Double Jeopardy and the Karen Read Case

In the case involving Karen Read, the jury deliberated for several days but ultimately failed to reach a unanimous decision, resulting in a hung jury. The judge declared a mistrial and dismissed the jury. However, neither the judge nor the attorneys individually assessed the jury's verdicts as to each count.

It later emerged, through post-trial statements from several jurors, that the jury had unanimously agreed on not guilty verdicts for counts one and three, but remained deadlocked on the remaining charges. Under standard legal procedure, the jury should have been allowed to return not guilty verdicts on those two counts, with a mistrial declared only for the unresolved charges, which could then be retried. Count 1, was charged as second degree murder. Count 3 was leaving the scene with injury/death.

A blanket mistrial was declared across all charges. This critical detail, that the jury had reached unanimous not guilty verdicts on some counts, only surfaced after the fact, when several jurors informed the defense team after reading news reports of what the news outlets believed was happening during the jury deliberation. 

Read's attorneys argued that retrying her on counts one and two would violate the constitutional protection against double jeopardy. Normally, this protection would apply if not guilty verdicts had been formally entered into the court record. However, because those verdicts were never officially recorded, and were only revealed through juror disclosures, the judge denied the defense's motion to prevent retrial. The case was then appealed.

The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld the trial judge's decision, and a federal judge later affirmed that ruling. As a result, despite the jury having reportedly acquitted Read on counts one and three, those charges remain eligible for retrial simply because the verdicts were never formally entered into the record.

Notably, jury notes indicated that they were deadlocked on some aspects of the case. However, the judge failed to clarify whether the deadlock applied to all counts or just specific ones. This omission proved significant. In cases of a mistrial, it is crucial for judges to instruct juries that each charge must be considered separately, and that they may return verdicts on any count for which they reach a unanimous decision.

In this case, the note from the jury foreman appeared to be so clear that they were divided, the judge did not inquire whether the jury had reached verdicts on individual counts, and because nothing was entered into the record, the legal system is left with no definitive account of the jury's conclusions. As a result, Karen Read now faces a second trial, even on charges for which the jury may have already unanimously found her not guilty. This situation appears to conflict with the spirit and intent of the Fifth Amendment's protection against double jeopardy.