Court Opinion

ID: 9819511
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 06:26:47.645632+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:27:11.425364
License: Public Domain

PRESIDING JUSTICE KNECHT, dissenting: I respectfully dissent. The cases cited and discussed by the majority are interesting, but they simply do not address the issue present here. A defendant need not withdraw a jury waiver that no longer exists. It should not be inferred the defendant waived a jury or reasserted his jury waiver. Defendant’s waiver of jury applied to his first trial. His fundamental right to a jury trial was once again on the table. Our system requires a defendant to be admonished, to be inquired of, and then to affirmatively and knowingly waive his right to a jury trial. Perhaps this defendant has frustrated the system. His first guilty finding was vacated because he asserted he wanted to “tell his side of the story,” and the trial court had not inquired of him whether he wanted to testify. At his second bench trial, he testified but was convicted. Now, he asserts what may be a tactical ploy. If we start anew, it is possible he will waive jury and be found guilty a third time. It is arguably a waste of resources to reverse and remand. Perhaps defendant knew what was going on and now seeks to take advantage of errors in the record. Instead of surmising what defendant may be doing or may have known, I prefer to focus on what the prosecutor, the defense attorney, and the judge are presumed and required to know — a defendant should be properly admonished, and the court should then determine if any affirmative waiver — not inferences from what has happened before — is a knowing, voluntary, and intelligent waiver. The process failed. To reverse and remand is not to reward defendant but to honor a clear and fundamental right and a clear and simple process.