Opinion ID: 2614563
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Current Double Jeopardy Balance: The Double Jeopardy Bar After a Mistrial or Reversal of a Conviction as a Result of Prosecutorial Misconduct

Text: Given the tension between the competing interests of the defendant and society with regard to the double jeopardy clause, we now review various approaches that have attempted to effectuate a workable limitation on prosecutorial discretion.
In Kennedy, the United States Supreme Court held that the double jeopardy clause of the fifth amendment to the United States Constitution does not bar a subsequent reprosecution unless the prosecution acted with the specific intent to cause the defendant to move for a mistrial. 456 U.S. at 676, 102 S.Ct. 2083. Kennedy was charged with the theft of an oriental rug. Id. at 669, 102 S.Ct. 2083. At trial, the prosecution called an expert witness on the subject of Middle Eastern rugs to testify regarding the value and identity of the rug in question. Id. On redirect examination, the prosecution sought to elicit the reasons for the witness' complaint against Kennedy. Id. After the trial court sustained a series of objections to this line of questioning, the following colloquy ensued: Prosecutor: Have you ever done business with the Kennedys? Witness: No, I have not. Prosecutor: Is that because he is a crook? Id. (emphasis added). The trial court then granted Kennedy's motion for a mistrial, but found that it was not the intention of the prosecution to cause a mistrial. Id. (citation omitted). On appeal, the Oregon Court of Appeals applied the rule that retrial is barred where the error that prompted the mistrial is intended to provoke a mistrial or is `motivated by bad faith or undertaken to harass or prejudice' the defendant. Id. at 670, 102 S.Ct. 2083 (citation omitted). According to the Oregon Court of Appeals, the prosecution's conduct constituted overreaching, and Kennedy's conviction was reversed. Id. On certiorari to the United States Supreme Court, a plurality of the Court chose not to concentrate on the egregiousness of the prosecution's overall conduct at trial, focusing instead on the prosecutor's subjective intent. Id. at 675-76, 102 S.Ct. 2083. The Kennedy Court reasoned that this specific intent standard was preferable in situations involving prosecutorial misconduct because a more general test would bar more retrials after findings of prosecutorial misconduct and could have a chilling effect on the prosecution. See id. at 674-75, 102 S.Ct. 2083. The Kennedy Court further noted that the specific intent standard, which was narrower than the standard applied by the Oregon Court of Appeals, was more manageable because it merely call[ed] for the [trial] court to make a finding of fact as to the prosecutor's intent. Id. at 675, 102 S.Ct. 2083. Consequently, the Kennedy Court limited the application of the double jeopardy bar to situations where the prosecutor intended to goad the defendant into requesting a mistrial and where the primary motivation for such goading was to obtain a second chance to obtain a more favorable opportunity to convict on retrial. See id. at 675-76, 102 S.Ct. 2083. In other words, regardless how egregious, a prosecutor's misconduct does not bar reprosecution absent intent ... to subvert the protections afforded by the Double Jeopardy Clause. Id. In a concurring opinion authored by Justice Stevens, four justices disagreed with the plurality, [7] contending that the specific intent test would make it nearly impossible for a defendant to prove that the prosecutor intended by deliberate misconduct to provoke a mistrial and not merely to prejudice the defendant. Id. at 688, 102 S.Ct. 2083 (Stevens, Brennan, Marshall, and Blackmun, JJ., concurring). According to Justice Stevens's concurring opinion, [t]here are other situations in which the defendant's double jeopardy interests outweigh society's interest in obtaining a judgment on the merits even though the defendant has moved for a mistrial. For example, a prosecutor may be interested in putting the defendant through the embarrassment, expense, and ordeal of criminal proceedings even if he cannot obtain a conviction. In such a case, with the purpose of harassing the defendant the prosecutor may commit repeated prejudicial errors and be indifferent between a mistrial or mistrials and an unsustainable conviction or convictions. Another example is when the prosecutor seeks to inject enough unfair prejudice into the trial to ensure a conviction but not so much as to cause a reversal of that conviction. This kind of overreaching would not be covered by the Court's standard because, by hypothesis, the prosecutor's intent is to obtain a conviction, not to provoke a mistrial. Yet the defendant's choiceto continue the tainted proceeding or to abort it and begin anew can be just as hollow in this situation as when the prosecutor intends to provoke a mistrial. To invoke the exception for overreaching, a court need not divine the exact motivation for the prosecutorial error. It is sufficient that the court is persuaded that egregious prosecutorial misconduct has rendered unmeaningful the defendant's choice to continue or to abort the proceeding. Id. at 689, 102 S.Ct. 2083 (emphasis added).
