James Wesley Amonett, Jr. v. Virginia

Issue 1. There is an important, recurring issue on which the Federal circuits and the states’ highest courts are split, i.e. whether the police can promise someone who they have arrested a specific benefit in exchange for the arrestee’s cooperation and whether that contract (offer and acceptance) is enforceable. a. Can the government escape responsibility for the promises made by the police and accepted by the arrestee by claiming that the police lacked the authority to make such promises? b. Does this Court’s ruling in Frazier v. Cupp, 394 U.S. 731, 89 S.Ct. 1420, 22 L.Ed.2d 684 (1969) that police may misrepresent the facts they know mean that the police can misrepresent their authority to make agreements with someone they have arrested? c. Should Santobello v. New York, 404 U.S. 257 (1971) apply to promises made by the police, accepted by the arrestee and upon which the arrestee relies to his detriment? Issue 2. Whether, under the Right to Trial by Jury Clause of the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, a defendant is entitled to have a jury determine the factual issue of whether the police and the defendant entered into a binding contract,and whether the contract has been breached.