Charges in Multiple Counties

My question involves criminal law for the state of: Minnesota

in November 2002 a co-worker of mine and his accomplice were arrested in St. Paul (ramsey county) for theft by swindle. They purchased gift cards in coon rapids (anoka county), and minneapolis (hennipen county) and used those gift cards to buy stuff. They got caught and arrested in the store and a search incident to arrest of their car yielded a bunch of gift card reciepts from the other stores in other counties.

First the attorney my coworker hired advised him to plead guilty because it would cost too much than he had to fight the charges. So he plead guilty first to ramsey county for felony theft by swindle. Than anoka came and charged him with felony transaction card fraud, he plead guilty. Than hennipen county came and charged him with felony theft by swinle he plead guilty.

Everything came out from a 3 day scheme of buying gift cards with a stolen credit card and using those gift cards to buy stuff. Question, if after having pleading guilty to the first offense in ramsey, shouldn't have the 5th amendment applied and barred prosecution in the other counties for reasons of double jeopardy?

As far as the hennipen county is concerned my co worker was advised by his lawyer to self incriminate infront of police and turn himself in 9 months after the fact. The complaint showed that evidence to link him to the hennipen county crime came from his own testimony. His accomplice wasn't charged because his lawyer told him to keep his mouth shut.

would it be possible to move the court to acquit him of 2nd and 3rd convictions, and further grant him a remedy to vacate 1st conviction? This was his first crime ever, and according to other credit card fraud cases, most people get diversion on their first offence, but he didn't because the prosecutor had prejudiced himself and the judge into believing my coworker was a repeat offender even though he hadn't plead guilty to anything at that point. Please help.

Eddie

This isn't double jeopardy. If you commit multiple acts you can be charged and tried on each one. If they'd all been in the same jurisdiction, they'd likely be aggregated together in one trial, but since he moved around, what happened is not uncommon.

I see nothing here that indicates why the guilty plea should be overturned here and even if there was, the chances to appeal it on whatever basis was over a long time ago. The fact that your friend was guilty, plead guilty, was found guilty pretty much indicates the way the system is supposed to work. The fact that he was actually given a sentence rather than a deferral means little. Deferral is almost always discretionary. The fact that there was apparently a crime spree going on may have quite validly taken such discretion off the table.

Each individual act can legally be considered a separate chargeable count. Using the card to buy a gift card is one count of CC fraud, times the number of times it was done. Each use of the gift card was theft by swindle. They are lucky to be getting off easy.

I think the case would pass, the test multiplicity of charges seeing that the evidence to onvict in the first.case was required to.convict in subsequent cases. proving that the gift, card was purchased f raudently would require proving the ceime charged in case, 2 of financial transaction card fraud.

I have no idea what the previous sentence is supposed to mean. He pled guilty. Whatever proof was needed went out the window with his statement in court that he did it.

Double Jeopordy is when a person is tried more than once for the same crime. Example, even if Casey Anthony confessed right now to killing her kid, she could not be tried for it again, she was already tried and exonerated by a jury.

Your friend committed crimes of the same type with multiple companies. Let's say he used the stolen credit card at the same Kohl's store, 5 times. He could get 5 charges.

Thanks for all the replies. One thing I like to make clear though in all my research, I have found that the biggest mistake that is made with the case that I've cited is that prosecution focuses on the offenses rather than the course of criminal conduct. In this case the crimes of financial transaction card fraud was incidental to the theft by swindle charge for which he had already plead guilty. by accepting that he committed theft by swindle by means of financial transaction card fraud it is safe to say that the theft by swindle is a lesser charge of the greater financial transaction card fraud.

Because the 3 charges were not joined into one indictment and were charged in separate counties as separate offenses resulting from the same behavioral incident, they should be thrown out for the mere fact that serialized prosecution is barred by the 5th amendment on related offenses comprising a single behavioral incident after jeopardy attached via the first guilty plea.

Check out these cases:
See State v. Naylor, 474 N.W.2d 314, 322 (Minn.1991) (holding defendant's drugging of victim and later participating in victim's stabbing were part of single behavioral incident);
State v. Beito, 332 N.W.2d 645, 649 (Minn.1983) (holding defendant's escape from prison and stealing of truck were part of same behavioral incident where the two offenses were related closely in the defendant's mind and the taking of the truck facilitated the escape);
State v. Finn, 295 Minn. 520, 522, 203 N.W.2d 114, 115 (1972) (holding offense of reckless driving was part of same behavioral incident as offense of using a vehicle without authorization where defendant drove recklessly in order to avoid police apprehension on the other charge).

to make my point by citing those three cases:
holding offense of financial transaction card fraud was part of same behavioral incident as offense of theft by swindle where the defendent used a credit card to buy gift cards as means to swindle the property from the same store.

It's homework time of year again, isn't it?

lol yeah it would seem so. Another fact to consider is the blockburger test. It seems this case is a prime example of why the serialized prosecution was barred. Anyhow lets give these guys the benefit of the doubt and say that the prosecution was illegal. What type of remedy should be requested in regards to all three cases. Would Anoka county district court have the authority to withdraw the guilty plea and adjudicate an acquittal in its place? does Anoka have the authority to tell Ramsey or Hennepin county District court to overturn their rulings?

Blockburger
Once a defendant is convicted and sentenced of a lesser offense, the state’s ability to prosecute the defendant for a greater offense for the same behavioral incident is greatly limited. In Blockburger v. United States, 284 U.S. 299, 304 (1932), the Supreme Court held that the Double Jeopardy Clause allows for successive prosecutions for the same criminal act under two different criminal statutes when each statute requires proof of a fact that the other does not. But when one offense is a lesser-included offense of the other, a second prosecution is barred. Brown v. Ohio, 432 U.S. 161, 166 (1977).

I'm sure your professors would appreciate you doing your own homework.

;)

as far as giving up all hope because of the guilty plea check this out. . Blackledge, 417 U.S at 31. The Supreme Court, in Menna v. New York, extended the Blackedge rule to double jeopardy claims, permitting a defendant to assert a double jeopardy claim on appeal despite his guilty plea. It held that where the constitution prohibits a state from “haling a defendant into court on a charge” a conviction on that charge must be overturned, “even if the conviction was entered pursuant to a counseled plea of guilty”.