Recognizing the inadequacy of the specific intent test set forth in Kennedy in ensuring double jeopardy protection against retrial as a result of prosecutorial misconduct, a growing number of jurisdictions have rejected the Kennedy standard and have shifted the focus of inquiry away from the prosecution's specific intent. Following the reasoning of Justice Stevens's concurring opinion, these courts have recognized that overreaching by the prosecution can sometimes justify a double jeopardy bar to a subsequent reprosecution even without the prosecutor's specific intent to cause a mistrial with the purpose of obtaining a more favorable opportunity to secure a conviction. See, e.g., State v. Kennedy, 295 Or. 260, 666 P.2d 1316 (1983) (holding under the Oregon Constitution, on remand from the United States Supreme Court, that retrial is barred when official conduct is so prejudicial to the defendant that it cannot be cured by means short of a mistrial, and if the official knows that the conduct is improper and prejudicial and either intends or is indifferent to the resulting mistrial or reversal); State v. White, 85 N.C.App. 81, 354 S.E.2d 324, 329 (1987) (noting that the better reasoned arguments support the broader test that includes bad faith prosecutorial overreaching or harassment aimed at prejudicing the defendant's chances for acquittal), aff'd, 322 N.C. 506, 369 S.E.2d 813 (1988); People v. Dawson, 154 Mich.App. 260, 397 N.W.2d 277, 282 (1986) (noting substantial difficulties with the United States Supreme Court's [specific intent] ... standard), aff'd, 431 Mich. 234, 427 N.W.2d 886 (1988); United States v. Wallach, 979 F.2d 912, 916 (2d Cir.1992), cert. denied, 508 U.S. 939, 113 S.Ct. 2414, 124 L.Ed.2d 637 (1993) (acknowledging in dictum that the double jeopardy clause may protect a defendant from retrial... where prosecutorial misconduct is undertaken with the intention of denying the defendant an opportunity to win an acquittal). For example, in Commonwealth v. Smith, 532 Pa. 177, 615 A.2d 321 (1992), the Pennsylvania Supreme Court recognized that, although there may be no intent to provoke a mistrial, the misconduct of the prosecutor may be so prejudicial that double jeopardy must attach. Id. at 325. In Smith, it was revealed that the prosecution had withheld potentially exculpatory physical evidence and had knowingly and falsely denied that its chief witness had been given a favorable sentencing agreement in exchange for testifying. Id. at 322-24. In addition, the prosecution intentionally suppressed the exculpatory evidence while arguing in favor of the death sentence and attempted to discredit a law enforcement officer who had testified to the existence of that evidence. Id. On appeal, the Smith court characterized the prosecution's behavior as an effort to subvert the truth-determining process[,] but found that there was no intent to goad the defendant into moving for a mistrial. Id. at 322 (citation omitted). In fact, the prosecution's intention was to prevent the defendant from moving for a mistrial by concealing how he had been wrongfully convicted. The Smith court reasoned that the specific intent standard would not bar a new trial even where there was a deliberate effort to prejudice a defendant's right to a fair trial. Therefore, the court held, under the Pennsylvania Constitution, that a retrial is barred not only when prosecutorial misconduct is intended to provoke the defendant into moving for a mistrial, but also when the conduct of the prosecutor is intentionally undertaken to prejudice the defendant to the point of the denial of a fair trial. Id. at 325 (emphasis added). Similarly, the Arizona Supreme Court adopted a more encompassing standard for the double jeopardy clause of its state constitution than the federal Kennedy standard where the prosecution in Pool posed numerous improper questions resulting in at least two bench conferences and one court admonishment. Pool v. Superior Court, 139 Ariz. 98, 677 P.2d 261, 269, 271-72 (1984). Noting the difficulty in determining a prosecutor's specific intent, the Pool court held, under the Arizona Constitution, that double jeopardy principles bar retrial after a mistrial is declared under the following conditions: 1. Mistrial is granted because of improper conduct or actions by the prosecutor; and 2. such conduct is not merely the result of legal error, negligence, mistake, or insignificant impropriety, but, taken as a whole, amounts to intentional conduct which the