Court Opinion

ID: 9772161
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:08:58.558804+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:42.387074
License: Public Domain

DUNN, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent from the portion of the majority’s opinion that concerns the trial court’s denial, without hearing, of appellant’s pro se motion to dismiss for lack of speedy trial. It is evident from the record that appellant filed this motion during the period of time when he had no counsel to represent him, and that he undertook to act as his own attorney. The majority, by its opinion, proposes that it is perfectly acceptable for a court to later wipe the record clean of all activity by appellant during a pro se situation when he eventually substitutes an attorney in his place. If this reasoning were followed through to its logical conclusion, it would be proper for a court to wipe out, without hearing, all activity of a former attorney on the substitution of another attorney. I do not think this is the result that the majority desires. Their reasoning, relative to “hybrid” representation, would be more palatable if the appellant had an attorney at the time his pro se motion was filed.
The State argues that the defendant had an opportunity to present his motion at the pre-trial hearing set by the court on October 29, 1985. This argument is without merit in light of the court’s summary overruling of defendant’s pro se motion without notice, or hearing, to the defendant or his newly acquired attorney.
I would find that it was error for the trial court to deny defendant’s motion without first setting a hearing and notifying *716defendant of same. See Tex.Crim.P.Ann. art. 28.01, sec. 1 & 2 (Vernon Supp.1986) (requiring defendant’s presence at hearing on pre-trial motions).