Court Opinion

ID: 9497262
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 16:47:01.509506+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:58:05.359563
License: Public Domain

FERGUSON, Circuit Judge,
dissenting in part:
Three years after a trial at which the State of Oregon was unable to produce sufficient evidence for a conviction of sodomy of his stepson on or about June 20, 1987, Jimmie Lee Custer was tried a second time and convicted of sodomy of his stepson on or between November 1, 1986, and June 19, 1987. Because “[t]he Double Jeopardy Clause forbids a second trial for the purpose of affording the prosecution another opportunity to supply evidence which it failed to muster in the first proceeding,” Burks v. United States, 437 U.S. 1, 11, 98 S.Ct. 2141, 57 L.Ed.2d 1 (1978), I dissent from Part 111(A) of the majority opinion.
The Fifth Amendment provides that no one shall be “subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb.” For Custer to prevail on his Double Jeopardy claim, he must demonstrate that, under clearly established federal law, he was subject to jeopardy for the same offense at both his first and second trials. He has made such a showing under the original common law test, which remains part of federal law established by the Supreme Court.
In a concurrence to Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U.S. 436, 450-51, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 25 L.Ed.2d 469 (1970), Justice Brennan stated that the precise meaning of “same offense” in the Double Jeopardy context had not been determined at the time the Bill of Rights was framed. The first common law definition of the term was not presented until 1796, when King v. Vandercomb & Abbott, 2 Leach 708 (Crown 1796), was decided. Ashe, 397 U.S. at 451, 90 S.Ct. 1189. Vandercomb held “that unless the first indictment were such as the prisoner might have been convicted upon by proof of the facts contained in the second indictment, an acquittal on the first indictment *976can be no bar to the second.”1 2 Leach at 720. To state the matter affirmatively, if a defendant might have been convicted by proof of the facts set forth in the second case, then an acquittal of the first case bars the second one.
To show a Double Jeopardy violation under the common law test, Custer must demonstrate that he could have been convicted under the first indictment by proof of the facts alleged in the second indictment. Custer’s second indictment alleged that Custer “on or between November 1, 1986, and June 19, 1987, in Marion County, Oregon, did unlawfully, feloniously and knowingly engage in deviate sexual intercourse with ... a child under the age of sixteen years.” Consequently, to meet the common law test, Custer must demonstrate that, had the prosecution been able to prove that “deviate sexual intercourse” with his stepson occurred “on or between November 1, 1986, and June 19, 1987,” in his first trial, he could have been convicted under the first indictment, which alleged that such conduct took place “on or about June 20, 1987.”
Under Oregon law, Custer could have been convicted at his first trial by proof of the facts alleged in the second indictment. Time is not a material element of the crime of sodomy. State v. Howard, 214 Or. 611, 331 P.2d 1116, 1118 (1958). “If the date of a crime is not a material element of the offense, variance between the date alleged and the date proven is not a fatal flaw, unless the date proven is outside the statute of limitations, or the defendant is prejudiced by the variance.” State v. Baldeagle, 154 Or.App. 234, 961 P.2d 264, 267 (1998) (holding that a trial court did not err in instructing the jury that it could find the defendant guilty of sexual abuse between April 1, 1994, and May 31, 1995, where the indictment alleged that the abuse occurred between January 1, 1995, and March 31, 1995). Baldeagle was an application of State v. Long, 320 Or. 361, 885 P.2d 696 (1994), in which the indictment had alleged that the defendant had committed sodomy “between June 1, 1982 and April 30, 1983”; at trial, the state presented evidence that the sodomy had occurred on April 22, 1984. In upholding that conviction, the Court relied on its holding in Howard, 331 P.2d at 1118-19 (upholding a conviction after the state elected at trial to prove that the defendant had committed sodomy on August 1, 1957, despite an indictment charging that the sodomy had occurred on September 27, 1957).
Here, the variance in dates is small (one day after the final date of abuse alleged in the second indictment) and there is no finding that the dates of either indictment were outside the relevant statute of limitations.
The record is clear from the prosecutor’s opening statement at the first trial that the State planned to put on evidence of prior episodes of the defendant’s sexual abuse of his stepson and had such evidence. The prosecutor told the jury in his opening statement that the victim “heard his stepfather coming into the room, and you will hear from the evidence this was not the first time he had heard his stepfather coming, and he had some anticipation of what was happening” (emphasis added). Moreover, although the prosecutor said that the victim’s mother would testify as to her observations regarding one specific instance of sodomy, he told the jury that they would “hear [the victim] testify about what happened in his life” (emphasis added). It is clear that at the first trial the *977prosecutor could have proved the events contained in the second indictment and certainly planned to do so.
The majority holds that Custer was not in jeopardy at his first trial for the charges alleged in the second indictment, and states that this issue was already decided as a matter of Oregon law in Custer v. Baldwin, 163 Or.App. 60, 986 P.2d 1203 (1999) (evaluating whether Custer’s second trial violated his former jeopardy rights under the Oregon Constitution). However, that opinion held that, under the “unitary transaction test” described in State v. Lyons, 161 Or.App. 355, 985 P.2d 204 (1999), Custer’s acts of sodomy were not all part of the “same criminal episode” and consequently did not need to be prosecuted together under Oregon former jeopardy law. Custer, 986 P.2d at 1207-08. It did not address the question of whether the facts alleged in the second indictment, had they been proved in the first trial, could have resulted in a conviction at that trial. This is the question posed by the common law test, and current Oregon law answers it in the affirmative.
Given that Custer’s second trial is a double jeopardy violation under the common law test, the question on habeas review is whether the common law test is part of clearly established federal law. A review of the relevant Supreme Court cases states that it is.
In his Ashe concurrence, Justice Brennan stated that the test described in Vandercomb in 1796 “was soon followed by a majority of American jurisdictions.” 397 U.S. at 451, 90 S.Ct. 1189. One of those jurisdictions was Massachusetts, which adopted the common law test in Morey v. Com., 108 Mass. 433, 434 (1871): “A conviction or acquittal upon one indictment is no bar to a subsequent conviction and sentence upon another, unless the evidence required to support a conviction upon one of them would have been sufficient to warrant a conviction upon the other.”2
In Ex parte Nielsen, 131 U.S. 176, 189-90, 9 S.Ct. 672, 33 L.Ed. 118 (1889), the Supreme Court said, “in order that an acquittal may be a bar to a subsequent indictment for [a] lesser crime, it would seem to be essential that a conviction of such crime might have been had under the indictment for the greater. If a conviction might have been had, and was not, there was an implied acquittal.” The Court distinguished Morey on its facts, but said that “[t]he conclusion we have reached is in accord with a proposition laid down by the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts in the case of Morey v. Commonwealth.” Nielsen, 131 U.S. at 187, 9 S.Ct. 672.
In both Carter v. McClaughry, 183 U.S. 365, 395, 22 S.Ct. 181, 46 L.Ed. 236 (1902), and Gavieres v. United States, 220 U.S. 338, 342, 31 S.Ct. 421, 55 L.Ed. 489 (1911), the Supreme Court cited Morey’s language directly: “A conviction or acquittal upon one indictment is no bar to a subsequent conviction and sentence upon another, unless the evidence required to support a conviction upon one of them would have been sufficient to warrant a conviction upon the other.” Noting that Carter had cited Morey “with approval,” the Gavieres Court applied the common law test and found “that evidence sufficient for conviction under the first charge would not have convicted under the second indictment ... Consequently a conviction of one would not bar a prosecution for the other.” 220 U.S. at 343-44, 31 S.Ct. 421. Four years later, *978in Ebeling v. Morgan, 237 U.S. 625, 630-31, 35 S.Ct. 710, 59 L.Ed. 1151 (1915), the Court said that, as in Gavieros, the Court would apply the common law test stated in Morey to the ease before it.
The common law test has historically been part of federal law as interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court, and nothing in recent Supreme Court discussions of the common law test suggests that the vitality of the test has been undermined. In Ashe, two justices writing separately specifically addressed the question of the common law test, and both began from the premise that the Ashe ruling was an expansion of the common law test.3 Moreover, one of the most recent Double Jeopardy cases, United States v. Dixon, 509 U.S. 688, 710, 113 S.Ct. 2849, 125 L.Ed.2d 556 (1993), justified its holding in part by noting that the ruling was consistent with the holding in Vandercomb that “these two offenses are so distinct in their nature, that evidence of one of them will not support an indictment for the other” (quoting Vandercomb, 2 Leach at 717).4
The common law test has been established as federal law by the Supreme Court. Application of this test to the case before us shows that Custer’s second trial violated his Fifth Amendment Double Jeopardy rights. The conclusion of the majority that no Double Jeopardy violation occurred was contrary to this federal law.
This case tests the strength of our Constitution. Every emotion that we have demands that the defendant be punished. But we cannot base constitutional rights and duties on an emotional foundation. The decision of the District Court to deny Custer’s habeas petition should be reversed. I therefore respectfully dissent from Part 111(A) of the majority opinion.