prosecutor knows to be improper and prejudicial, and which he pursues for any improper purpose with indifference to a significant resulting danger of mistrial or reversal; and 3. the conduct causes prejudice to the defendant which cannot be cured by means short of a mistrial. Id. at 271-72 (footnote omitted). In doing so, the court abandoned the subjective intent standard and adopted an objective standard, noting that [t]he trial judge is to measure what the prosecutor intends and knows by objective factors, which include the situation in which the prosecutor found himself, the evidence of actual knowledge and intent and any other factors which may give rise to an appropriate inference or conclusion. He [or she] may also consider the prosecutor's own explanations of his [or her] knowledge and intent to the extent that such explanation can be given credence in light of the minimum requirements expected of all lawyers. Id. at 271 n. 9 (emphasis and brackets added). Applying this standard, the Pool court concluded that reprosecution was barred. Id. at 272. Adopting a similar objective standard, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals likewise rejected the Kennedy subjective intent standard. Bauder v. State, 921 S.W.2d 696, 696-700 (Tex.Crim.App.1996) ( en banc ) (hereafter Bauder II ), rev'g, 880 S.W.2d 502 (Tex.App.1994) (hereafter Bauder I ). The defendant in Bauder was charged with the offense of driving while intoxicated. Bauder II, 921 S.W.2d at 697. Before trial, the court granted defendant's motion in limine barring evidence of any uncharged misconduct by the defendant that had occurred before the charged offense. Bauder I, 880 S.W.2d at 503. After the jury was impaneled, the prosecutor presented the arresting officer's testimony that when the defendant had exited the car, he was barely able to stand and his pants were unbuttoned. Thereafter, the prosecutor asked what the defendant had been doing in the parked car before the alleged crime. The officer responded in graphic language that the defendant was receiving oral sex. On this basis, the trial court granted the defendant's motion for a mistrial. Id. On appeal, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals held, under the Texas Constitution, that a successive prosecution is jeopardy barred after declaration of a mistrial at the defendant's request, not only when the objectionable conduct of the prosecutor was intended to induce a motion for mistrial, but also when the prosecutor was aware but consciously disregarded the risk that an objectionable event for which he was responsible would require a mistrial at the defendant's request. Bauder II, 921 S.W.2d at 699. The New Mexico Supreme Court adopted a similar conscious disregard standard in State v. Breit, 122 N.M. 655, 930 P.2d 792 (1996). Like the conscious disregard standard set forth by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the Breit court held that retrial is barred when improper conduct is so unfairly prejudicial to the defendant that it cannot be cured by means short of a mistrial or a motion for a new trial, and if the official knows that the conduct is improper and prejudicial, and if the official either intends to provoke a mistrial or acts in willful disregard of the resulting mistrial, retrial, or reversal. Id. at 803 (emphasis added). The Breit court emphasized that the willful disregard standard contemplates situations where the prosecutor is actually aware, or is presumed to be aware, of the potential consequences of his or her actions. The term connotes a conscious and purposeful decision by the prosecutor to dismiss any concern that his or her conduct may lead to a mistrial or reversal. Id. (citation omitted). The Breit court further noted: Though we indicate the official must know, or under certain circumstances is presumed to know, that the conduct is improper, we doubt a claim of lack of experience could lift the bar of double jeopardy. Rare are the instances of misconduct that are not violations of rules that every legal professional, no matter how inexperienced, is charged with knowing. Id. (emphasis added) (citing Pool, 677 P.2d at 270). Therefore, a growing number of state courts have recognized that the specific intent standard adopted by the United States Supreme Court in Kennedy fails adequately to protect defendants' right to a fair trial against prosecutorial misconduct and have adopted objective standards focusing on the prejudice to defendants' right to a fair trial.