Ferenc v. Dugger

• Decision Date: 15 March 1989
• Docket Number: No. 88-3007,88-3007
• Citation: 867 F.2d 1301
• Parties: John M. FERENC, Petitioner-Appellee, v. Richard L. DUGGER, and Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, Respondents- Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 1301

867 F.2d 1301

John M. FERENC, Petitioner-Appellee, v. Richard L. DUGGER, and Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, Respondents- Appellants.

No. 88-3007.

United States Court of Appeals,

Eleventh Circuit.

March 15, 1989.

Sean Daly, Asst. Atty. Gen., Daytona Beach, Fla., for respondents-appellants.

Robert A. Leventhal, Orlando, Fla., for petitioner-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

Before RONEY, Chief Judge, HATCHETT, Circuit Judge, and HENDERSON, Senior Circuit Judge.

HENDERSON, Senior Circuit Judge:

This is an appeal from an order of the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida granting federal habeas corpus relief to the petitioner, John Ferenc, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2254. The sole issue on appeal is whether the doctrine of collateral estoppel precludes the State's use of evidence, previously suppressed on fourth amendment grounds in a prior state court proceeding, in a subsequent, unrelated criminal action against the same defendant.

Ferenc's odyssey through the Florida courts began in 1983, when he was arrested in Escambia County, Florida on suspicion of burglary. Officer Shook of the Pensacola Police Department apprehended Ferenc, who matched the suspect's description, approximately one-half mile from the scene of the burglary. After a backup unit arrived, the officers observed the outline of a handgun in Ferenc's pants pocket. The resulting arrest and search of Ferenc's person produced the revolver, a screwdriver, a pair of gloves, three penlight flashlights, and a set of keys. Officer Shook used the keys to open Ferenc's nearby van and discovered, among other things, a stamp and coin collection allegedly stolen from a Seminole County residence. The van was impounded and a warrant for the search was later obtained. The petitioner was charged with attempted burglary, possession of a firearm and possession of burglary tools in Escambia County.

In the Escambia County trial, Ferenc filed a pretrial motion to suppress all evidence seized during the search. The trial court denied the petitioner's motion to suppress evidence found on his person, but excluded all items seized from the van, including the stamp and coin collection, for the reason that Ferenc had not consented to Officer Shook's search of the van. The trial court also rejected the State's argument that the officer had probable cause to search the van to determine the presence of a second suspect. The Escambia County prosecuting attorney did not seek an interlocutory appeal on this ruling, electing instead to proceed directly to trial. Ferenc was convicted of all offenses as originally charged in that county.

Approximately one year later, Ferenc was charged in Seminole County with first-degree grand theft of the stamp and coin album found in his van. Relying on the Escambia County suppression order, Ferenc filed a motion to dismiss information and motion to suppress the evidence seized from the van during the search. The Seminole County court denied the motions, holding that the State was not collaterally estopped from relitigating the suppression issue because Ferenc's previous Escambia County pretrial motion to suppress did not place him in double jeopardy. The court then denied Ferenc's renewed motion to suppress, holding that the search of the van and resulting seizure of the collection were not unlawful. ¹ Ferenc was convicted on the grand theft charge and appealed to the Florida Fifth District Court of Appeal, which affirmed his conviction. Ferenc v. State, 462 So.2d 28 (Fla.Dist.Ct.App.1984) (per curiam).

Ferenc then filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the federal district court, urging again that the Escambia County suppression order precluded the Seminole County court from addressing the fourth amendment seizure issue. ² The State maintained, as it had in the Seminole County trial, that the doctrine of collateral estoppel was not invoked because the Escambia County suppression hearing did not "necessarily result in the determination of a factual issue through a final judgment." The district court disagreed, holding that the fourth amendment issue of the lawfulness of the search previously had been decided by the Escambia County trial court in a valid and final judgment, barring introduction of the evidence from that search in the subsequent Seminole County trial. The district court found that the Seminole County court's failure to honor the Escambia County suppression order violated Ferenc's fifth amendment right to be free from double jeopardy and accordingly issued the writ of habeas corpus. The State filed this appeal.

