Lovejoy carried his 
burden of establishing the factual predicate.  The court of appeals determined that 
the jury’s verdict acquitting Lovejoy of murder was grounded on either of two 
conclusions — (1) that Lovejoy was not a participant in the crime, or (2) that 
Lovejoy did not act with purpose in causing Curry’s death (the element of purpose 
is common to murder and felony-murder aggravated murder).  Review of the 
evidence at trial, the charge to the jury, and Ohio law, however, does not compel 
that conclusion. 
 
The state’s evidence did not implicate Lovejoy as the principal offender in 
Curry’s murder.  Instead, the state sought to impose criminal responsibility on 
Lovejoy as an aider and abettor.  The state tried the defendant on two separate 
counts of aggravated murder.  The first count charged that Lovejoy purposely 
caused Curry’s death with prior calculation and design.  In connection with the 
first count, the court also charged the jury on lesser included offenses of murder 
 
22
and involuntary manslaughter.  The second count charged Lovejoy with 
aggravated murder for purposely causing Curry’s death in connection with the 
commission of a felony.  Under the second count, the court instructed the jury on 
lesser included offenses of murder and involuntary manslaughter, as it had done in 
connection with count one. 
 
In attempting to prove that Lovejoy intended Curry’s death, the state relied 
heavily on Lovejoy’s participation in the aggravated robbery.  According to the 
state, Lovejoy’s motive to kill Curry resulted from commission of the robbery — 
to avoid retribution.  Moreover, the bulk of the state’s evidence on the prior-
calculation-and-design murder charge relied on inferences from the manner in 
which the robbery was allegedly committed.  The state produced scant evidence 
apart from Lovejoy’s alleged participation in the robbery that would have 
demonstrated that Lovejoy and Stepherson (the principal offender in the murder) 
devised a plan to kill Curry. 
 
The court charged the jury as follows: 
 
“When a person has engaged in a common design with another to commit 
aggravated robbery by force or violence or in a manner likely to produce death, it 
may be inferred that such person intended to cause the death of any other person 
who is killed during the commission of the offense.  That inference, however, is 
not conclusive, but it may be considered in determining intent.”  
 
The jury charge is a correct statement of Ohio law.  R.C. 2903.01(D); State 
v. Coleman (1988), 37 Ohio St.3d 286, 525 N.E.2d 792, paragraph one of the 
syllabus.  For the inference to be made, however, the jury was first required to 
determine that Lovejoy engaged in a common design with an accomplice to 
commit the robbery.  Because the jury was unable to agree on a verdict as to count 
two and its lesser included offenses and count three (the aggravated robbery 
 
23
charge itself), it is plausible that the jury considered itself restrained from 
considering evidence related to the robbery in connection with count one. 
 
Without the benefit of inferences drawn from commission of the robbery, 
the jury was left with the scantiest of evidence upon which to base Lovejoy’s 
purpose.  This may be why the jury returned acquittal verdicts on all of the charges 
related to the prior-calculation-and-design count — because, aside from proof of 
the robbery, which was an element of the felony-murder charge, there was little 
independent evidence upon which a jury could ground a finding of purpose to kill.  
Given this scenario, the jury’s acquittal on the charges related to the prior-
calculation-and-design murder count does not equal a decision favorable to 
Lovejoy on the issues of purpose or identity regarding the felony-murder charge. 
 
Finally, considering the court’s instructions, the jury determinations do not 
clearly establish a finding in Lovejoy’s favor on the issue of purpose or identity.  
Instead they reveal only inconsistency. 
 
Regarding the felony-murder count, the jury was charged, “If you find that 
the State failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant purposely 
caused the death of Nathan Curry, you will find the defendant not guilty of 
aggravated murder and not guilty of murder * * *.” The court also generally 
charged the jury, “If you are not convinced beyond a reasonable doubt that the 
defendant was the person who committed the crime, you must find the defendant 
not guilty.”  Here, if we were to assume the jury unanimously determined the issue 
of identity or purpose to kill in Lovejoy’s favor in connection with his acquittal of 
murder at the first trial, the jury would have also been required to enter an 
acquittal on the felony-murder charge and its lesser included offense of murder. 
Compare United States v. Aguilar-Aranceta (C.A.1, 1992), 957 F.2d 18.  Instead, 
the jury failed to agree on any verdict regarding count two. 
 
