Court Opinion

ID: 9743206
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:28:25.891949+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:39.963069
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Justice,
dissenting.
According to the record as recited above, the causes were "continued by agreement of the parties" on April 19, 1988. My judicial experience is that such general continuances of a cause by agreement of the parties typically reflect their free choice that advancement of the cause towards final resolution be stopped until one of the parties or the court restarts it. The cessation of activity occasioned and sanctioned by the agreement generally causes a delay in bringing the cause to trial, within the intendment of Criminal Rule 4(F). Such delay should extend the one year period for bringing the accused to trial in the same manner as would his motion for continuance of the trial. Criminal Rule 4(C). There is an actual delay here since the omnibus date had not been set when the continuance by agreement was granted and thus various deadlines for completion of pretrial procedures were not set. Ind.Code § 35-36-8-1. When a party delays a task which must be completed before a trial can take place, that party can and often does delay the setting of the case for trial, and through that, the trial itself. That is the effect of a continuance of the cause by agreement of the parties.