# Double Jeopardy question

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/double-jeopardy-question/638378>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 21, 2012, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/double-jeopardy-question/638378 "2012-10-21T02:37:19Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 23

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**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\
**Post date:** [October 22, 2012, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/double-jeopardy-question/638378/23 "2012-10-22T12:24:29Z")

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> [@Tom\_Tildrum](#):
>
> However, if the prosecution can show that you committed perjury in the course of being convicted in the first case, you probably can’t invoke collateral estoppel in the second case, since the issue wasn’t genuinely litigated the first time.

There’s a story – THE JAILHOUSE LAWYER, by Phillip Margolin – where the defendant **doesn’t** commit perjury the first time; he just plays the Angry Black Man who gets warned about contempt and sneers that _“I got no respect fo’ a honkey pig”_ while on trial for reckless driving in Oregon.

So he acts as his own lawyer (and, yes, the ‘fool for a client’ quote comes up; and, yes, he predictably fails to object to inadmissible testimony) sure as he doesn’t bother to take the stand while unconvincingly maintaining his innocence throughout; he thus later proves he wasn’t simultaneously murdering someone in New Jersey, since, hey, that was the judge’s authoritative verdict back when a cop swore to it on the stand, right?

(Why didn’t the defendant request a jury? _“One pig or six fascist sheep, it don’t make no difference.”_)

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