722
Syllabus
Court established a "narrow exception" to the general rule that double jeopardy principles have no application in the sentencing context. There, after a capital defendant received a life sentence from the original sentencing jury and then obtained a new trial, the State announced its intention to seek the death penalty again. This Court imposed a double jeopardy bar, finding that the first jury's deliberations bore the hallmarks of a trial on guilt or innocence because the jury was presented with a choice between two alternatives together with standards to guide their decision, the prosecutor had to establish facts beyond a reasonable doubt, and the evidence was introduced in a separate proceeding that formally resembled a trial. Moreover, the Bullington Court reasoned that the embarrassment, expense, ordeal, anxiety, and insecurity that a capital defendant faces are at least equivalent to that faced by any defendant during the guilt phase of a criminal trial. Bullington's rule has since been applied to a capital sentencing scheme in which a judge made the original determination to impose a life sentence. See Arizona v. Rumsey, 467 U. S. 203, 209-210. Pp. 727-731.
(b) Bullington's rationale does not apply to California's noncapital sentencing proceedings. Even if those proceedings have the hallmarks identified in Bullington, a critical component of that case's reasoning was the capital sentencing context. In many respects, a capital trial's penalty phase is a continuation of the trial on guilt or innocence of capital murder. The death penalty is unique in both its severity and its finality, and the qualitative difference between a capital sentence and other penalties calls for a greater degree of reliability when it is imposed. That need for reliability accords with one of the central concerns animating the double jeopardy prohibition: preventing States from making repeated attempts to convict, thereby enhancing the possibility that an innocent person may be found guilty. Moreover, this Court has previously suggested that Bullington's rationale is confined to the unique circumstances of a capital sentencing proceeding, Caspari v. Bohlen, 510 U. S. 383, 392, and has cited Bullington as an example of the heightened procedural protections accorded capital defendants, Strickland v. Washington, 466 U. S. 668, 686-687. Pp. 731-733.
(c) Petitioner attempts to minimize the relevance of the death penalty context by arguing that the application of double jeopardy principles turns on the nature rather than the consequences of the proceeding. Bullington's holding, however, turns on both the trial-like proceedings at issue and the severity of the penalty at stake. In this Court's death penalty jurisprudence, moreover, the nature and the consequences of capital sentencing proceedings are intertwined. States' implementation of trial-like protections in noncapital sentencing proceedings is a
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