Court Opinion

ID: 9565069
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 19:14:32.787193+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:22.925216
License: Public Domain

Evans, Judge,
concurring specially.
After both the state and defendant had closed all evidence, defendant moved to dismiss the indictment on the ground that he had not been given a commitment hearing. I concur fully in the pronouncements by the majority, and add thereto as follows: This was much too late to make the motion, and defendant had waived same by pleading to the merits (not guilty) without raising this question.
*697This is nothing more than an effort to file a special plea in bar to the indictment, and "if such pleas are not made preliminary to the trial they are held to be waived in contemplation of law,” as is held in Jones v. Mills, 216 Ga. 616, at 618 (118 SE2d 484). In Bryant v. State, 224 Ga. 235 (161 SE2d 312), this identical motion was made at the close of the evidence (never given a committal hearing) and the Supreme Court of Georgia holds: "... we treat them (motions to quash) as being pleas in abatement or a special plea in bar. Regardless of how these motions are designated, such motion must be made in writing upon the defendant’s being arraigned. Code § 27-1501. Where such motions are not made at the proper time, they are deemed to have been waived.”
In the Bryant case, supra, counsel for defendant was the identical counsel for appellant in the case sub judice. Obviously she was not impressed with the correctness of the full-bench decision in the Bryant case, as she makes the identical motion at the identical (close of all evidence) time again.