Court Opinion

ID: 7820596
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-09-07 17:53:11.628175+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T16:30:43.781790
License: Public Domain

John A. Fogleman, Justice, dissenting. I would set aside the bond forfeiture. Appellant had been arraigned on April 12, 1977. Thereafter, his attorney, Richard E. Gardner, withdrew from the case. The court gave no notice to appellant to appear on November 22, 1977. The notice to appear was sent by the prosecuting attorney. The bail was to guarantee all subsequent appearances of the defendant on the charge. Rule 9.2, Arkansas Rules of Criminal Procedure. We need not consider the very dubious practice of a notice to appear by the prosecuting attorney, the charging official, who, for the purposes of trial, was appellant’s adversary, because appellant never got or knew about that notice, which was addressed for delivery by certified mail to the addressee only. The only notice we have for consideration is a written notice by the clerk to an attorney who had withdrawn from the case. That notice was actually received by appellant on November 18. That notice was for arraignment only. The petition for forfeiture was filed on November 21, 1977, the day before appellant’s scheduled appearance. The forfeiture was declared on the day the court had scheduled for appellant’s appearance. Appellant was justified in taking the notice at face value, and in believing that it was sent in error, or, as he put it, “administrative error,” and recipient would have been justified in feeling that there was confusion for which he was not to blame. The petition for. forfeiture was predicated only upon the fact that the prosecuting attorney’s notice had been returned with the notation, “Return to Sender — Addressee Unknown.” Before the forfeiture was declared, Gardner stated to the court (and it is not denied) that appellant had been previously arraigned and that he had always appeared in the past when he had notice. Appellant’s father, who posted the $5,000 cash bail (according to Gardner), had not been notified that appellant was to appear on November 22. There is no showing that he had. Appellant testified that Gardner only told him that he should employ an attorney and that Gardner agreed that he had already been arraigned, but did not tell him that he should appear. There is no intimation that a trial was set or anticipated on November 22. At the time the court heard appellant’s motion to remit the forfeiture (July 18, 1978), there had been no trial and the trial judge gave notice that the case would be tried no later than the following September. It is quite possible that the court was justified in considering appellant to be of dubious credibility and in giving his testimony little weight. I am confident, although the record does not reflect it, that the trial judge correctly found that appellant was doing whatever he could to avoid being tried on the charge. I simply think that a forfeiture should not be declared on this record.