CHILD ABUSE/NEGLECT – CRIMINAL PROSECUTIONS – ABUSE AND ENDANGERMENT. In one of those hard cases, the Court of Appeals held that the Double Jeopardy Clause won’t stop a court from convicting a parent of both child abuse and child endangerment for the same act. They are not the same offense, and certainly neither one of them is a lesser included offense of the other. The appellate question was limited to the third prong of the Double Jeopardy Clause, which prohibits multiple punishments for the same offense. Assuming it was for one continuous act, the Court of Appeals found two distinct legislative intents in the two statutes and the judges applied the Blockburger v. U.S. rule in analyzing the abuse statute, §18.2-371.1(A) and the endangerment statute §40.1-103(A), and found different conduct prohibited by each one. Thus a conviction of each requires finding different facts, different conduct. In child abuse there has to be the serious injury to the child’s life or health, and for endangerment, while serious injury, or any injury, is not required, there has to be a placement at risk of danger. King v. Commonwealth, 56 Va. App. 133, 692 S.E.2d 249, 24 VLW 1265 (4/27/10).