Case Title: State ex rel. Collins v. Pokorny

Citation: 1999-Ohio-343

Docket Number: 19990074

State: ohio

Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Date: 1999-07-07T00:00:00Z

Document:
[Cite as State ex rel. Collins v. Pokorny, 86 Ohio St.3d 70, 1999-Ohio-343.] 
 
 
 
 
 
THE STATE EX REL. COLLINS, APPELLANT, v. POKORNY, JUDGE, APPELLEE. 
[Cite as State ex rel. Collins v. Pokorny (1999), 86 Ohio St.3d 70.] 
Procedendo — Court of appeals’ dismissal of complaint upheld, when. 
(No. 99-74 — Submitted May 4, 1999 — Decided July 7, 1999.) 
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Cuyahoga County, No. 75290. 
 
In 1991, appellant, Larry Collins, was convicted of aggravated burglary and 
aggravated robbery and sentenced to an aggregate prison term of ten to twenty-five 
years.  The court of appeals affirmed his conviction and sentence.  State v. Collins 
(Feb. 4, 1993), Cuyahoga App. No. 61713, unreported, 1993 WL 27638. 
 
In July 1996, appellee, Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Judge 
Thomas J. Pokorny, denied Collins’s motion for new trial, and in January 1997, 
Judge Pokorny denied Collins’s motion for explanation or reconsideration of the 
denial of the new trial motion. In March 1997, the court of appeals denied 
Collins’s request for a writ of mandamus to compel Judge Pokorny to issue 
findings of fact and conclusions of law on his July 1996 decision denying the 
motion for new trial.  State ex rel. Collins v. Pokorny (Mar. 20, 1997), Cuyahoga 
App. No. 71960, unreported, 1997 WL 127189. 
 
In September 1998, Collins filed a complaint in the court of appeals for a 
writ of procedendo to compel Judge Pokorny to issue findings of fact and 
conclusions of law on the July 1996 denial of Collins’s motion for new trial.  Judge 
Pokorny filed a motion to dismiss.  The court of appeals granted the motion and 
dismissed the action. 
 
This cause is now before the court upon an appeal as of right. 
__________________ 
 
Larry Collins, pro se. 
__________________ 
 
 
2
 
Per Curiam.  Collins asserts in his propositions of law that the court of 
appeals erred in dismissing his procedendo action.  For the following reasons, 
Collins’s assertion lacks merit. 
 
As the court of appeals correctly held, Judge Pokorny had no duty to issue 
findings of fact and conclusions of law when he denied Collins’s Crim.R. 33 
motion for a new trial.  State v. Girts (1997), 121 Ohio App.3d 539, 565, 700 
N.E.2d 395, 412; see, generally, State ex rel. Grove v. Nadel (1998), 81 Ohio St.3d 
325, 326, 691 N.E.2d 275, 276. 
 
In addition, res judicata barred Collins from raising the same issue that he 
had raised in his previous mandamus action.  Russell v. Mitchell (1999), 84 Ohio 
St.3d 328, 329, 703 N.E.2d 1249. 
 
Based on the foregoing, we affirm the judgment of the court of appeals. 
Judgment affirmed. 
 
MOYER, C.J., DOUGLAS, RESNICK, F.E. SWEENEY, PFEIFER, COOK and 
LUNDBERG STRATTON, JJ., concur.