Court Opinion

ID: 9773118
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:37:53.523497+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:50.245025
License: Public Domain

John I. Purtle, Justice., dissenting. Appellants were arrested on October 11, 1977, while they were already confined in prison. Arkansas Rules of Criminal Procedure, Rule 28.1 (a) and (b) provide: (a) Any defendant charged with an offense in circuit court and committed to a jail or prison in this state shall be brought to trial before the end of the second full term of the court, but not to exceed nine (9) months, from the time provided in Rule 28.2, excluding only such periods of necessary delay as are authorized in Rule 28.3. (b) Any defendant charged with an offense in circuit court and held to bail, or otherwise lawfully set at liberty, shall be brought to trial before the end of the third full term of court from the time provided in Rule 28.2, excluding only such periods of necessary delay as are authorized in Rule 28.3. It is obvious the clear language of Rule 28.1 (a) required the appellants to be released long before the trial date unless there was some exception to the rule which prevented such release. They were brought to trial on March 26, 1979. This is almost a year and a half (17 months) after their arrest. Both two full terms of court and nine months had expired long before they were tried. Periods excluded from the above-stated rule are set out in Rule 28.3. There are a great number of reasons for holding a prisoner beyond the period set out in 28.1 above. In addition to a number of reasons listed, the final reason is “other periods of delay for good cause.” It does not appear that any of the reasons enumerated caused the great delay in this case nor is a good cause shown, in my opinion. It appears to me that the nine months provision has been overlooked, and it is the controlling factor in this case. The nine months would have expired on July 10, 1978. If, as the majority argues, the prisoner was merely entitled to be treated as released and the court was given an additional term to try them, that period would have also expired. After July 10, 1978, the October term commenced on October 2, 1978. The March 1978 term ended September 30 and the October 1978 term started on October 2, 1978. The March 1979 term commenced on March 5, 1979. Therefore, one full term of court expired after the nine months period had expired. The terms of court excluded, what continues to be baffling is the fact that appellants were arrested October 17, 1977, and trial was not even set until July 14, 1978, which was ten months after the date of arrest. Even though a continuance was granted in October, the trial was not reset until January 1978, six months for the continuance and 15 months from the date of arrest. No reason is given for the delay in setting the trial date after the continuance was granted and surely a continuance does not extend free rein to avoid the resetting of a trial date at any time during the foreseeable future. It is obvious that something is manifestly unfair about a rule which will allow one man to be held a year and a half, in prison, and not be denied a speedy trial when we have previously held that another man held for seven months in prison was denied a speedy trial. See Alexander v. State, 268 Ark. 384, 598 S.W. 2d 395 (1980), and State v. Lewis, 268 Ark. 359, 596 S.W. 2d 697 (1980). If the majority is correct, which I seriously doubt, then it is even more apparent why the rule should be changed to set a mandatory period of time for trials to apply throughout the state of Arkansas. I am authorized to state that Mays, J., joins me in this dissent.