Opinion ID: 3049318
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Collateral Estoppel Principles

Text: To determine whether Digsby’s appellate counsel rendered ineffective assistance, we first assess the strength of the collateral estoppel claim that Digbsy asserts his appellate counsel should have raised in his state direct appeal. Only if failure to bring the claim both rendered counsel’s performance deficient and resulted in prejudice to Digsby was there ineffective assistance. “The doctrine of collateral estoppel is a narrow exception to the Government’s right to prosecute a defendant in separate trials for related conduct.” United States v. Brown, 983 F.2d 201, 202 (11th Cir. 1993). It is a bar to prosecution only if “a fact or issue necessarily determined in the defendant’s favor 17 in the former trial is an essential element of conviction at the second trial.” Id. In deciding whether collateral estoppel applies, we first “must examine the verdict and the record to see what facts, if any, were necessarily determined in the acquittal at the first trial.” United States v. Ohayon, 483 F.3d 1281, 1286 (11th Cir. 2007) (quotation marks omitted). Second, we “must determine whether the previously determined facts constituted an essential element of the second offense.” Id. (quotation marks omitted). Put another way, “‘[w]here a previous judgment of acquittal was based upon a general verdict,’” a court must consider “‘whether a rational jury could have grounded its verdict upon an issue other than that which the defendant seeks to foreclose from consideration.’” Id. (quoting Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U.S. 436, 444, 90 S. Ct. 1189, 1194 (1970)). In making this determination, the court must examine the record of the prior proceeding and other relevant matters. Ohayon, 483 F.3d at 1286. After examining this record, the court “must decide whether it can ascertain the basis of the acquittal at the first trial.” Brown, 983 F.2d at 202. Only if the jury’s acquittal in the first trial was based upon reasonable doubt about an element essential to conviction in the second trial does collateral estoppel apply. Id.