Ciucci v. Illinois/Dissent Douglas

by William O. Douglas

United States Supreme Court

356 U.S. 571

Ciucci  v.  Illinois

 Argued: March 13, 1958. --- Decided: May 19, 1958

Mr. Justice DOUGLAS, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE and Mr. Justice BRENNAN concur, dissenting.

This case presents an instance of the prosecution being allowed to harass the accused with repeated trials and convictions on the same evidence, until it achieves its desired result of a capital verdict.

Petitioner's wife and three children were found dead in a burning building. It was later established that death was due both to the fire and to bullet wounds each had received in the head. Petitioner was first tried on an indictment charging that he had murdered his wife. At that trial the evidence was not limited to the wife's death. The deaths of the three children were also introduced, and testimony as to the cause of death of all of the victims was received. This trial was in effect a trial for the murder of all four victims for the gruesome details of each of the four deaths were introduced into evidence. Petitioner was found guilty. Under Illinois law the jury determines the sentence in a murder case between a minimum of 14 years' imprisonment and a maximum of death. Ill.Rev.Stat., 1957, c. 38, § 360. At that first trial the jury fixed the penalty at 20 years' imprisonment.

The prosecutor demanded another trial. Accordingly petitioner was next tried on a charge of murdering one of his daughters.

At the second trial the same evidence was introduced as in the first trial. Evidence concerning the four deaths once more was used. Once more all the gruesome details of the four crimes were presented to the jury. Once more the accused was tried in form for one murder, in substance for four. This time a different jury again found petitioner guilty and sentenced him to 45 years' imprisonment.

The prosecutor was still not satisfied with the result. And so a third trial was had, the one involved here.

In this third trial, petitioner was charged with murdering his son. This time petitioner objected before trial that he was being subjected to double jeopardy. He also moved to exclude testimony concerning the other deaths and after verdict he protested that he had been denied a fair trial guaranteed by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The trial court overruled those objections. At the trial complete evidence of all of the deaths and their causes was again introduced. Once more the gruesome details of four murders were presented to a jury-the gathering of the family in their home, the fire at 2 a.m., the .22 caliber bullets in the bodies of the four victims, the borrowing by the accused of a .22 rifle, the arrival of the firemen, the autopsies at the morgue. This time a third jury sentenced petitioner to death.

In my view the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment prevents this effort by a State to obtain the death penalty. No constitutional problem would have arisen if petitioner had been prosecuted in one trial for as many murders as there were victims. But by using the same evidence in multiple trials the State continued its relentless prosecutions until it got the result it wanted. It in effect tried the accused for four murders three consecutive times, massing in each trial the horrible details of each of the four deaths. This is an unseemly and oppressive use of a criminal trial that violates the concept of due process contained in the Fourteenth Amendment, whatever its ultimate scope is taken to be.

Mr. Justice BLACK concurs in this dissent on the ground that the Fourteenth Amendment bars a State from placing a defendant twice in jeopardy for the same offense.

Notes