State v. Acton

HIGGINS, Judge.

James 0. Acton was convicted by the trial court of driving while intoxicated, and sentenced as a persistent offender in the course of which the court treated his guilty pleas under prior DWI statutes as “convictions” for purposes of sentence enhancement. §§ 577.010, 577.023, RSMo 1983. Appellant does not dispute the conviction but challenges the enhanced sentence by asserting that section 577.023 violates constitutional proscriptions against ex post facto laws when applied retroactively to his prior pleas. Affirmed.

Defendant pleaded guilty on two previous occasions to charges…