Court Opinion

ID: 9569903
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:18:26.336371+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:04:14.238015
License: Public Domain

Blackburn, Judge,
concurring specially.
OCGA § 16-5-40 (a) defines a kidnapper as a person who “abducts or steals away [another] person without lawful authority or warrant and holds such person against his will.” The majority correctly holds that the distance which the kidnapper abducts the victim is without legal significance under Georgia law. See Giddens v. State, 190 Ga. App. 723, 725 (380 SE2d 274) (1989). While I am constrained to follow the rulings of this court, this legal principle is carried too far when kidnapping is based upon the asportation of the victim from one room in an apartment to another. Under the present holdings, almost any crime in which a victim moves from the point of initial *34contact with the defendant would authorize a kidnapping charge.
Decided February 11, 1994.
Donald B. Lowe III, for appellant.
Spencer Lawton, Jr., District Attorney, Ann M. Elmore, Assistant District Attorney, for appellee.
In Division 2, the majority discusses, without deciding, whether counsel’s statement, “I think that’s a mistrial, Your Honor.” was sufficient to present a motion for mistrial. There is no magic to the word “motion”; counsel’s comments were sufficient to inform the trial court of the action which counsel thought was required. Once such a motion is made, it is the duty of the trial court to rule upon it, and the trial court’s failure to meet its burden should not be held against the movant. In Georgia, the burden is put upon the defendant not only to raise the proper motions and objections, but to insure that the trial court meets its duties, while providing no authority by which he can require the trial court to act.
In Division 3, the majority determined that the victim’s drug use was not relevant to whether Peterson kidnapped, raped, threatened, or sodomized the victim. I agree, that under the facts of this case, such evidence was not relevant. I concur specially in this Division to point out that such facts could be relevant, depending on the defenses raised by the defendant.