24
 
In sum, the jury verdict did not necessarily depend on a finding that Lovejoy 
was not a participant in the crime or that Lovejoy lacked purpose to cause Curry’s 
death.  Accordingly, I would conclude that Lovejoy has not carried his burden of 
establishing a finding in his favor on either issue. 
Acquittal on “Same Offense” as an Act Terminating Jeopardy 
 
One final issue requires analysis — should Lovejoy’s acquittal of murder in 
connection with count one (prior-calculation-and-design murder) bar a second trial 
after a hung jury mistrial on count two (felony-murder) under the Blockburger 
test?  In Blockburger, 284 U.S. at 304, 52 S.Ct. at 182, 76 L.Ed. at 309, the court 
stated that “where the same act or transaction constitutes a violation of two distinct 
statutory provisions, the test to be applied to determine whether there are two or 
only one, is whether each provision requires proof of a fact which the other does 
not.” 
 
Other courts, relying on Richardson, have reasoned that jeopardy continues 
on any count resulting in a hung jury mistrial and a defendant’s only protection 
against a second trial resides in the collateral estoppel doctrine.5  It is my belief 
that this conclusion results from a reading of Richardson that is unduly 
formalistic, resulting in a strained attempt by courts to reason that collateral 
estoppel applies outside of jeopardy concepts. 
 
As a prerequisite to application of the double jeopardy doctrine, Richardson 
requires only the occurrence of “some event” terminating the original jeopardy.  
Richardson, 468 U.S. at 325, 104 S.Ct. at 3086, 82 L.Ed.2d at 251.  The 
Richardson court referred to an acquittal as being such an event, but never stated 
whether an acquittal on one count may terminate jeopardy as to another. 
 
In Price v. Georgia (1970), 398 U.S. 323, 329, 90 S.Ct. 1757, 1761, 26 
L.Ed.2d 300, 305, the court recognized an implied acquittal (where a jury returns a 
 
25
conviction on a lesser included offense when given a choice between a lesser and 
greater offense) as an event that terminates jeopardy.  Conceptually, a jury’s 
silence regarding a greater offense in the implied-acquittal context is different 
from a court’s declaration of a mistrial for the jury’s inability to reach a verdict.  In 
the implied-acquittal scenario, we may assume that the jury considered and 
rejected conviction of the greater offense.  In the hung-jury-mistrial scenario, that 
inference is foreclosed.  Nevertheless, the Price court’s recognition of an implied 
acquittal as an event that terminates jeopardy argues against an overly formalistic 
reading of Richardson, by demonstrating that an acquittal on one charge may 
terminate jeopardy as to another. 
 
The Richardson court, citing Burks v. United States (1978), 437 U.S. 1, 98 
S.Ct. 2141, 57 L.Ed.2d 1, also recognized that a judicial declaration of insufficient 
evidence to convict is an event that terminates jeopardy.  Richardson, 468 U.S. at 
325, 104 S.Ct. at 3086, 82 L.Ed.2d at 251.  The Burks court held that an 
unreversed appellate ruling that the government had failed to introduce sufficient 
evidence at a first trial terminated the defendant’s jeopardy, because that ruling 
constituted a decision that the government had failed to prove its case.  Burks, 437 
U.S. at 10-11, 98 S.Ct. at 2147, 57 L.Ed.2d at 9. 
 
In determining whether jeopardy terminates after a trial resulting in a partial 
verdict and a hung jury mistrial, a rigid, mechanistic rule that the defendant always 
remains in continuing jeopardy regarding those counts for which the court 
declared a mistrial is inappropriate. See Illinois v. Somerville (1973), 410 U.S. 
458, 467, 93 S.Ct. 1066, 1072, 35 L.Ed.2d 425, 432.  Instead, an acquittal verdict 
should terminate jeopardy not only as to the charge for which it is returned, but 
also as to any charge that would require the state to prove the acquitted charge as a 
subcomponent.  The acquittal demonstrates a resolution, correct or not, that the 
 
26
state has failed to prove the elements of that offense after one full and fair 
opportunity to do so.  To that decision, the Double Jeopardy Clause affords 
finality.  Dowling, supra, 493 U.S. at 355, 110 S.Ct. at 676, 107 L.Ed.2d at 722 
(Brennan, J., dissenting); Fong Foo v. United States (1962), 369 U.S. 141, 143, 82 
S.Ct. 671, 672, 7 L.Ed.2d 629, 631. 
 
