Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/524bv.pdf
Page Number: 776

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Unit: $U98

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Cite as: 524 U. S. 721 (1998)

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Opinion of the Court

stitute[s] a decision to the effect that the government has
Id., at 443 (quoting Burks, supra,
failed to prove its case.’ ”
at 15).

Moreover, we reasoned that the “embarrassment, expense
and ordeal” as well as the “anxiety and insecurity” that a
capital defendant faces “are at least equivalent to that faced
by any defendant at the guilt phase of a criminal trial.”
451
U. S., at 445. And we cited the “unacceptably high risk”
that repeated attempts to persuade a jury to impose the
death penalty would lead to an erroneous capital sentence.
Id., at 445–446. We later extended the rule set forth in
Bullington to a capital sentencing scheme in which the
judge, as opposed to a jury, had initially determined that a
life sentence was appropriate. See Arizona v. Rumsey, 467
U. S. 203, 209–210 (1984).

Petitioner contends that the rationale for imposing a dou-
ble jeopardy bar in Bullington and Rumsey applies with
equal force to California’s proceedings to determine the
truth of a prior conviction allegation. Like the Missouri
capital sentencing scheme at issue in Bullington, petitioner
argues, the sentencing proceedings here have the “hallmarks
of a trial on guilt or innocence” because the sentencer makes
an objective ﬁnding as to whether the prosecution has
proved a historical fact beyond a reasonable doubt. The de-
termination whether a defendant in fact has qualifying prior
convictions may be distinguished, petitioner maintains, from
the normative decisions typical of traditional sentencing.
In
petitioner’s view, once a defendant has obtained a favorable
ﬁnding on such an issue, the State should not be permitted
to retry the allegation.

Even assuming, however, that the proceeding on the prior
conviction allegation has the “hallmarks” of a trial that we
identiﬁed in Bullington, a critical component of our reason-
ing in that case was the capital sentencing context. The
penalty phase of a capital trial is undertaken to assess the
gravity of a particular offense and to determine whether it