Opinion ID: 1354183
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Time of Trial Issue

Text: If a proper demand for trial in a non-capital criminal case is filed at the first term of court, the accused must be tried at that term or the second term of court, and if he is not tried by the state at either of those two terms, he shall be absolutely discharged and acquitted of the offense charged in the indictment. Code Ann. § 27-1901. If a proper demand for trial is filed in a capital case, the state must try the defendant at the first, second, or third term of court, and if not so tried, then he shall be absolutely discharged and acquitted of the offense charged in the indictment. Code Ann. §§ 27-1901.1, 27-1901.2. In this case the appellant's first two trials took place during the latter days of the second term of court. His third trial took place during the third term of court, and it therefore becomes very material as to whether he was charged with a capital or non-capital crime. The penalty for armed robbery in Georgia is death, imprisonment for life, or imprisonment for not less than one or more than twenty years. Code Ann. § 26-1902. Assuming that Georgia's death penalty statutes are constitutional, which I do not, the appellant contends that the state not only waived the death penalty in all three trials, but even went further and conceded in open court at all three trials that this case does not fit in the death penalty category under the new death penalty statute. Having made this concession at the first trial, whether it be deemed waiver or statement of fact and law, the state could not, under double jeopardy principles, successfully call for and impose the death penalty in any subsequent trial of the accused after the first trial. Green v. United States, 355 U. S. 184 (1957); Price v. Georgia, 398 U. S. 323 (1969). Therefore, the state, after waiving the death penalty or conceding that it was not applicable in the first trial, knew that the death penalty could not be imposed in a subsequent second, third, fourth, or fifth trial, and that the three-term statutory provision with respect to demand for trial was not applicable. Once the state has waived the death penalty in a trial or conceded that the death penalty is not applicable in the case, the two-term statutory provision (Code Ann. § 27-1901) is applicable. I think the state is placed in the indefensible position of having contended in all three trials that the death penalty was not applicable, but, for purposes of conducting a third trial at the third term, it contends that the case tried at the third term was a capital case. The appellant's motion to dismiss the indictment at the beginning of the third term should have been granted; and the denial of the motion, the motion being based upon a statute that accorded all accused persons a procedural right, was an arbitrary denial of procedural due process of law.