State v. Pitts’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

5 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 5 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “A law will disadvantage Defendant if it: (1) declares acts to be criminal which were not criminal when committed; (2) aggravates a crime, or makes it greater than it was; (3) increases punishment of crime; or (4) alters the rules of evidence to allow less or different testimony. Collins v. Youngblood, 497 U.S. 37 , [42-43] 110 S.Ct. 2715, 2719 [2], 111 L.Ed.2d 30 (1990); and Miller v. Florida, 482 U.S. 423, 430 , 107 S.Ct. 2446, 2451 , 96 L.Ed.2d 351 (1987). Further, “no ex post facto violation occurs if the change in the law is merely procedural and does ‘not increase the punishment, nor change the ingredients of the offense or the ultimate facts necessary to establish guilt.’ ” Miller, 482 U.S. at 433 , 107 S.Ct. at 2452—53[4], quoting Hopt v. Utah, 110 U.S. 574, 590 , 4 S.Ct. 202, 210 , 28 L.Ed. 262 (1884). [[Image here]] In Heistand v. State, 740 S.W.2d 282 (Mo.App.1987), the court found the retrospective application of §§ 557.036 and 558.016.2, RSMo 1986, to sentence the defendant as a prior offender was not ex post facto. Id. at 287-88[4]. The court reasoned the statutes did not increase punishment, but rather, merely allowed the judge, not the jury, to assess the punishment. Id. It was merely a procedural change. Id.; See also, State v. Griffin, 339 S.W.2d 803, 806-07 [8, 9] (Mo.1960) (change from jury sentencing to judge sentencing in § 556.280, RSMo 1949, procedural in nature and constitutional); and State v. Morton, 338 S.W.2d 858, 863 [7, 8] (Mo.1960) (§ 556.280, R”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. State v. Chandler