. Justice Brennan termed this the "same evidence” test (Ashe, 397 U.S. at 451, 90 S.Ct. 1189); however, I will refer to it as the common law test.

. In so holding, Morey relied on Com. v. Roby, 29 Mass. 496, 504 (1832), which cited Vandercomb as the origin of the rule "that unless the first indictment were such as the prisoner might have been, convicted upon by proof of the facts contained in the second indictment, an acquittal on the first indictment can be no bar to the second."

. The dispute between the justices was over whether the expansion was merited. Chief Justice Burger's dissent said that the Court had already expanded the Double Jeopardy Clause into the test “first enunciated in The King v. Vandercomb," and that the majority had needed “to reach out far beyond the accepted offense-defining rule to reach its decision in this case.” Ashe, 397 U.S. at 463 & n. 1, 464, 90 S.Ct. 1189. Justice Brennan’s concurrence made the case for expanding the common law test, which in his view permitted a number of problematic prosecutions. Id. at 451-52, 90 S.Ct. 1189. (Despite this recognition of the common law test's limitations, Justice Brennan continued to believe that it held remaining currency: in Ciuzio v. United States, 416 U.S. 995, 999, 94 S.Ct 2410, 40 L.Ed.2d 774 (1974), he dissented from a denial of a petition for writ of certiorari on the basis that, under the common law test as formulated in Morey, there was a clear question as to "whether the evidence required to support a conviction upon one of the charges would have been sufficient to warrant conviction upon the other.”)

. Dixon overruled Grady v. Corbin, 495 U.S. 508, 110 S.Ct. 2084, 109 L.Ed.2d 548 (1990). Grady had rejected a "same evidence” test, explaining in a footnote that "[a] true 'same evidence’ test or 'actual evidence' test would prevent the government from introducing in a subsequent prosecution any evidence that was introduced in a preceding prosecution. It is in this sense that we discuss, and do not adopt, a 'same evidence’ or 'actual evidence' test.” Id. at 521 n. 12, 110 S.Ct. 2084. Although Justice Brennan and Chief Justice Burger had referred to the common law test as a "same evidence” test, the overruled Grady opinion had rejected a different (and far broader) rule.