## Facts

- Missouri capital murder law authorized only two sentences: death or life imprisonment without probation or parole eligibility for 50 years.
- Missouri required a bifurcated proceeding: after a guilty verdict, the same jury conducted a separate sentencing hearing to receive aggravation and mitigation evidence.
- Death could be imposed only if the prosecution proved statutory aggravating circumstances beyond a reasonable doubt, and a death verdict required written findings of the aggravators.
- Bullington was convicted of capital murder; at the penalty phase, the jury rejected death and returned a verdict fixing punishment at life imprisonment without parole eligibility for 50 years.
- The trial court granted Bullington a new trial after an intervening constitutional ruling invalidated Missouri’s jury-selection practice.
- Before retrial, the State filed notice of intent to seek the death penalty again based on the same aggravating circumstances.
- Bullington moved to strike the death notice on Double Jeopardy grounds; although the trial court indicated it would grant the motion, the Missouri Supreme Court issued a writ allowing the State to seek death at retrial.

## Issues

1. Whether the Double Jeopardy Clause bars the State from seeking the death penalty at a retrial when the first jury, after a formal capital sentencing hearing, imposed life imprisonment rather than death.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court reversed.
- The Court held that Missouri could not seek the death penalty at Bullington’s retrial.
- Because Missouri’s capital sentencing hearing had trial-like features and required proof beyond a reasonable doubt of aggravating circumstances, the first jury’s life sentence functioned as an acquittal of the death penalty.
- The State therefore could not subject Bullington to a second attempt to obtain a death sentence for the same offense.

## Legal Principles

- Double Jeopardy prohibits a second prosecution attempt after an acquittal; this protection can apply to capital sentencing when the sentencing phase operates like a trial on whether death is warranted.
- When a capital sentencing scheme requires the State to prove specified aggravating facts beyond a reasonable doubt in a separate, adversarial proceeding, a jury’s choice of life over death is treated as an acquittal of the death penalty.
- After such a life verdict, the State may not seek death again at retrial for the same offense by attempting to prove the same aggravating circumstances.

## Conclusion

In Missouri’s bifurcated capital system, the first jury’s penalty-phase verdict imposing life imprisonment, reached after a proceeding requiring the State to prove aggravating circumstances beyond a reasonable doubt, terminated jeopardy as to death; the Double Jeopardy Clause therefore barred the State from pursuing a death sentence at retrial.


Bullington v. Missouri, 451 U.S. 430 (1981)