double jeopardy
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 303 U.S. 391 - Helvering v. Mitchell · 1938Most cited · 2,158 citing opinions
the double jeopardy clause prohibits merely punishing twice, or attempting a second time to punish criminally, for the same offense.
How the Supreme Court has restated “double jeopardy”
Each Supreme Court definition of “double jeopardy,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “double jeopardy”
Court decisions citing the 5 opinions that defined “double jeopardy” — 7,148 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 5 definitions, chronological · 1911–1938
- ORIGINAL
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. The test is not whether the defendant has already been tried for the same act, but whether he has been put in jeopardy for the same offense. A single act may be an offense against two statutes; and if each statute requires proof of an additional fact which the other does not, an acquittal or conviction under either statute does not exempt the defendant from prosecution and punishment under the other.
same-offense test
The death of the injured person was the principal element of the homicide, but was no part of the assault and battery. At the time of the trial for the latter the death had not ensued, and not until it did ensue was the homicide committed. Then, and not before, was it possible to put the accused in jeopardy for that offense.
separate offenses with later-arising element
The test of identity of offenses is whether the same evidence is required to sustain them; if not, then the fact that both charges relate to and grow out of one transaction does not make a single offense where two are defined by the statutes.
identity of offenses
one who engages therein commits two distinct offenses, one against the United States and one against the state, and may be subjected to prosecution and punishment in the federal courts for one, and in the state courts for the other, without any infraction of the constitutional rule against double jeopardy; it being limited to repeated prosecutions 'for the same offense.