Court Opinion

ID: 9861942
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-25 00:55:36.188503+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:29:50.655671
License: Public Domain

PRENTICE, Justice,
concurring and dissenting.
I am in agreement with the majority holding reversing the judgment. However, I do not agree that the appellant can be retried, consistently with the proscription of Burks v. United States, (1978) 437 U.S. 1, 98 S.Ct. 2141, 57 L.Ed.2d 1. It is the viewpoint of the majority that, but for the lateness of the admonition limiting the application of Allen’s prior testimony, the State may have presented additional incriminating evidence and that it was, therefore, somehow denied a fair opportunity to offer its best evidence. The same could as well be said under innumerable circumstances where the verdict was an acquittal. Certainly when the State’s best, and perhaps its only evidence of guilt is excluded by the court, when tendered, the State has been denied its opportunity. If that exclusion was error, the denial has been unfair, in the sense that it was not according to the rules. Nevertheless, the acquitted defendant cannot be retried-even though the ruling excluding the evidence be later reversed as a reversed question. I do not believe that the Burks opinion permits speculation as to why sufficient substantive evidence was not presented or upon what additional evidence might be forthcoming if the prosecution is given another try. Rather, it is my opinion that the rationale behind the double jeopardy proscription is simply that, considering the resources available to the State and the grave injustice done one who is erroneously brought to trial, it behooves the State to prosecute only upon firm evidence and then to bring forth its best case or suffer the consequences. Accordingly, I would order an acquittal in this case.