NCJ Number
190820
Journal
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology Volume: 91 Issue: 2 Dated: Winter 2001 Pages: 429-468
Date Published
2001
Length
40 pages
Annotation
This paper critiqued the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Carmell v. Texas (2000), which held that the Ex Post Facto Law Clause of the U.S. Constitution prohibited the application of a Texas statute of criminal procedure in trials against sex offenders for their offenses committed prior to the amendment of the statute in 1995.
Abstract
The Court reasoned that the amendment to the Texas statute altered the sufficiency of the evidence needed to convict criminal defendants, and thus it qualified as an ex post facto law as such under the seminal case of Calder v. Bull (1798). In particular, the Court was persuaded that the facts of "Carmell" mirrored the 300 year-old case of Sir John Fenwick, the same case that Justice Chase cited in "Calder" for the proposition that statutes that altered the sufficiency of the evidence needed to convict were invalid ex post facto laws. This paper argued that the Supreme Court's decision was incorrect. First, the majority incorrectly found that Texas Article 38.07 altered the sufficiency of the evidence needed to obtain a conviction. Instead, this article was functionally identical to rules of witness competency, and was not ex post facto as such under the principles of "Calder." Second, the Court erroneously analogized the facts of John Fenwick's case to Carmell's situation. Finally, even if the majority were correct in its assertion that Texas Article 38.07 qualified as an ex post facto law as defined in "Calder," the majority ignored subsequent case law that effectively reinterpreted the "Calder" definition, to the exclusion of Calder's fourth category of ex post facto laws, those that alter the legal rules of evidence. 324 notes