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Prosecution Gets One Chance At Conviction

1978

In Burks v. United States, the government wants to retry a defendant who won an appeal of his conviction based on insufficient evidence at trial. The U.S. Supreme Court rules that a new trial, or a “do-over,” would violate the double jeopardy clause: “The Double Jeopardy Clause forbids a second trial for the purpose of affording the prosecution another opportunity to supply evidence which it failed to muster in the first proceeding.”