Court Opinion

ID: 9623865
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 06:45:08.317689+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:05:35.867669
License: Public Domain

Sognier, Chief Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. I find that the resentencing was in error because no defendant may be sentenced after a new trial is granted but has not yet occurred, and also because the May 15 order, which expressly reaffirmed the February 26 finding of insufficient evidence, raised the bar of double jeopardy.
The resentencing was erroneous even absent the bar of double jeopardy because the grant of a new trial “ ‘[wipes] the slate clean as if no previous conviction and sentence had existed,’ ” Pledger v. State, 193 Ga. App. 588 (2a) (388 SE2d 425) (1989), and as a general rule leaves the case pending below for retrial. Id. at 589. Consequently, the effect of the February 26 order was to eliminate the record of evidence made at trial and return appellant to the status he held before trial, i.e., under indictment and facing trial. Further, although the trial court was authorized to reconsider that ruling within the same term, the court did not do so. Instead, in its May 15 order, the court expressly reaffirmed the prior finding that appellant was entitled to a new trial because the evidence adduced at trial was “legally insufficient” to establish the charged crime. Thus, regardless whether the trial court’s rulings on appellant’s new trial motion raised the bar of double jeopardy, he could not have been sentenced on any charge until after a retrial and subsequent conviction.
However, no retrial could be held. Once the trial court found the State’s evidence to be legally insufficient, the double jeopardy clause of the federal constitution barred a second trial on the trafficking charge. Burks v. United States, 437 U. S. 1 (98 SC 2141, 57 LE2d 1) (1978); Ricketts v. Williams, 242 Ga. 303 (248 SE2d 673) (1978). A retrial similarly was barred under state law because of the trial court’s finding that the evidence was insufficient to authorize the verdict. OCGA § 16-1-8 (a) (1), (d) (2); Marchman v. State, 234 Ga. 40 (215 SE2d 467) (1975) (construing former Ga. Code Ann. § 26-507). When a new trial is granted based on a finding of insufficient evidence, such *787a ruling has the same effect as a directed verdict of acquittal: no retrial is permitted. Bethay v. State, 235 Ga. 371, 375 (219 SE2d 743) (1975); accord Burks, supra at 17-18 (held, after court rules on motion for new trial that evidence was. insufficient, the only proper remedy is the direction of a verdict of acquittal). Consequently, once appellant’s motion for new trial was granted, and the May 15 order, which provided for the resentencing at issue on appeal, expressly reaffirmed the finding of insufficiency and the grant of a new trial, appellant could not be retried, see Marchman, supra, and the case against him was at an end.1
Moreover, jeopardy also attached to the charge of cocaine possession, the offense for which appellant was resentenced. Hogan v. State, 193 Ga. App. 543 (1) (388 SE2d 532) (1989), cited by the majority, is not applicable because in that case the sentencing for the lesser included offense was ordered after the appellate court found a fatal variance between the allegata and the probata in the proof of the charged crime, a ruling which did not raise the bar of double jeopardy. Here, however, the trial court’s orders did not merely affirm the verdict and then go on to amend the sentence to reflect a fatal variance, but instead granted a new trial based on evidentiary insufficiency and expressly reaffirmed this ruling before entering a judgment and sentence on a lesser included charge. This ruling did raise the bar of double jeopardy. Consequently, since a subsequent charge of cocaine possession would have arisen from the same conduct and been based on the same evidence at issue in the trafficking trial, see Dalton v. State, 249 Ga. 720-721 (1) (292 SE2d 834) (1982); compare Rogers v. State, 182 Ga. App. 599 (1) (356 SE2d 546) (1987), such a prosecution would have been barred under OCGA §§ 16-1-7 (b); 16-1-8 (b) (1), (d) (2). Marchman, supra at 41. Given that the double jeopardy statutes would have barred a retrial of appellant for cocaine possession, it follows that he could not be sentenced for that offense after the trial court entered the ruling to which double jeopardy attached.
Since there was no case pending against appellant, no record of evidence adduced against him, and no possibility of retrial on either charge, there was no basis upon which a sentence could be entered. Accordingly, I would reverse the judgment entered below and remand with direction to enter a directed verdict of acquittal. Burks v. *788United States, supra at 18; accord State v. Bryant, 182 Ga. App. 698 (356 SE2d 656) (1987); compare Hunter v. State, 257 Ga. 571, 574 (4) (361 SE2d 787) (1987).
Decided July 16, 1991
Reconsideration denied July 31, 1991
Underwood & Mathis, Billy C. Mathis, Jr., for appellant..
Britt R. Priddy, District Attorney, for appellee.
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Banke joins in this dissent.

 In its brief before this court, the State urges us to vacate the order granting a new trial. The State cannot seek such a remedy on appeal because the double jeopardy clause precludes an appeal by the State from a lower court ruling based on insufficiency of the evidence even if the ruling was erroneous. State v. Williams, 246 Ga. 788-789 (1) (272 SE2d 725) (1980); State v. Bryant, 182 Ga. App. 698 (356 SE2d 656) (1987). “Since the trial court ruled that the [S]tate failed to prove its case as charged and tried, [the State] cannot now [challenge that ruling] and subject [appellant] to a new trial on the merits.” Bryant, supra at 699.