Court Opinion

ID: 9587724
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:25:40.367415+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:00:55.396795
License: Public Domain

Banke, Presiding Judge,
concurring specially.
Prior to the 1987 amendment to OCGA § 17-7-170 (a), this court held, in Majia v. State, 174 Ga. App. 432 (330 SE2d 171) (1985), and Collins v. State, 154 Ga. App. 651 (269 SE2d 509) (1980), “that a defendant’s right to file a demand for trial with respect to a charge for which he had been arrested and issued a uniform traffic citation commenced upon the return of the citation to recorder’s court, even though the recorder’s court did nothing more than transfer the case to state court for trial. These two cases would appear to stand for the general proposition that an accusation embodied in an existing uniform traffic citation is ‘found’ within the meaning of [the former version of] OCGA § 17-7-170 (a) at the moment any court which is lawfully entitled to do so asserts its jurisdiction over the case.” State v. Spence, 179 Ga. App. 750, 752 (347 SE2d 612) (1986). But see Keller v. State, 183 Ga. App. 717, 719 (359 SE2d 714) (1987), holding that “it is not until the traffic violations bureau loses jurisdiction to the state court under OCGA § 40-13-62 that a uniform traffic citation becomes an accusation and is ‘found’ for purposes of [the former version of] OCGA § 17-7-170.”
The 1987 amendment to OCGA § 17-7-170 (a) eliminated the word “found” from the statute and substituted in its place the words “filed with the clerk” was “filed.” In addition, the amendment substituted for the requirement that “the demand for trial shall be placed on the minutes of the court” the proviso that “the demand for trial shall be served on the prosecutor and shall be binding only in the court in which the demand is filed, except where the case is transferred from one court to another without a request from the defendant.”
In light of these amendments, I believe it is now clear (if it was not clear before) that the Legislature contemplated that a demand for trial would be effective to invoke the statutory sanction of mandatory acquittal only if filed in a court of record having both regular terms and the authority to impanel juries. Consequently, I would hold that the demand filed in the recorder’s court in the present case was inef*348fective to invoke the statutory sanction of acquittal. The majority reaches the same result but does so by interpreting the 1987 amendment in such manner as to place the defendant in a “Catch-22” situation, holding, in effect, that a defendant is entitled to file a demand for trial in recorder’s court but that by doing so he is requesting that the case be transferred to a court having regular terms and the authority to impanel juries, with the result that upon such transfer the demand becomes invalid.
Decided November 8, 1988 —
Rehearing denied November 21, 1988.
Collar & Roberts, Mickey G. Roberts, for appellant.
Gerald N. Blaney, Jr., Solicitor, David M. Fuller, Assistant Solicitor, for appellee.
I am authorized to say that Judge Beasley joins in this special concurrence.