Court Opinion

ID: 9900823
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-20 16:03:53.941094+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:21:19.410626
License: Public Domain

Court of Appeals
of the State of Georgia

                                          ATLANTA,____________________
                                                   November 20, 2023

The Court of Appeals hereby passes the following order:

A24A0536. MICHAEL FORBES v. THE STATE.

       A jury found Michael Forbes guilty of rape, incest, child molestation,
aggravated child molestation, and aggravated sodomy. He was sentenced to twenty
years’ imprisonment. We affirmed Forbes’s convictions on appeal. Forbes v. State,
284 Ga. App. 520 (644 SE2d 345) (2007). Since that time, the trial court denied or
dismissed many post-conviction motions filed by Forbes.1 Most recently, Forbes filed
a “Motion to Correct Plain Error by Trial Court Nunc Pro Tunc,” raising a hearsay
issue and ineffective assistance of trial counsel for counsel’s failure to raise that issue
at trial. The trial court dismissed the motion, and Forbes filed this direct appeal.
       A post-conviction motion seeking to vacate an allegedly void criminal
conviction is not one of the established procedures for challenging the validity of a
judgment in a criminal case, and an appeal from the trial court’s ruling on such a
petition should be dismissed. See Roberts v. State, 286 Ga. 532, 532 (690 SE2d 150)
(2010).

       1
         This Court dismissed Forbes’s appeal of the denial of his “Omnibus
Petition/Extraordinary Motion to Set Aside Void Judgment on Illegal Sentence.” See
Case No. A18A0704 (Nov. 30, 2017).
     Because Forbes’s motion was an improper collateral attack on his conviction,
this appeal is hereby DISMISSED.

                                    Court of Appeals of the State of Georgia
                                           Clerk’s Office, Atlanta,____________________
                                                                     11/20/2023
                                           I certify that the above is a true extract from
                                    the minutes of the Court of Appeals of Georgia.
                                            Witness my signature and the seal of said court
                                    hereto affixed the day and year last above written.

                                                                                   , Clerk.