Court Opinion

ID: 9709569
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 03:51:15.732245+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:22:50.179709
License: Public Domain

HOFFMAN, Presiding Judge,
concurring in result.
Neither Criminal Rule 4(C) nor Criminal Rule 4(F), allowing extension of the Rule 4 time periods, distinguishes between continuances requested or agreed to by the defendant before or after a trial date has been set. The majority relies upon two cases for the proposition that the defendant is not accountable for continuances requested or agreed to by the defendant before a trial date is set.
In State ex rel. O’Donnell v. Cass Superior Ct. (1984), Ind., 468 N.E.2d 209, 211, the court determined that an agreed continuance which occurred prior to the trial setting was not attributable to the defendant because the defendant did not realize at that point that the trial date would be set beyond the boundaries of the rule, and foremost, because the defendant notified the court within two days of the trial setting that the date was outside of the rule’s time frame. In dictum, the majority states, “[w]hen a defendant has agreed to a continuance prior to the setting of any trial date, those days shall not be attributed to the defendant for the purposes of Ind.R. Cr.P. 4(C).” Id. (Emphasis supplied.)
The language does not support a conclusion that the defendant may request continuances without accountability for Rule 4(C) purposes. Moreover, the above statement *947appears to have crept inadvertently into the majority opinion in its earnest effort to address the defendant’s assignment of error. Justice DeBruler’s dissent in O’Donnell calls into question the viability of any such pronouncement. Justice DeBruler stated:
“[S]uch general continuances of a cause by agreement of the parties typically reflect their free choice that advancement of the cause towards final resolution be stopped until one of the parties or the court restarts it. The cessation of activity occasioned and sanctioned by the agreement generally causes a delay in bringing the cause to trial, within the intendment of Criminal Rule 4(F). Such delay should extend the one year period for bringing the accused to trial in the same manner as would his motion for continuance of the trial. Criminal Rule 4(C).”
O’Donnell, supra, 468 N.E.2d at 211.
The other case relied upon by the majority in the instant cause, Morrison v. State (1990), Ind., 555 N.E.2d 458, 461, recognized that the Court of Appeals’ decision followed the dissent in O’Donnell. While the court agreed with the defendant’s assertion that the Court of Appeals’ treatment of the delay contravened O’Donnell, any endorsement of the O’Donnell determination was conspicuously absent. Instead, the court found that the delay prior to a trial setting was properly charged to the defendant inasmuch as the defendant had conceded accountability of that particular time period. Id.
Consequently, I would not further advance the language in O’Donnell. Rather, it should be viewed as inadvertent or aberrational.