It would be repugnant to the principles of double jeopardy to subject a 
defendant to a second trial on a compound offense that required him to defend 
against that same charge (as a subcomponent of a compound offense) for which he 
formerly received a verdict of acquittal (e.g., felony-murder trial after acquittal of 
the underlying felony).  The same concern arises where a defendant is retried on a 
greater offense after a hung jury mistrial, where the original jury acquitted the 
defendant of a lesser included offense (e.g., prior-calculation-and-design murder 
trial after acquittal of murder).  In contrast, where a jury acquits on a compound 
offense but is hung on the predicate offense, the same concerns are not present on 
the retrial of the predicate offense — the state will not again seek to prove that the 
defendant committed an offense upon which he was formerly acquitted (e.g., hung 
jury on the underlying felony and acquittal of felony-murder aggravated murder).  
The same is true where a defendant is retried on a lesser included offense after a 
hung jury mistrial, where a jury formerly acquitted the defendant of the greater 
offense (e.g., hung jury on murder and acquittal of prior-calculation-and-design 
aggravated murder). 
 
In this case the jury acquitted Lovejoy of murder under R.C. 2903.02 in 
connection with count one.  As stated in the Legislative Service Commission’s 
comment to R.C. 2903.02, “the offense can be a lesser included offense to both 
forms of aggravated murder.”  In fact, in this case, the court gave an identical 
charge of murder as a lesser included offense under both counts.  Both counts 
 
27
involved the same victim, the same conduct, and the same proof.  There is no legal 
basis under which the murder charges under counts one and two may be 
distinguished. 
 
Because, at the second trial, to gain a conviction on the felony-murder 
charge the state was required to prove every element of the formerly acquitted 
murder charge, the Double Jeopardy Clause prohibited Lovejoy’s retrial for 
aggravated murder.  The prior acquittal terminated Lovejoy’s jeopardy on the 
mistried aggravated murder charge, and Blockburger may be applied to bar the 
second trial. 
Issue on Cross-Appeal 
 
Consistent with Lockhart v. Nelson (1988), 488 U.S. 33, 109 S.Ct. 285, 102 
L.Ed.2d 265, the appellate court’s ruling that the trial court erred in taking judicial 
notice of Lovejoy’s prior conviction does not bar Lovejoy’s retrial on the charge 
of having a weapon while under a disability, despite any claim that, absent judicial 
notice, the state’s evidence was insufficient to support a conviction. 
 
The test announced in Lockhart looks to all the evidence actually admitted 
to determine sufficiency for purposes of the double jeopardy doctrine.  Id. at 40, 
109 S.Ct. at 290-291, 102 L.Ed.2d at 273. That the court admitted evidence 
erroneously goes only to ordinary issues of trial error and has fundamentally 
different implications from a reversal based on evidentiary insufficiency.  Trial 
error does not imply guilt or innocence of the defendant, but is a determination 
that the defendant has been convicted through a defective process. Id.  
Accordingly, the appellate court acted correctly in remanding the case for a new 
trial after determining that the trial court erred in its use of judicial notice. 
Conclusion 
 
28
 
In accordance with the above analysis, I would affirm the judgment of the 
appellate court. 
 
MOYER, C.J., and PFEIFER, J., concur in the foregoing dissenting opinion. 
 
FOOTNOTES: 
3. 
In reaffirming the Dunn rule, the Supreme Court specifically noted that 
Dunn’s statements regarding res judicata, if not incorrect at the time, are no longer 
acceptable in light of more recent cases analyzing collateral estoppel. United 
States v. Powell (1984), 469 U.S. 57, 64, 105 S.Ct. 471, 476, 83 L.Ed.2d 461, 468.  
Nonetheless, the Powell court found the Dunn rule rests on sound rationale 
independent of its erroneous reliance on theories of res judicata.  Accordingly, the 
Dunn rule is of limited value where, as here, multiple prosecutions invoke double 
jeopardy concerns not present in the Dunn scenario of inconsistent verdicts. 
4. 
The majority’s attempt to distinguish State v. Liberatore (1983), 4 Ohio 
St.3d 13, 4 OBR 11, 445 N.E.2d 1116, fails.  Liberatore was, in fact, indicted on 
separate counts of aggravated arson and aggravated murder.  Aggravated arson 
served as the predicate felony for the aggravated murder charge.  Nevertheless, 
both statutory offenses were charged as separate counts in the indictment.  This 
was also the case in State v. Adams (1978), 53 Ohio St.2d 223, 7 O.O.3d 393, 374 
N.E.2d 137, where the court allowed conviction of the compound offense to stand 
despite acquittal in the same trial on a separate count containing its predicate 
offense. 
 
