Court Opinion

ID: 9535685
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:51:54.601752+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:33:18.397178
License: Public Domain

MR. JUSTICE SHEA
concurring in part with the dissent of DALY, J., and separately dissenting in part.
With the exception of the waiver of the jury trial issue, I concur in Justice Daly’s dissent wherein he concludes that the law involved here, should have prospective application only.
I would reverse defendant’s conviction because the jury trial waiver was not spread upon the record, as I believe it required under the United States Constitution, if not our own.
In my dissenting opinion in the case of State v. McCartney (1978), 179 Mont. 49, 585 P.2d 1321, 1326-28, I expressed my views as to the requirement of a waiver of a jury trial being spread upon the record. McCartney is distinguished from the present case only in that McCartney did not sign a written waiver of a jury trial, whereas here the defendant did sign one. But even a written signature indicating a waiver does not eliminate the need for independent judicial inquiry into the circumstances of signing the waiver, nor does it eliminate the requirement for the trial court to adequately inform the defendant of his constitutional rights. This was not done in this case, and I would reverse.