## Facts

- Alfred Kapala Carroll was arrested around 2:40 a.m. on October 19, 1978, in connection with starting a fire at Jefferson School.
- At the scene, an officer searched Carroll, found a canister, assumed it was nasal spray, and returned it to him.
- Carroll was taken to the police station and booked for attempted criminal property damage in the second degree.
- During a later custodial search at the station, an officer recovered the canister again and identified it as Mace.
- Around 3:20 a.m., Carroll was charged under a Honolulu ordinance with possession of an obnoxious substance (Mace).
- Carroll was tried in district court on the ordinance charge and acquitted.
- The State later indicted Carroll in circuit court for felony attempted criminal property damage in the second degree.
- Carroll moved to dismiss the indictment, arguing the felony charge arose from the same “episode” as the earlier Mace charge and was barred by Hawaii’s statutory compulsory-joinder and former-prosecution provisions.
- The circuit court dismissed the indictment; the State appealed.

## Issues

1. Whether the Mace possession offense and the attempted criminal property damage offense arose from the same “episode” under HRS § 701-109(2), requiring joinder in one trial.
2. If they arose from the same episode, whether the prior acquittal on the Mace charge barred the subsequent felony prosecution under HRS § 701-111(1)(b).

## Decision

- The Hawaii Supreme Court reversed the dismissal of the indictment.
- The court held the Mace possession offense and the attempted property damage offense did not arise from the same “episode” under HRS § 701-109(2).
- Because the offenses were not part of the same episode, HRS § 701-111(1)(b) did not bar the felony prosecution after the Mace acquittal.
- The felony prosecution was permitted to proceed.

## Legal Principles

- Under HRS § 701-109(2), separate trials are barred only for multiple offenses based on the same conduct or arising from the same “episode,” as defined by the relationship of time, place, and circumstances.
- Offenses arise from the same episode when they are so closely related in time, place, and circumstances that a complete account of one charge cannot be given without referring to details of the other.
- Mere temporal proximity or discovery of a separate offense during arrest processing does not, by itself, make offenses part of the same episode.
- When offenses are not from the same episode, a prior acquittal on one offense does not bar later prosecution for the other under HRS § 701-111(1)(b).

## Conclusion

The court held that possession of Mace discovered during station processing was not part of the same episode as the alleged attempted property damage at the school, so the State was not required to join the charges and could prosecute the felony despite the earlier acquittal on the ordinance offense.


State v. Carroll, 627 P.2d 776 (Haw. 1981)