Michigan v. Evans (Opinion)
Annotate this CaseThe issue before the Supreme Court was whether the Double Jeopardy Clauses of the Michigan and federal constitutions barred defendant's retrial. Defendant Lamar Evans was accused of burning a vacant house. There was no dispute that the trial court wrongly added an extraneous element to the statute under which Defendant was charged. Specifically, the trial court ruled that the prosecution was required to present proof that the burned house was not a dwelling, which was not a required element of MCL 750.73. As a result of the trial court's erroneous addition of this extraneous element to the charged offense, it granted Defendant's motion for a directed verdict and entered an order of acquittal, dismissing the case. Upon review, the Supreme Court held that when a trial court grants a defendant's motion for a directed verdict on the basis of an error of law that did not resolve any factual element of the charged offense, the trial court's ruling does not constitute an acquittal for the purposes of double jeopardy and retrial is therefore not barred. Accordingly, because the trial court's actions did not constitute an acquittal for the purposes of double jeopardy, the Court affirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remanded the case for further proceedings.
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