Court Opinion

ID: 9850700
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:01:45.156697+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:41.855538
License: Public Domain

Pope, Presiding Judge,
concurring specially.
I am constrained to agree with the result reached by the majority in this case, but do so reluctantly because I do not believe that the legislature intended the result here. To the contrary, I agree with the dissent that OCGA § 40-6-376 was enacted to avoid such a result. But I cannot agree with the dissent that the statute as written can be construed to effectuate that intent. Certainty of legislative intent cannot compensate for omissions or oversights in statutory drafting — we must abide by the statute as it is plainly written. Here, as the majority notes, the legislature failed to distinguish between misdemeanor and felony grades of vehicular homicide when it drafted OCGA § 40-6-376, and we cannot rewrite the statute to make such a distinction. This is a job for the General Assembly, not the courts.
*857I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Smith joins in this special concurrence.