In the Heath v. Alabama case of 1985, the US Supreme Court ruled that successive prosecutions by two states for the same conduct does not violate the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Larry Gene Heath had hired a man to kill his pregnant wife in Alabama, but her body was found in Georgia where he was tried and pled guilty to murder charges. Subsequently, he was also indicted for murder during a kidnapping in Alabama based on identical facts as those presented at his trial in Georgia. The court held that because each state is a sovereign entity with its own laws and interests to protect, they may separately prosecute an individual if their laws are violated even though it arises from one act or transaction.

In the dissenting opinion for Heath v. Alabama, Justice Brennan, joined by Justice Marshall, argued that the majority's decision violated the Double Jeopardy Clause of the Fifth Amendment. They contended that this clause should protect a defendant from multiple prosecutions by different states for a single act because it is fundamentally unfair and contrary to American principles of justice to subject someone to potential punishment more than once for each crime they commit. The dissenters believed that allowing separate sovereigns (in this case two states) to prosecute an individual separately was inconsistent with these principles and could lead to abuses of power and unjust outcomes. They also disagreed with the majority's interpretation of precedent on dual sovereignty doctrine in relation to double jeopardy protections.