Court Opinion

ID: 9612966
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 04:13:07.007093+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:56:06.258472
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Presiding Judge,
dissenting.
I concur in Division 2 of the opinion, which holds that the appeal from the order of contempt must be dismissed, but I dissent from reversal of the judgment.
The trial court did not err in denying defendant’s plea in bar on double jeopardy grounds. The carefully detailed order describes the sequence of events which led up to the grant of mistrial during defense counsel’s closing argument. It explains that the court had found that defense counsel deliberately displayed a portion of the videotape to the jury during closing argument which counsel knew had not been admitted in evidence, and had also found that what was shown was not relevant and was prejudicial to the State.1 The trial court, unlike this court, saw what unrelated matter was shown to the jury by defendant and it was in a position, unlike this court, to assess the effect on the jury. In the order, the court stated that the problem could not have been rectified by curative instruction which, in the court’s judg*721ment, would have only exacerbated the evil. This same conclusion was stated in the order of mistrial and contempt entered shortly after the aborted trial. The trial transcript fully supports the court’s findings and warrants its conclusions.
Defendant’s plea in bar is based on the double jeopardy clause of the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution, the double jeopardy provision in Georgia’s Bill of Rights,2 and OCGA § 16-1-8 (a) (2). In her briefs and letter-brief below, she made no distinction between the two constitutions and presented no separate argument with respect to the state constitution as an independent ground. See Michigan v. Long, 463 U. S. 1032 (103 SC 3469, 77 LE2d 1201) (1983). The trial court impliedly concluded that neither the statute nor either constitution had been violated by the grant of mistrial in that it cited cases dealing with all three bases: State v. Abdi, 162 Ga. App. 20 (288 SE2d 772) (1982), aff’d 249 Ga. 827 (294 SE2d 506) (1982); Abdi v. State of Ga., 744 F2d 1500 (11th Cir. 1984); Bradfield v. State, 211 Ga. App. 318 (439 SE2d 100) (1993).
On appeal, defendant cites the three sources but argues them all together, indiscriminately, even though they are not the same. She has not shown that her rights under any one of them will be infringed by another trial, one that is brought to a conclusion. In support of her contention that double jeopardy bars retrial because the grant of mistrial was improper, Stevens cites only Morris v. State, 262 Ga. 446 (421 SE2d 524) (1992), and Bradfield, supra.
“[T]he defense injected the matter that resulted in the mistrial and cannot prevent retrial by withholding consent to the mistrial.” McGarvey v. State, 186 Ga. App. 562, 563 (368 SE2d 127) (1988). As in Moss v. State, 200 Ga. App. 253 (407 SE2d 477) (1991), Venson v. State, 212 Ga. App. 540 (1) (441 SE2d 893) (1994), and Height v. State, 212 Ga. App. 410 (442 SE2d 8) (1994), other recent cases where defendants injected prejudice, the court’s “broad discretion” in granting the mistrial was not abused. The result is that bars against double jeopardy have not been breached. As repeated in Height, supra at 411, “[t]he trial court has a broad discretion in declaring mistrial, particularly ‘when the grounds for the mistrial relate to jury prejudice, for the trial judge is in a peculiarly good position to observe the jurors, the witnesses and the attorneys in order to evaluate the extent of the prejudice.’ ”
Whether by mistake or design, the effect on the jury in this instance was the sáme. That is, whether defense counsel knew or did not know that the unrelated portions of the videotape which he displayed to the jury were not in evidence, the finding of the trial court *722that it was prejudicial against the State is unassailable. So is its exercise of discretion in eschewing remedies short of mistrial.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge McMurray and Judge Andrews join in this dissent.

 Defense counsel himself had earlier argued that there were portions of the tape which were not related to this case.

 Constitution of Georgia, Art. I, Sec. I, Par. XVIII.