Chatham v. State
| Decision Date | 10 February 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. 36643,36643 |
| Citation | 274 S.E.2d 473,247 Ga. 95 |
| Parties | CHATHAM v. The STATE. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
Gerald P. Word, Word, Cook & Word, Carrollton, for Chatham.
William F. Lee, Dist. Atty., Michael G. Kam, Asst. Dist. Atty., Newnan, for State.
We granted certiorari to determine (1) the merits of the defendant's plea of double jeopardy, and (2) whether the Court of Appeals correctly held that the defendant could not complain about the court's charging language taken from a case he cited at the foot of a written request to charge specific language.
This case is a sequel to In re Brookins, 153 Ga.App. 82, 264 S.E.2d 560 (1980), in which the Court of Appeals held that the trial court abused its discretion in finding appellant's counsel in contempt following a dispute between counsel and the State's attorney over which one of two cases was first to be tried. Counsel was fined $975 and ordered to jail to serve a 10-day sentence. The jury had been impaneled and sworn. The court declared a mistrial and discharged the jury.
In finding the trial court had abused its discretion, the Court of Appeals held In re Brookins :
When appellant's case was called for trial the second time, appellant's new counsel filed a motion in bar of trial which was overruled. The case went to trial, appellant was convicted and the Court of Appeals affirmed, Chatham v. State, 155 Ga.App. 154, 270 S.E.2d 274 (1980). We reverse.
1. We do not disagree with the Court of Appeals that once the trial court had sent appellant's counsel off to jail it had no choice other than to call a mistrial. However, In Re Brookins established that "the procedure followed by the court and district attorney was fundamentally unfair" in finding counsel in contempt, and "all fault was upon the court and the district attorney, and counsel had been misled but was at all times respectful and courteous...."
That jeopardy had attached at appellant's aborted first trial is not in dispute. The only issue is to decide if there was such "a manifest necessity" of calling a mistrial that an exception existed to the double jeopardy rule.
We think that it would be unfair to hold in one instance that the trial court and the district attorney were totally at fault in the contempt finding which resulted in the mistrial and allow the State to take advantage of such an abuse by again putting appellant in jeopardy.
In Cobb v. State, 246 Ga. 619, 272 S.E.2d 296 (1980), we held...
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...sort. No prosecutorial misconduct is involved. Compare Cobb v. State, 246 Ga. 619, 620, 272 S.E.2d 296 (1980); Chatham v. State, 247 Ga. 95, 96, 274 S.E.2d 473 (1981). It is apparent from the exchange between court and counsel and from the hearing on the plea in bar that the defendant was a......
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