20 results for 'cat:"Sex Offender" AND cat:"Double Jeopardy"'.
J. Palafox finds a lower court erred in granting defendant’s motion to quash after he was charged with child sex offenses. Defendant argued that it violated his double jeopardy rights to be charged with both continuous sexual abuse of a child and lesser constituent offenses, but while this is true for sentencing, “no sentence has yet been imposed and no judgment has yet been entered,” and prosecutors can pursue both at trial. Reversed.
Court: Texas Courts of Appeals, Judge: Palafox, Filed On: May 10, 2024, Case #: 08-23-00335-CR, Categories: sex Offender, double Jeopardy, Child Victims
J. Ahlers finds that defendant was properly convicted of sexually abusing his coworker after he refused to leave her house and repeatedly assaulted her. The double jeopardy claim fails because the coworker's comments that led to the initial mistrial had been unintentional and had not been induced by the prosecution. Affirmed.
Court: Iowa Court Of Appeals, Judge: Ahlers, Filed On: April 24, 2024, Case #: 23-0087, Categories: sex Offender, double Jeopardy
J. Procaccini affirms the postconviction court's denial of the defendant's petition for postconviction relief for his third-degree criminal sexual conduct conviction. Guilty verdicts for both that conviction and a charge of attempted third-degree sexual assault are legally consistent, since the defendant was not convicted of, or punished for, the attempted offense. The defendant's counsel was therefore not ineffective for failing to raise that issue. Additionally, the district court did not abuse its discretion when it denied his request for an evidentiary hearing regarding expert testimony challenging the testimony used to convict him, since that purported newly discovered evidence would not probably lead to a more favorable result for the defendant. Affirmed.
Court: Minnesota Supreme Court, Judge: Procaccini, Filed On: March 20, 2024, Case #: A22-1063, Categories: Evidence, sex Offender, double Jeopardy
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J. Vigil finds defendant's second trial on sexual assault charges was barred by double jeopardy because the prosecutor's misstatement of defendant's previous conditional discharge as a previous felony conviction was willful misconduct that prevented a retrial. Additionally, the prosecutor used the word "pedophile" five times during closing arguments, mentioned the Catholic Church sexual abuse scandal and attempted to shift the burden of proof onto defendant, all of which prejudiced the jury against him and resulted in a mistrial. Reversed.
Court: New Mexico Supreme Court, Judge: Vigil, Filed On: February 19, 2024, Case #: S-1-SC-38941, Categories: Prosecutorial Misconduct, sex Offender, double Jeopardy
J. Larson partially affirms the defendant's convictions for first-degree criminal sexual conduct. The infliction of bodily harm alone is sufficient to prove "force" for the purpose of such convictions, regardless of whether that harm caused a victim to submit to penetration. The state, however, charged the defendant for the same act of criminal sexual conduct under two alternative theories, and one of the defendant's two convictions must therefore be vacated. Affirmed in part.
Court: Minnesota Court Of Appeals, Judge: Larson, Filed On: February 5, 2024, Case #: A23-0200, Categories: sex Offender, double Jeopardy
J. Klingensmith finds the trial court properly convicted defendant for sexual battery, though it improperly sentenced him. The judge’s mistakenly pronouncing sentence in terms of “months” rather than "years" does not allow defendant opportunity to take advantage of the verbal misstep. The mistake was quickly rectified, and double jeopardy does not prevent the trial court from correcting the error. Affirmed in part. Reversed in part and remanded.
Court: Florida Courts Of Appeal, Judge: Klingensmith, Filed On: August 30, 2023, Case #: 4D21-3229, Categories: Sentencing, sex Offender, double Jeopardy
J. Watkins finds that the trial court properly denied defendant's double jeopardy plea in bar claiming that his guilty plea to burglary and theft precluded the state from prosecuting him for offenses he allegedly committed against the same victim, including rape, kidnapping, sodomy and false imprisonment. The offenses alleged in the two indictments did not arise from the same conduct because defendant left the apartment after allegedly raping the victim and returned later. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Court of Appeals, Judge: Watkins, Filed On: August 22, 2023, Case #: A23A1046, Categories: sex Offender, double Jeopardy, Kidnapping
J. Clark finds the prosecutor's use of the phrase "nuts and sluts" in reference to typical defenses in sexual assault cases similar to defendant's did not constitute prosecutorial impropriety. In context, the phrase was made regarding the victim's credibility and did not prejudice the jury against him. Meanwhile, defendant's double jeopardy rights were not violated by multiple convictions that stemmed from the same sequence of events. Although all of his criminal conduct occurred in a short period of time, the assaults on the couch and stairwell were separate incidents and supported multiple charges of sexual assault. Affirmed.
Court: Connecticut Court Of Appeals, Judge: Clark, Filed On: July 7, 2023, Case #: AC45378, Categories: sex Offender, double Jeopardy
J. Grassl Bradley finds the court of appeals improperly reversed the circuit court's denial of defendant's motion to dismiss his felony trafficking of a child case after the circuit court declared a mistrial due to the defense presenting third-party perpetrator evidence without notifying the state beforehand or getting a ruling on admissibility from the circuit court. Contrary to defendant's arguments, a retrial of his case would not violate his constitutional protection against double jeopardy, as all of the factors in the relevant precedent are met to support the circuit court's use of solid discretion to declare a mistrial based on "manifest necessity." The circuit court properly did this in part because the state never knew about the surprise testimony implicating a third party in the underlying sex trafficking crime and it never made a ruling on that evidence, and in part because the circuit court reasonably concluded a curative jury instruction could not "unring the bell," even though the evidence was later deemed admissible. Reversed.
Court: Wisconsin Supreme Court, Judge: Grassl Bradley, Filed On: June 29, 2023, Case #: 2021AP000267-CR, Categories: sex Offender, double Jeopardy, Human Trafficking
J. Ziegler finds against defendant in his appeal claiming his second prosecution for sexual assault of a minor exposes him to double jeopardy since the charges largely deal with matters from the first prosecution, which ended in a mistrial and dismissal caused by intentional overreach by a prosecutor who attempted to broaden the time frame of the allegations and introduce other acts evidence and amend the information during trial against the court's orders. Defendant was never exposed to jeopardy for the specific 10 charges in his new case, in part because they were never charged and fully addressed before the initial mistrial, so defendant was never at risk of being convicted of them, and constitutional and common law issue preclusion do not bar the new charges because the initial mistrial and dismissal means there was no "valid judicial determination of the ultimate fact" or actual litigation of the scope of defendant's jeopardy. The court of appeals incorrectly upheld the circuit court's dismissal of the new criminal complaint, and the matter is remanded to take up defendant's argument of "prosecutorial vindictiveness." Reversed.
Court: Wisconsin Supreme Court, Judge: Ziegler, Filed On: June 21, 2023, Case #: 2020AP002012-CR, Categories: Constitution, sex Offender, double Jeopardy
[Consolidated.] J. Hodges finds that the trial court properly convicted defendant of child molestation and correctly sentenced defendant. After initially sentencing defendant as a recidivist to serve 40 years in prison, the trial court resentenced defendant due to an error which said the sentence was the result of both a negotiated guilty plea and a jury trial. The new sentence merged all three of defendant's convictions related to touching the victim's vagina into one conviction and resentenced him as a recidivist. The resentencing did not violate double jeopardy protections. Defendant failed to show that his trial counsel performed deficiently. Affirmed.
Court: Georgia Court of Appeals, Judge: Hodges, Filed On: June 21, 2023, Case #: A23A0035, Categories: Sentencing, sex Offender, double Jeopardy