Court Opinion

ID: 9681057
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 07:43:20.369746+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:31.983177
License: Public Domain

On Motion for Rehearing or in the Alternative to Transfer to Court En Banc
PER CURIAM:
In defendant’s motion for rehearing he states that we did not rule on points numbered 12 and 13 in his brief in which he contended that he was denied a fair trial “because of personal interest and prejudice of the trial judge,” and that the trial court erred in overruling his motion to “disqualify the trial judge.” First, the motion to disqualify was not timely filed in compliance with Supreme Court Rule No. 30.12, V.A.M.R. Therefore, the motion and affidavit, assuming it to have been otherwise sufficient, did not automatically disqualify the trial judge. Second, the allegations in the affidavit of the motion did not support a finding that the judge was in anywise interested or prejudiced. The only statements therein were conclusions to the effect that the trial court had previously made some rulings asserted to have been erroneous. Assuming the rulings to have been erroneous, that fact alone does not demonstrate bias and prejudice.
 Defendant also asserts that we failed to rule on his points number 11 and number IS. In point 11 he makes general assertions that he was denied due process of law because employed counsel of his own selection did not do certain things that defendant now thinks he should have done. What was or was not done by trial counsel could well have been the result of considered trial strategy, and the point is without merit. Point 15 is quite lengthy, but by it defendant asserts he was prejudiced “by the trial court’s action in sentencing him upon the basis of assumptions concerning a prior criminal record and prior criminal activity, and misinformation as to other material matters, or carelessness in that respect.” Defendant was properly charged and sentenced under the habitual criminal act, and the sentence imposed was within the statutory limits.
Points in a brief totally without merit, such as these, are automatically ruled in the order affirming the judgment. We mention them in this per curiam only because we made no general statement in the principal opinion to that effect. Other matters in the motion for rehearing are reargument of issues previously ruled.
The motion for rehearing, or in the alternative to transfer the case to the court in banc, is overruled.