MESA COUNTY, Colo. — Even though Mexico's judicial system acquitted a man for a murder he committed in Mesa County, there was no prohibition against Colorado prosecutors also charging him for the offense when he returned, the state Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday.
A jury found Rafael Aguilar Garcia guilty of murder in 2017, nearly three decades after he killed Charles Porter in Palisade and five years after Mexican authorities acquitted him of the crime. Garcia initially fled to Mexico after the murder but returned to Colorado under the impression that the constitutional prohibition on double jeopardy would preclude a second prosecution in the United States.
He was wrong.
"We reject these claims and conclude that, under both the United States Constitution and state law, Mesa County was entitled to prosecute Garcia despite his earlier prosecution and acquittal in Mexico," wrote Justice Melissa Hart in the June 20 opinion.
Double jeopardy prohibits the government from prosecuting someone twice for the same offense. There is an exception, however, under the "dual sovereignty doctrine" — the idea that a person's conduct can violate the laws of both federal and state governments, for example, and can be prosecuted under each.
>Read the full article at Colorado Politics
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