In a criminal proceeding, the protection of collateral estoppel is embodied in the fifth amendment guarantee against double jeopardy. Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U.S. 436, 445, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 1195, 25 L.Ed.2d 469, 476 (1970); United States v. Demarco, 791 F.2d 833, 836 (11th Cir.1986). Collateral estoppel, however, is limited in its application. Its parent doctrine, double jeopardy, prohibits prosecution of the crime itself, whereas collateral estoppel "simply forbids the government from relitigating certain facts in order to establish the fact of the crime." United States v. Mock, 604 F.2d 341, 343 (5th Cir.1979).

The Supreme Court laid the cornerstone for the doctrine of collateral estoppel in Ashe v. Swenson, supra. The Court there held collateral estoppel simply to mean "that when an issue of ultimate fact has once been determined by a valid and final judgment, that issue cannot be litigated between the same parties in any future lawsuit." 397 U.S. at 443, 90 S.Ct. at 1194, 25 L.Ed.2d at 475. This principle extends to prevent redetermination of evidentiary facts as well as ultimate facts. United States v. Lee, 622 F.2d 787, 789 (5th Cir.1980), cert. denied, 451 U.S. 913, 101 S.Ct. 1987, 68 L.Ed.2d 303 (1981); Blackburn v. Cross, 510 F.2d 1014, 1019 (5th Cir.1975).

Ashe 's progeny in the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals have held collateral estoppel to apply in either of two ways: "(1) it may bar prosecution or argumentation of facts necessarily established in a prior proceeding; or (2) it may completely bar subsequent prosecution where one of the facts necessarily determined in the former trial is an essential element of the conviction the government seeks." United States v. DeMarco, supra, 791 F.2d at 836; accord United States v. Griggs, 735 F.2d 1318, 1326 (11th Cir.1984). Thus, two inquiries are necessary. First, what facts were necessarily determined in the first trial? Second, did the State in the second trial attempt to relitigate facts necessarily established against it at the first trial? See United States v. Irvin, 787 F.2d 1506, 1515 (11th Cir.1986) (citing United States v. Mock, supra, 604 F.2d at 343).

Initially, we take note of the State's argument that collateral estoppel is not implicated where, as the State contends, the issue of the lawfulness of the search is a question of law and not one of ultimate or evidentiary fact. Collateral estoppel bars only the reintroduction or relitigation of facts already established against the government. Mock, supra, 604 F.2d at 343. To the extent that the determination of a search and seizure's lawfulness depends upon the particular circumstances of each case, however, the fourth amendment inquiry is, by necessity, a mixed question of law and fact. Analysis of the petitioner's claim within a collateral estoppel framework is therefore appropriate.

Only those facts which necessarily were determined in the first prosecution are foreclosed from reexamination at the subsequent trial. Griggs, supra, 735 F.2d at 1326 (citing United States v. Lee, supra, 622 F.2d at 790). A "necessarily determined" or "necessarily established" fact must meet two requirements for purposes of collateral estoppel. First, the issue sought to be foreclosed from consideration must have been resolved in the defendant's favor at the prior trial. United States v. Corley, 824 F.2d 931, 935 (11th Cir.1987); United States v. Nelson, 599 F.2d 714, 716 (5th Cir.1979). The rationale behind this requirement is to prevent the government from forcing a defendant to defend against charges or factual allegations which he overcame in an earlier trial. United States v. Corley, supra, 824 F.2d at 935. Second, the fact which the defendant seeks to exclude must have been essential to conviction in the first trial. In United States v. Smith, 757 F.2d 1161, 1165 n. 2 (11th Cir.1985), this court noted that "if the government were to try to prove the same factual issue in two trials, an adverse decision in the first trial would prevent relitigation of that same issue if it was critical to the first prosecution." See also United States v. Nelson, supra, 599 F.2d at 716 (collateral estoppel doctrine precludes government from relitigating issues of fact that were essential to conviction where such facts were determined favorably to defendant in a prior judgment).

It cannot be said that any...