── Tallon Westlake v. State of Alaska ──
Court: Court of Appeals of Alaska
Date: April 17, 2026
Category: General
NOTICE
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IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF ALASKA
TALLON COLT WESTLAKE,
Court of Appeals No. A-14462
Petitioner, Trial Court No. 3AN-22-06282 CR
v.
OPINION
STATE OF ALASKA,
Respondent. No. 2828 — April 17, 2026
Petition for Review from the Superior Court, Third Judicial
District, Anchorage, Michael L. Wolverton, Judge.
Appearances: Jenna C. Klein, Assistant Public Defender, and
Terrence Haas, Public Defender, Anchorage, for the Petitioner.
Nancy R. Simel, Assistant Attorney General, Office of
Criminal Appeals, Anchorage, and Treg R. Taylor, Attorney
General, Juneau, for the Respondent.
Before: Wollenberg, Harbison, and Terrell, Judges.
Judge TERRELL.
Under the Double Jeopardy Clauses of the United States and Alaska
Constitutions,1 a defendant cannot be retried for the same offense following a mistrial
1
U.S. Const. amend. V; Alaska Const. art. I, § 9.
absent their consent to the mistrial or “manifest necessity” for the mistrial.2 The
prohibition on multiple trials for the same offense without the defendant’s consent or
manifest necessity is “deeply ingrained” in our legal system, serving as a valuable check
against government overreach.3
But like many of our constitutional protections against government
overreach, it is not without cost. Enforcing the prohibition against multiple trials means
there will be instances where “the State will be barred from retrying the defendant,
regardless of the strength of the State’s evidence.”4
Here, Tallon Colt Westlake was tried on four theories of homicide and one
count of tampering with physical evidence for allegedly beating his father to death and
then cleaning up the scene. The jury began deliberations on a Thursday afternoon and
continued into Friday before advising the trial court first thing Monday morning that it
had reached a verdict on the highest charge but had not reached a unanimous verdict on
the next highest charge. Upon further inquiry by the court, the jury said that it had been
unable to reach a decision on any of the remaining counts but also asked for clarification
regarding one of the counts.
The jury ultimately returned a verdict of not guilty on the most serious
charge, first-degree murder. Before the jury returned this verdict, however, the court
engaged in an exchange with the jury foreperson in open court which indicated that
there was juror confusion about several legal issues. Rather than inquiring about this
apparent confusion or attempting to clarify it, the court determined, after polling the
jury, that the jury was hung and dismissed the jury over Westlake’s objection.
2
Arizona v. Washington, 434 U.S. 497, 505 (1978); Koehler v. State, 519 P.2d 442,
448 (Alaska 1974).
3
Green v. United States, 355 U.S. 184, 187-88 (1957).
4
Allen v. State, 366 P.3d 536, 541 (Alaska App. 2016).
–2– 2828
Westlake moved to dismiss his case on double jeopardy grounds.
Westlake argued that there was no manifest necessity for declaring a mistrial because
the jury did not deliberate for a sufficient l