Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 588

529US2

Unit: $U52

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OCTOBER TERM, 1999

513

Syllabus

CARMELL v. TEXAS

certiorari to the court of appeals of texas,
second district

No. 98–7540. Argued November 30, 1999—Decided May 1, 2000

In 1996, petitioner was convicted on 15 counts of committing sexual of-
fenses against his stepdaughter from 1991 to 1995, when she was 12 to
16 years old. Before September 1, 1993, Tex. Code Crim. Proc. Ann.,
Art. 38.07, speciﬁed that a victim’s testimony about a sexual offense
could not support a conviction unless corroborated by other evidence
or the victim informed another person of the offense within six months
of its occurrence, but that, if a victim was under 14 at the time of the
offense, the victim’s testimony alone could support a conviction. A 1993
amendment allowed the victim’s testimony alone to support a conviction
if the victim was under 18. The validity of four of petitioner’s convic-
tions depends on which version of the law applies to him. Before the
Texas Court of Appeals, he argued that the four convictions could
not stand under the pre-1993 version of the law, which was in effect at
the time of his alleged conduct, because they were based solely on the
testimony of the victim, who was not under 14 at the time of the offenses
and had not made a timely outcry. The court held that applying the
1993 amendment retrospectively did not violate the Ex Post Facto
Clause, and the State Court of Criminal Appeals denied review.

Held: Petitioner’s convictions on the counts at issue, insofar as they are
not corroborated by other evidence, cannot be sustained under the
Ex Post Facto Clause. Pp. 521–553.

(a) In Calder v. Bull, 3 Dall. 386, 390, Justice Chase stated that the
proscription against ex post facto laws was derived from English
common law well known to the Framers, and set out four categories
of ex post facto criminal laws: “1st. Every law that makes an action
done before the passing of the law, and which was innocent when done,
2d. Every law that aggravates a
criminal; and punishes such action.
crime, or makes it greater than it was, when committed.
3d. Every
law that changes the punishment, and inﬂicts a greater punishment,
than the law annexed to the crime, when committed. 4th. Every law
that alters the legal rules of evidence, and receives less, or different,
testimony, than the law required at the time of the commission of the
offence, in order to convict the offender.” The Court has repeatedly
endorsed this understanding, including the fourth category. Both Jus-
tice Chase and the common-law treatise on which he drew heavily cited