Opinion ID: 3217053
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: A. to touch his penis.

Text: The court reviews de novo whether two convictions merge for double jeopardy purposes. Kaliku v. United States, 994 A.2d 765, 787 (D.C. 2010). Although the Double Jeopardy Clause prohibits multiple punishments for the same 16 offense, “[t]here is no double jeopardy bar to separate and cumulative punishments for separate criminal acts, even if those separate acts do happen to violate the same criminal statute.” Brown v. United States, 795 A.2d 56, 63 (D.C. 2002) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). Offenses do not merge if they “arise out of separate acts or transactions.” Reeves v. United States, 902 A.2d 88, 89 (D.C. 2006). Consequently, “[i]f at the scene of the crime the defendant can be said to have realized that he has come to a fork in the road, and nevertheless decides to invade a different interest, then his successive intentions make him subject to cumulative punishment.” Spain v. United States, 665 A.2d 658, 660 (D.C. 1995). Here, appellant was convicted of MSA of a child and attempted MSA. These are different offenses for double jeopardy purposes; MSA of a child has age requirements for the victim and perpetrator, while attempted MSA has a knowledge-of-lack-of-consent requirement. See Blockburger v. United States, 284 U.S. 299, 304 (1932) (noting that two offenses are different, for double jeopardy purposes, if “each requires proof of a fact which the other does not”). Moreover, the conduct underlying each conviction represents a discrete criminal act for which appellant can properly be punished separately. Appellant’s MSA of a child conviction was premised on appellant masturbating in front of V.A., while his attempted MSA conviction was premised on his attempt to force V.A. to touch 17 appellant’s penis. Appellant not only reached a “fork in the road” between these two actions, at which he could have chosen to not try to force V.A. to touch his penis, but the conduct was markedly different as well; one conviction involved appellant touching himself, while the other was based on appellant’s attempt to force V.A. to touch him. We are satisfied that appellant was convicted of two different statutory offenses and that the criminal conduct on which each conviction was predicated represented a discrete act for which appellant could be punished separately.