State v. Plastow, 873 N.W.2d 222

Defendant Alvin Plastow, previously convicted of raping a 5‑year‑old, lived in a home with a 3‑year‑old child (S.G.) and others; S.G.’s father (Grace) observed and later reported suspicious touching.
Plastow admitted in a recorded interview to sexually touching and raping S.G. on two occasions and to photographing her; he told police the image would be on his phone.
Police recovered photographs from Plastow’s phone showing a child in Dora pajamas and a partially naked prepubescent female’s lower torso; no other independent witnesses (Grace, S.G., or the forensic interviewer) would testify at the suppression hearing.
The State charged Plastow with two counts of first‑degree rape and two counts of possession of child pornography; Plastow moved to suppress his admissions for lack of independent corroboration of the corpus delicti.
The circuit court suppressed the admissions, concluding the photograph alone did not independently establish the corpus delicti of rape; the State appealed.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether circuit court misapplied corpus delicti in excluding admissions	State: need not prove independent evidence for each element; only independent evidence that someone committed the rape	Plastow: State lacks sufficient independent corroboration (photo alone insufficient)	Court: circuit court misstated rule—State need only prove corpus delicti (someone committed rape) independent of admission, but photo alone here was insufficient, so suppression was proper under existing precedent
Whether South Dakota should replace corpus delicti rule with trustworthiness standard	State: adopt Opper/Smith trustworthiness rule allowing independent evidence to bolster confession’s reliability	Plastow: change would be retroactive and deny fair warning; due process problem	Court: adopts trustworthiness standard prospectively but declines retroactive application here; suppression affirmed
Whether retroactive application would violate due process/fair warning	State: procedural rule change not ex post facto; should apply	Plastow: new rule is unexpected; retroactive application deprives fair warning	Held: retroactive application would violate due process (citing Rogers and Carmell); change applied prospectively only

State v. Thompson, 560 N.W.2d 535 (S.D. 1997) (applied corpus delicti rule to reverse where independent corroboration lacking)
State v. Best, 232 N.W.2d 447 (S.D. 1975) (explained independent‑evidence requirement to admit extrajudicial statements)
Opper v. United States, 348 U.S. 84 (1954) (announced trustworthiness standard: require substantial independent evidence tending to establish confession’s reliability)
Smith v. United States, 348 U.S. 147 (1954) (companion case elaborating that independent evidence may bolster confession to establish all elements)
Rogers v. Tennessee, 532 U.S. 451 (2001) (held judicial change to criminal common law cannot be retroactively applied if it was unexpected and indefensible)
Carmell v. Texas, 529 U.S. 513 (2000) (held that reducing required corroboration for sexual‑offense convictions violated fundamental fairness when applied retroactively)