Ingram v. Commonwealth

801 S.W.2d 321, 1990 Ky. LEXIS 144, 1990 WL 211427
CourtKentucky Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 27, 1990
Docket90-SC-336-DG
StatusPublished
Cited by55 cases

This text of 801 S.W.2d 321 (Ingram v. Commonwealth) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Kentucky Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ingram v. Commonwealth, 801 S.W.2d 321, 1990 Ky. LEXIS 144, 1990 WL 211427 (Ky. 1990).

Opinions

COMBS, Justice.

By a multi-count indictment, appellant Ingram was charged with three offenses involving the sale, and possession for intended sale, of marijuana. In a single trial, he was found guilty on all counts. Two of those convictions constitute the subject matter of this review, which presents the question of whether Ingram has been twice put in jeopardy for the same offense, in violation of Kentucky Constitution § 13.

The factual premise is simple. Ingram— an adult — sold two1 marijuana cigarettes to a minor. This exchange happened to occur within one thousand yards of a school building. The transaction produced two convictions, one for selling marijuana to a minor,2 another for trafficking within one thousand yards of a school;3 consecutive five-year sentences were imposed. Appellant insists that multiple convictions for a single act are prohibited by the Double Jeopardy Clause.4

We have by dictum expressed a view that the protections against double jeopardy afforded by the Kentucky Constitution are co-extensive with those guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States. Jordan v. Commonwealth, Ky., 703 S.W.2d 870, 872 (1986). But notwithstanding the almost identical language of the two provisions, our interpretation of the one has not in fact mirrored the United States Supreme Court’s reading of the other.

The doctrine operates to bar subsequent prosecution for an offense, once the defendant has been acquitted or convicted, and to prohibit multiple punishments for the same offense. North Carolina v. Pearce, 395 U.S. 711, 89 S.Ct. 2072, 23 L.Ed.2d 656 (1969); Ohio v. Johnson, 467 U.S. 493, 104 S.Ct. 2536, 81 L.Ed.2d 425 (1984); Jordan v. Commonwealth, supra. To determine whether two charged offenses are in law the same offense, in the context of multiple punishments, the U.S. Supreme Court established the following test:

The applicable rule is that where the same act or transaction constitutes a violation of two distinct statutory provisions, the test to be applied to determine whether there are two offenses or only one, is whether each provision requires proof of a fact which the other does not.

Blockburger v. United States, 284 U.S. 299, 304, 52 S.Ct. 180, 182, 76 L.Ed. 306 (1932). This test, which has been codified in Kentucky,5 is essentially whether either offense is included in the other.

[323]*323The Supreme Court has painstakingly distinguished the successive prosecutions context as raising grave concerns “beyond merely the possibility of an enhanced sentence_” Grady v. Corbin, — U.S. -, -, 110 S.Ct. 2084, 2091, 109 L.Ed.2d 548, 562 (1990). Where the issue is subsequent prosecution, inquiry may proceed beyond the Blockburger analysis:

[A] subsequent prosecution must do more than merely survive the Blockbur-ger test. As we suggested in Vitale, the Double Jeopardy Clause bars any subsequent prosecution in which the government, to establish an essential element of an offense charged in that prosecution, will prove conduct that constitutes an offense for which the defendant has already been prosecuted.

Id., at -, 110 S.Ct. at 2093, 109 L.Ed.2d, at 564. Cf. Illinois v. Vitale, 447 U.S. 410, 100 S.Ct. 2260, 65 L.Ed.2d 228 (1980); Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. 161, 97 S.Ct. 2221, 53 L.Ed.2d 187 (1977).

The Court has not, however, supplemented the Blockburger criteria when the issue is multiple punishments imposed in a single trial. See Ohio v. Johnson, supra; Garrett v. United States, 471 U.S. 773, 105 S.Ct. 2407, 85 L.Ed.2d 764 (1985). It has even said that in such cases, “the Double Jeopardy Clause does no more than prevent the sentencing court from prescribing greater punishment than the legislature intended.” Missouri v. Hunter, 495 U.S. 359, 366, 103 S.Ct. 673, 678, 74 L.Ed.2d 535 (1983).

This Court holds the Kentucky Constitution superordinate to legislative intent. Moreover, we have at times, in a series of multiple punishment cases, inclined to the view that a single impulse or a single act constitutes but one offense.6 This view of § 13 is obviously broader than the “included offense” approach of Blockburger and KRS 505.020.

Although the facts were very different, the situational posture in Hamilton v. Commonwealth, Ky., 659 S.W.2d 201 (1983), was closely analogous to that in the present case. Hamilton was convicted of both rape and incest for a single act of sexual intercourse with his ten-year old daughter. Clearly, neither offense was included in the other. The father-daughter relationship necessary to the offense of incest, was extraneous to the charge of rape; the age of the victim, very material to the non-consent element of rape, was immaterial to incest. Departing from strict application of Blockburger, we reversed one of the convictions on double jeopardy grounds.

In Jackson v. Commonwealth, Ky., 670 S.W.2d 828 (1984), we held that a conviction for theft of property precludes a simultaneous conviction for knowingly receiving (the same) stolen property. In reversing, we emphasized that the defendant had been twice convicted for the same act.

In Polk v. Commonwealth, Ky., 679 S.W.2d 231 (1984), we affirmed convictions for burglary in the first degree and assault in the first degree. Apart from separate elements, these offenses involved separate acts:

The question is whether in each offense there are additional acts of criminal misconduct which are unnecessary to the commission of the other offense. [Emphasis added.]

Id., at 233. The burglar’s stabbing the home dweller was an additional act constituting the separate offense of assault. Polk effectively substituted the requirement of additional acts for the additional facts of Blockburger, although the different standard did not alter the result.

In Wilson v. Commonwealth, Ky., 695 S.W.2d 854 (1985), we affirmed multiple convictions for conspiracy to commit robbery in the first degree and accomplice to assault in the second degree. It was again clear that the offenses involved multiple acts. We quoted the “additional acts of [324]*324criminal misconduct” language of Polk as the “determinative question.”

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Bluebook (online)
801 S.W.2d 321, 1990 Ky. LEXIS 144, 1990 WL 211427, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ingram-v-commonwealth-ky-1990.