Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 640

529US2

Unit: $U52

[09-26-01 10:36:40] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 513 (2000)

565

Ginsburg, J., dissenting

same results as the actual statute in every case. Not “in
certain instances,” ante, at 551, or “in some situations,”
ante, at 550, but in every case.9 Recognizing this equiva-
lency, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has noted that
the Texas accomplice corroboration rule is “a mere rule of
evidence” even though “statutorily worded as a sufﬁciency
standard.” Malik v. State, 953 S. W. 2d 234, 240, n. 6
(1997).10

In sum, the function and purpose of the corroboration
requirement embedded in the former version of Article 38.07
was to ensure the credibility of the victim’s testimony, not
otherwise to impede the defendant’s conviction. Our prece-
dents, I explain next, make clear that the retroactive repeal

9 The Court contends that the effect of Article 38.07 is distinct from
that of a witness competency rule because noncompliance with the former
dictates acquittal ex proprio vigore while noncompliance with the latter
dictates acquittal “in combination with the normally operative sufﬁciency
rule.” Ante, at 552, n. 35. This is a distinction without a difference, be-
cause the “normally operative sufﬁciency rule” in question—when the
prosecution submits no admissible evidence, its case will be deemed in-
sufﬁcient—is a bedrock requirement of due process, applicable in every
criminal trial.

10 The Court observes that the characterization of a state law under the
Ex Post Facto Clause is a federal question. Ante, at 544, n. 31. This
undoubtedly correct observation stands in some tension, however, with
the Court’s reliance on the assertion that “Texas courts treat Article
38.07 as a sufﬁciency of the evidence rule.” Ante, at 518, n. 2.
In any
event, the latter assertion is inaccurate, as Malik’s discussion of the ac-
complice corroboration rule suggests.
It is true that a trial court’s failure
to comply with Article 38.07 results on appeal in the entry of an order
of acquittal. But it is not true that the remedy on appeal for the intro-
duction of inadmissible evidence is always a remand for a new trial.
When the only evidence introduced by the prosecution is evidence that
may not be considered by a jury in determining the defendant’s guilt, the
proper result is always acquittal. By the same reasoning, as this Court
decided just this Term, when a court of appeals has found that evidence
was improperly admitted in a civil trial and that the remaining evi-
dence is insufﬁcient, it may enter judgment as a matter of law rather than
ordering a new trial. Weisgram v. Marley Co., 528 U. S. 440 (2000).