David Stanley James Pijor v. Commonwealth of Virginia

Summary

The Supreme Court of Virginia affirmed David Stanley James Pijor's perjury conviction, which arose from testimony he gave at his larceny trial that he had neither seen his ex-girlfriend's missing dog, Ben, nor received any information about the dog's whereabouts. The court held that collateral estoppel, as embodied in the Fifth Amendment's double jeopardy protection, did not bar the prosecution because Pijor failed to carry his burden of showing that his general-verdict acquittal on larceny necessarily resolved the precise factual issue he sought to preclude. The court further held that the circumstantial evidence—repeated sightings of Pijor walking Ben beginning five days after his testimony, his arrest with the dog in his car, and his refusal to say when he found Ben—was sufficient to prove perjury beyond a reasonable doubt. No separate opinions were filed.