Opinion ID: 425952
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Confusion in the Circuits

Text: 45 After Bordenkircher, the prosecutorial vindictiveness doctrine was in disarray. Blackledge and Bordenkircher had articulated two distinct guiding principles, always in conflict, with both always present and neither carrying with it any intrinsic limiting precept. Blackledge stood for the right of criminal defendants to be free to exercise legal rights without fear of reprisals through vindictive exercises of prosecutorial discretion. Bordenkircher stood for the pragmatic recognition for the need of prosecutors to have discretion in bringing additional or different charges. The circuit courts had obvious and understandable difficulty in melding the two conflicting goals of Blackledge and Bordenkircher. See generally, Michigan Note, supra, at 200-08. This situation remained unclear until Goodwin.