Singleton v. State

The trial court erred in considering only the 19-month delay between the defendant's indictment and the denial of his plea in bar for a speedy trial rather than the 55-month delay between his arrest and the denial of his plea in bar.

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On appeal from the trial court’s denial of his plea in bar, Steve Singleton argues that the court abused its discretion because the State took more than four years from his arrest to bring the case to a ruling on the plea. We vacate and remand for further proceedings because the trial court considered only 19 of the 55 months of delay between Singleton’s arrest and the denial of his plea, with the result that it could not properly exercise its discretion as to whether his constitutional right to a speedy trial was violated.

We examine Singleton’s claim under the four-part test established in Barker v. Wingo, 407 U. S. 514 92 SC 2182, 33 LE2d 101 1972, “considering 1 the length of the delay, 2 the reason for the delay, 3 the defendant’s assertion of the right, and 4 the prejudice to the defendant. See Brown v. State, 264 Ga. 803, 804 2 450 SE2d 821 1994.”Johnson v. State, 268 Ga. 416, 417 2 490 SE2d 91 1997. “The factors should be considered together in a balancing test of the conduct of the prosecution and the defendant.” Citations and punctuation omitted. Nusser v. State, 275 Ga. App. 896, 897 622 SE2d 105 2005. “Absent an abuse of discretion, we must affirm the trial court’s balancing and weighing of the four Barker factors.” Id. However, when a trial court ” ‘has clearly erred in some of its findings of fact and/or has misapplied the law to some degree, the deference owed the trial court’s ultimate ruling is diminished.’ “ State v. Porter, 288 Ga. 524, 526 2 a 705 SE2d 636 2011, quoting Williams v. State, 277 Ga. 598, 601 592 SE2d 848 2004.

Singleton v. State

The trial court erred in considering only the 19-month delay between the defendant's indictment and the denial of his plea in bar for a speedy trial rather than the 55-month delay between his arrest and the denial of his plea in bar.

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