Opinion ID: 220681
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: State Court Ruling

Text: Here, the relevant state-court decision is the September 29, 2007 Ohio Court of Appeals ruling that Goodell had not made the requisite showing of vindictiveness to warrant relief. State v. Goodell, 2007 WL 2874334. In reaching its decision, the appellate court correctly identified two important Supreme Court decisions, North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U.S. 711, 89 S.Ct. 2072, 23 L.Ed.2d 656 (1969), and Texas v. McCullough, 475 U.S. 134, 106 S.Ct. 976, 89 L.Ed.2d 104 (1986). In Pearce, the Court recognized that where a defendant has successfully challenged his conviction and then is convicted again on retrial, due process is violated if the sentence imposed on resentencing is influenced by vindictiveness on the part of the sentencing court. 395 U.S. at 725, 89 S.Ct. 2072. Recognizing that retaliatory motivation could be difficult to prove, the Court held that whenever a more severe sentence is imposed on resentencing, the reasons, based on objective information, must affirmatively appear in the record. Id. at 726, 89 S.Ct. 2072. Because no record of such reasons had been made in the two cases then before it, the Pearce Court upheld the award of habeas relief in both cases. Although the notion of a presumption appears nowhere in the Pearce opinion, the ruling has since been read to apply a presumption of vindictiveness, which may be overcome only by objective information in the record justifying the increased sentence. United States v. Goodwin, 457 U.S. 368, 374, 102 S.Ct. 2485, 73 L.Ed.2d 74 (1982) (applying the presumption but finding it rebutted by the sentencing court's careful explanation of reasons for imposing a greater sentence). In McCullough, the Court revisited the issue of vindictiveness and the teaching of Pearce. After McCullough was initially convicted of murder and sentenced by the jury to a prison sentence of twenty years, the trial court granted his motion for new trial based on prosecutorial misconduct. McCullough, 475 U.S. at 135-36, 106 S.Ct. 976. McCullough had a second jury trial, with the same trial judge presiding. After the jury found him guilty, McCullough elected to be sentenced by the trial judge, who sentenced him to fifty years in prison. The Supreme Court declined to apply a presumption of vindictiveness for two reasons. First, the Court observed that the trial judge herself had granted McCullough's motion for new trial. Unlike a judge whose ruling had been reversed by an appellate court, this trial judge was deemed not to have motivation to engage in self-vindication. Id. at 138-39, 106 S.Ct. 976. Second, the presumption was deemed inapplicable because different sentencers assessed the varying sentences that McCullough received. Id. at 140, 106 S.Ct. 976. Moreover, even if the presumption were deemed to apply, the Court held that it had been rebutted by the trial court's findings based on objective information justifying the increased sentence. Relying on these authorities, as well as state court precedents applying them, the Ohio Court of Appeals concluded that the presumption of vindictiveness did not apply in this case because the harsher thirteen-year sentence was imposed by a different sentencer than had imposed the original nine-year sentence. Goodell, 2007 WL 2874334 at . The court also determined that Goodell had failed to identify evidence of actual vindictiveness. Id. at -4. The court thus affirmed the thirteen-year prison sentence.