Benton v. Maryland
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| Benton v. Maryland | ||||||||||
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 Supreme Court of the United States |
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| Argued December 12, 1968 Reargued March 24, 1969 Decided June 23, 1969 |
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| Holding | ||||||||||
| The Fifth Amendment protection against double jeopardy is enforceable against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment. | ||||||||||
| Court membership | ||||||||||
| Chief Justice: Warren E. Burger Associate Justices: Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, John Marshall Harlan II, William J. Brennan, Potter Stewart, Byron White, Thurgood Marshall |
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| Case opinions | ||||||||||
| Majority by: Marshall Joined by: Burger, Black, Douglas, Brennan Concurrence by: White Dissent by: Harlan Joined by: Stewart |
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| Laws applied | ||||||||||
| U.S. Const. amend. V and XIV | ||||||||||
Benton v. Maryland, , was a decision issued by the United States Supreme Court concerning double jeopardy, that overruled an earlier landmark decision Palko v. Connecticut.
John Dalmer Benton was tried on charges of larceny and burglary. He was acquitted of larceny but found guilty on the burglary count. As a result, Benton was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Shortly after Benton's conviction, the Maryland Court of Appeals ruled in Schowgurow v. State that the portion of the Maryland Constitution which had required all jurors to swear their belief in the existence of God was itself unconstitutional. Since the jurors in Benton's case had been selected under the unconstitutional provision, he was given the option of demanding a new trial. Benton did in fact choose to undergo a new trial, but at the second trial, the state again charged Benton with larceny in spite of the fact that he had been acquitted of larceny in the first trial. The second trial concluded with Benton being found guilty on both burglary and larceny.
The Supreme Court ruled that the second trial constituted double jeopardy. There was no protection against double jeopardy in Maryland, but the Court ruled that under the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution incorporated the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment and made it enforcable against to the states. As a result, the Court overturned the larceny conviction. Justice Thurgood Marshall, writing for the majority, wrote:
It is clear that petitioner's larceny conviction cannot stand once federal double jeopardy standards are applied. Petitioner was acquitted of larceny in his first trial. Because he decided to appeal his burglary conviction, he is forced to suffer retrial on the larceny count as well. As this Court held in Green v. United States ... "[c]onditioning an appeal of one offense on a coerced surrender of a valid plea of former jeopardy on another offense exacts a forfeiture in plain conflict with the constitutional bar against double jeopardy."
