Conrad v. State

Full title: MALCOLM CONRAD, Plaintiff in Error v. STATE OF TENNESSEE

Court: Supreme Court of Tennessee, at Jackson, April Term, 1957

Date published: May 3, 1957

302 S.W.2d 60 (Tenn. 1957)

302 S.W.2d 60

Opinion

Opinion filed May 3, 1957.

CONSTITUTIONAL LAW. CRIMINAL LAW.

Statute providing for increased punishment based on prior convictions was not ex post facto, even as to defendant whose prior convictions had allegedly occurred before effective date of statute. T.C.A. sec. 59-1035.

FROM DECATUR

E.C. KENNEDY, Decaturville, for plaintiff.

NAT TIPTON, Advocate General, for the State.

Defendant was convicted in the Criminal Court, Decatur County, Andrew T. Taylor, Jr., Circuit Judge, of driving while intoxicated, and was given the increased punishment provided by statute for subsequent offenders, and he brough error. The Supreme Court, Swepston, Justice, held that statute providing for increased punishment based on prior convictions was not ex post facto even as to defendant, whose prior convictions had allegedly occurred before effective date of statute.

Affirmed.

MR. JUSTICE SWEPSTON delivered the opinion of the Court.

The plaintiff in error was convicted of driving while intoxicated and was given the increased punishment provided by T.C.A. sec. 59-1035, the proof showing this to be his third offense, which occurred in August of 1955, that is, subsequent to the enactment of this provision of the statute of 1953.

All of the several assignments of error are predicated on the insistence that the date of occurrence of the two prior convictions is not shown by the proof to have been also subsequent to the Act of 1953. It is, therefore, insisted that said Act is ex post facto as to this accused.

All of the authorities hold that these habitual offenders statutes are not ex post facto even where the prior convictions occurred before the effective date of such statute. See 25 Am. Jur. 263, and especially 58 A.L.R. 21.

The judgment below is affirmed.