Court Opinion

ID: 9754666
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:09:03.652267+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:27:56.288007
License: Public Domain

RODOWSKY, Judge
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent because I adhere to my belief that the sanction of dismissal for violation of § 591 and Rule 746 is unnecessary, misdirected and disproportionate. My reasons were set forth in my dissent in Calhoun v. State, 299 Md. 1, 472 A.2d 436 (1984). One of those reasons pointed to the recommendation by this Court’s Standing Committee on Rules that a rule should prohibit dismissal of a charging document as a sanction for any violation of any rule which was not of constitutional dimension. See proposed Rule 1-201(a), relating to the construction of rules generally and published at 10:10 Md.R.S-7 (May 13, 1983). A majority of this Court rejected that recommendation at a public meeting on June 23, 1983.
Despite that rejection the Rules Committee submitted the same recommendation, as a proposed criminal rule, in its Eighty-seventh Report. See proposed Rule 4-102 published at 10:25 Md.R. S-8 (December 9, 1983). This Court by a vote of 4-3-rejected the resubmitted recommendation at a public meeting on March 21, 1984. I would accept our Rules Committee’s advice and abrogate, either by rulemaking or by judicial overruling, that part of the holding in State v. Hicks, 285 Md. 310, 403 A.2d 356 (1979) which adopts the dismissal sanction.