Criminal Law‪.‬

Jury's Silence on Theory of First-Degree Murder Not an Acquittal for Double Jeopardy Purposes--Commonwealth v. Carlino, 865 N.E.2d 767 (Mass. 2007) Prohibitions against double jeopardy, whether based on the Double Jeopardy Clause of the United States Constitution or the right provided by Massachusetts law, prevent the government from subjecting individuals to the hazards of standing trial more than once for the same offense. (1) Generally, courts have not interpreted a jury's silence on one charge as an implied acquittal for purposes of double jeopardy, unless the jury's guilty verdict on another charge logically excludes guilt of the charge on which the jury remained silent. (2) In Commonwealth v. Carlino, (3) the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (SJC) considered whether a jury's silence on one of three alternate theories of first-degree murder at the defendant's first trial prevented the Commonwealth from retrying the defendant on that same theory. (4) The SJC held that the jury's silence on the felony-murder theory in Thomas Carlino's first trial was not an acquittal for double jeopardy purposes and, thus, did not prevent retrial on that theory. (5)