Moreover, federal authority does not support the majority’s distinction.  In 
United States v. Powell (1984), 469 U.S. 57, 67-68, 105 S.Ct. 471, 478, 83 
L.Ed.2d 461, 470, the court declined to carve out an exception to the Dunn rule 
 
29
where “the jury acquits a defendant of a predicate felony, but convicts on the 
compound felony.” 
5.  
Demonstrative of this trend is the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals’ 
decision in United States v. Bailin (C.A.7, 1992), 977 F.2d 270, 275-276, which 
has been either expressly adopted or cited with approval by many state and federal 
courts.  See, e.g., United States v. Shenberg (C.A.11, 1996), 89 F.3d 1461, 1479. 
 
The Bailin court cited Richardson for the proposition that the defendant 
therein remained in continuing jeopardy regarding counts for which a jury was 
unable to reach a verdict, resulting in the court’s declaration of a mistrial.  Despite 
finding continuing jeopardy, the Bailin court held that collateral estoppel was 
applicable, apparently analyzing collateral estoppel as a concept independent of 
jeopardy concerns. 
 
In Ashe v. Swenson (1970), 397 U.S. 436, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 25 L.Ed.2d 469, 
the court held that collateral estoppel is embodied in the Fifth Amendment’s 
guarantee against double jeopardy and, therefore, is applicable to the states 
through the Fourteenth Amendment.  Id. at 445, 90 S.Ct. at 1195, 25 L.Ed.2d at 
476.  As a matter of federal constitutional law, collateral estoppel is derivative of 
the Double Jeopardy Clause, and therefore its protections should attach only after 
jeopardy has terminated.  I find no authority in Supreme Court precedent that 
would impose concepts of collateral estoppel embodied in the Double Jeopardy 
Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution upon the states 
outside of that clause’s application. 
 
The Bailin court reasoned that “collateral estoppel is applicable in criminal 
cases only when double jeopardy is not.”  (Emphasis sic.)  It supports this 
statement by postulating that if collateral estoppel were to operate only in the 
 
30
double jeopardy sphere, Ashe would be overruled and collateral estoppel would 
become a nullity.  Bailin, supra, 977 F.2d at 275. 
 
I believe an acquittal terminates jeopardy not only on the count for which 
the defendant received an acquittal verdict, but also as to separate offenses that 
share common issues of ultimate fact necessarily determined in a defendant’s 
favor as subsumed in an acquittal verdict, as determined under the Ashe test.  Ashe 
embodies the Supreme Court’s recognition that, for purposes of double jeopardy, 
there is no constitutional distinction between reprosecuting a criminal defendant 
on the same count for which he received an acquittal verdict and reprosecuting a 
criminal defendant on a separate offense involving a common issue of ultimate 
fact that was decided in the defendant’s favor at an earlier trial.  Ashe, 397 U.S. at 
446, 90 S.Ct. at 1196, 25 L.Ed.2d at 477. 
 
“[A]n acquittal ‘represents a resolution, correct or not, of some or all of the 
factual elements of the offense charged.’ (Emphasis added.)” Justices of Boston 
Mun. Court v. Lydon (1984), 466 U.S. 294, 309, 104 S.Ct. 1805, 1814, 80 L.Ed.2d 
311, 325, quoting United States v. Martin Linen Supply Co. (1977), 430 U.S. 564, 
571, 97 S.Ct. 1349, 1355, 51 L.Ed.2d 642, 651.  The guarantee against double 
jeopardy extends to protect “the accused from attempts to relitigate the facts 
underlying a prior acquittal.”  Brown v. Ohio (1977), 432 U.S. 161, 165-166, 97 
S.Ct. 2221, 2225, 53 L.Ed.2d 187, 194.