Oregon v. Kennedy (456 U.S. 667)
U.S. Supreme Court · decided May 24, 1982 · Supreme Court Database (Spaeth)
- Citation
- 456 U.S. 667 · 102 S. Ct. 2083
- Decided
- May 24, 1982
- Term
- October Term 1981
- Vote
- 9–0
- Majority author
- Justice Rehnquist
- Issue area
- Criminal Procedure
- Disposition
- Reversed and remanded
- Outcome
- Petitioning party won
- Ideological direction
- Conservative
Opinion excerpt
Justice Rehnquist delivered the opinion of the Court. The Oregon Court of Appeals decided that the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution barred respondent’s retrial after his first trial ended in a mistrial granted on his own motion. 49 Ore. App. 415, 619 P. 2d 948 (1980), cert. granted, 454 U. S. 891 (1981). The Court of Appeals concluded that retrial was barred because the prosecutorial misconduct that occasioned the mistrial in the first instance amounted to “overreaching.” Because that court took an overly expansive view of the application of the Double Jeopardy Clause following a mistrial resulting from the defendant’s own motion, we reverse its judgment. I Respondent was charged with the theft of an oriental rug. During his first trial, the State called an expert witness on the subject of Middle Eastern rugs to testify as to the value and the identity of the rug in question. On cross-examination, respondent’s attorney apparently attempted to establish bias on the part of the expert witness by asking him whether he had filed a criminal complaint against respondent. The witness eventually acknowledged this fact, but explained that no action had been taken on his complaint. On redirect examination, the prosecutor sought to elicit the reasons why the witness had filed a complaint against respondent, but the trial court sustained a…
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