Court Opinion

ID: 9467805
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 01:57:13.269999+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:40:32.494954
License: Public Domain

MURNAGHAN, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
The authorities support the conclusion Judge Ervin has reached. I find no fault whatever in what he has written. Nevertheless, I am concerned that the case not be taken to extend further than its facts require.
On the facts, it is by no means open and shut whether the evidence sufficed at each of the two trials to sustain a conviction. Purposely, I avoid drawing any conclusion. However, had the issue been reached, it is altogether possible that the double jeopardy issue would have been decided against Ellis on the merits. We obviously should not contemplate breaking new legal ground to allow an appeal at a stage in a case heretofore deemed not to be final and appealable where the result would be to leave Ellis worse off than he would be had he taken no appeal. A finding on the present appeal that there was no double jeopardy would altogether preclude his raising, in connection with the third trial, the defense that, the evidence at one or both of the prior trials having been insufficient to convict, he should have been acquitted and the third trial should be terminated on double jeopardy grounds. In view of the grounds upon which decision has been rested, Ellis is not so precluded. He may seek reconsideration in the lower court, and, of course, will be *136free to raise the double jeopardy issue on appeal, in the event that the third trial results in a conviction.
At the same time, it is important to bear in mind that another case may well arise where the insufficiency of the evidence at the prior trial which ended in a hung jury is entirely manifest on the face of the record. If and when that day comes, I doubt that we should or would decline to rule on the double jeopardy question and, in the interests of preserving formality at the expense of substance, require the defendant to go through the ordeal of another trial, well knowing that any conviction would, on appeal, be reversed.
I have written as I have with some hesitation, knowing that some defendants will regard my words as an open invitation to take a premature appeal, although their cases by no means present the possible situation which I have mentioned of plain, evident insufficiency of evidence. As the result which we have reached in the present case indicates, however, appeals in such circumstances, /. e. prior to retrial, will not be successful. Nor should they materially succeed in achieving delay, for the absence of a crystal clear case will be readily ascertainable and any cases may be summarily disposed of. Furthermore, the courts will not be precluded from applying appropriate sanctions in cases of frivolous appeals. Cf. Abney v. United States, 431 U.S. 651, 662, fn. 8, 97 S.Ct. 2034, 2042, fn. 8, 52 L.Ed.2d 651 (1977): “It is well within the supervisory powers of the courts of appeals to establish summary procedures and calendars to weed out frivolous claims of former jeopardy.”