Ex Post Facto Laws Archives

F-2009-1002

Post author:Staff
Post published:December 10, 2010
Post category:F

In OCCA case No. F-2009-1002, Rickey Dewayne Prince appealed his conviction for multiple serious crimes, including possession of child pornography, lewd molestation, and first-degree rape. In an unpublished decision, the court decided to modify some of his sentences but upheld his convictions. One judge dissented. Rickey Dewayne Prince faced a jury trial where he was found guilty on multiple counts related to child exploitation and abuse. His punishment included lengthy prison sentences, with certain counts requiring him to serve them consecutively, leading to a total of many years behind bars. After the trial, Prince raised several arguments in his appeal. He claimed that he did not receive a fair trial due to various reasons. These included improper support for the victims' testimonies by a nurse, errors in how the charges were brought, issues regarding the admission of his own statements to police, and claims about his lawyer not doing a good enough job defending him. The court reviewed these points carefully. They found that while some mistakes occurred, like using the wrong statute for charging possession of child pornography, the overall outcome of the trial was justified. The judges believed that the evidence presented during the trial strongly supported Prince's convictions, even without additional corroborating details from other sources. In some points of his appeal, Prince's arguments were dismissed because he did not raise them in time during the trial, which limited how much the court could consider his issues. They also decided that any errors that did happen were not serious enough to change the trial's verdict or give him the right to a new trial. As a result, while some of Prince's sentences were adjusted to be less severe, the court affirmed many of his convictions for serious crimes against children, keeping him under a long prison sentence for his actions. The court made changes to the official records to properly reflect the legal basis for his convictions while confirming that he did not face unfair treatment during his trial.

S-2009-944

Post author:Staff
Post published:October 28, 2010
Post category:S

In OCCA case No. S-2009-944, the defendant appealed his conviction for Failure to Register as a Sex Offender. In an unpublished decision, the court decided to uphold the lower court's ruling that the amendments to the Sex Offender Registration Act did not apply to the defendant. A dissenting opinion was not stated. The case involved the defendant, who was previously charged under the Sex Offender Registration Act. The key question was whether later amendments to the law should apply to him or not, given that he had entered a plea in 1999 and had complied with the previous legal conditions. The magistrate in the lower court determined that the law changes would be unfair to apply retroactively in the defendant's case. The court explained that new laws usually apply to future actions unless they are explicitly stated to have retroactive effects. They found no clear indication in the legislature's changes to imply that the new requirements should apply to those who had already been sentenced under the old rules. The court confirmed that since the amendments would change the defendant's obligations significantly, these substantive changes should not apply to him. As a result, the decision maintained that the lower court's refusal to move forward on the charge against the defendant could stand, with the matter being sent back to the District Court for any further actions needed, while affirming that the defendant was correct in his assertion that the recent amendments did not apply to him.