Steve Palmer [00:00:00]:

All right, folks, Steve Palmer here, lawyer talk off the record, on the air, Q and A style. I'm going to talk about a case that happened here in Columbus, Ohio. Look, we publish these things for the world to see. But I do have a law practice, a criminal defense practice right here in Columbus, Ohio. A friend and colleague of mine recently tried a case. He represented a local police officer named Connor Grubbs. He was accused of some homicide related offenses based on a shooting with an interaction with with a suspect outside of a grocery store. Check the details.

Steve Palmer [00:00:32]:

But there's plenty of breakdown to be done here on this case. There's lots of political.

Steve Palmer [00:00:39]:

Viewpoints on it both ways. I'm not going to dig into that. But somebody asked me something because Conor Grubbs was acquitted. In other words, he was found not guilty of those offenses. And somebody asked me outside my normal purview whether the government could appeal that acquittal. Or somebody said, look, that doesn't seem like they. Clearly this individual didn't agree with the verdict. Fair enough, I'm not going to take that on.

Steve Palmer [00:01:04]:

But the question was whether the government could appeal since the defendant won. The answer is no. The answer is the government does not have a right to appeal on an acquittal just because there was an acquittal. In other words, the defendant was accused of a crime. The government brought the case into a courtroom. The government decided to charge Connor Grubb with murder related offenses. The case the government came into court with. Prosecutors presented the case to a jury.

Steve Palmer [00:01:30]:

The jury said not guilty on everything. In other words, you are free to go an acquittal, absolute absolution, walk out free. The government is stuck with that verdict. It cannot appeal. There are, though some situations where the government can't appeal and usually it has to do with something the judge ruled upon prior to trial. So take a drug case and the defense files a motion to suppress, meaning they're challenging the admissibility of the very drugs that the defendant is accused of possessing. So let's say the police stop your car, they search it, they find in your car a backpack. And in the backpack they find 100 pounds of marijuana and a firearm.

Steve Palmer [00:02:08]:

And the police say, well, we're going to charge you not only with trafficking and drugs because that's a lot of marijuana, but we're also going to accuse you of possession of drugs and possessing a firearm at the time you're possessing drugs. So it makes it even more serious. Well, the defense is crafty and they've got a good lawyer. And the lawyer says this was a Fourth Amendment violation. We are challenging the search and seizure of these items. And maybe the stop of the car violated the fourth Amendment, maybe the search of the car violated the fourth Amendment, and maybe even the search of the backpack in the car violated the Fourth Amendment. Whatever the reason is, the police screwed up and the judge agrees. And the judge says, you, you know what? I don't like it.

Steve Palmer [00:02:48]:

I don't relish the fact that I have to throw out all this evidence and prohibit the government from using it at a trial. But there's a Fourth Amendment violation here and there's nothing I can do. Bye. Bye. So I hereby agree with the defense, and I'm going to throw out all the evidence. I'm going to suppress it from use at trial. Well, the government says, well, look, I'm stuck holding a bag here, Judge. I can't prove a case.

Steve Palmer [00:03:08]:

I can't. You know, this is the only evidence that I had that, that I could have used to prove this case. I can't go to trial. There's a provision in Ohio, and I imagine most jurisdictions that would let the government appeal that decision. The government basically has to certify that it cannot move forward without that evidence. And then it could go to the court of appeals. And if the court of appeals says, look, the court screwed this up, there was no Fourth Amendment violation, then it comes back and the government can then go to trial. That's a limited circumstances where the government can appeal.

Steve Palmer [00:03:42]:

Now, finally, you might be asking, well, why can't they appeal.

Steve Palmer [00:03:47]:

Like the Connor Grubb case? Well, we have this provision in the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution called double jeopardy. The government presented the case to the jury, the jury acquitted. You can't twice put a guy in jeopardy, and that would violate the Fifth Amendment double jeopardy clause if, if the government were permitted to appeal that and then get a new trial. So it doesn't work that way. Like most of the constitutional stuff, we the people get the constitutional rights and you, the government, do not call it unfair. Call it whatever it is. That's just how it goes. You got your own question about Connor Grub or any other case, shoot it to me@LawyerTalkPodcast.com, leave it in the questions week in, week out.

Steve Palmer [00:04:26]:

Lawyer Talk podcast off the record, on the air.