IN THE COURT OF CRIMINAL APPEALS
OF TEXAS
PD-1374-14
WESLEY ALLEN DOTSON, Appellant
v.
THE STATE OF TEXAS
ON APPELLANT’S PETITION FOR DISCRETIONARY REVIEW
FROM THE FOURTH COURT OF APPEALS
KARNES COUNTY
Per curiam. Richardson, J., not participating.
OPINION
A jury convicted appellant of aggravated assault of a public servant, and sentenced
him to fifty years’ confinement and assessed a $10,000 fine. On appeal, appellant claimed
that the trial court erred by allowing the State to impeach a defense witness with prior
felony convictions that were more than ten years old.
The court of appeals upheld the trial court’s actions by applying the common law
tacking doctrine to the remote convictions, and assessing their admissibility under Rule of
Evidence 609(a)’s “outweigh” standard rather than Rule of Evidence 609(b)’s
WESLEY ALLEN DOTSON – 2
“substantially outweigh” standard. Dotson v. State, No. 04-13-00858-CR, slip op. at 3-4
(Tex. App.–San Antonio Sept. 10, 2015)(not designated for publication). Applying Rule
609(a), the court of appeals upheld the admission of the prior remote convictions. Id. at 6.
Appellant has filed a petition for discretionary review of this decision. We recently
addressed this issue in Meadows v. State, PD-0175-14, slip op. at 4 (Tex. Crim. App. Feb.
25, 2015), in which we held that the unambiguous plain language of Rule of Evidence
609 supplants the common-law tacking doctrine. Under Rule 609(b), evidence of a prior
conviction is inadmissible to impeach a witness “if more than ten years has elapsed since
the later of the date of conviction or release of the witness from confinement imposed for
that conviction ‘unless the court determines, in the interests of justice, that the probative
value of the conviction supported by specific facts and circumstances substantially
outweighs its prejudicial effect.’” Id. at 6.
The Court of Appeals in the instant case did not have the benefit of our opinion in
Meadows. Accordingly, we grant ground (1) of appellant’s petition for discretionary
review, vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals, and remand this case to the Court of
Appeals in light of our opinion in Meadows.1
DELIVERED April 15, 2015
DO NOT PUBLISH
1
Ground (2) of appellant’s petition for discretionary review is refused without prejudice.