In 1999, Anthony D. Murray pleaded guilty to one count of robbery, two counts of armed robbery, and two counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Two months later, Mr. Murray, proceeding pro se, timely moved to withdraw his guilty plea to the armed-robbery and aggravated-assault counts on the ground that he received ineffective assistance of counsel. After successfully moving for an out-of-time appeal of the denial of that motion, Mr. Murray again moved to withdraw his guilty plea to those charges. Proceeding pro se, he now appeals the denial of that motion. For the reasons noted infra , we affirm in part, vacate the two aggravated-assault sentences, and remand the case to the trial court for resentencing. The record shows that on February 20, 1999, Mr. Murray and his girlfriend beat and robbed two Hispanic males in two separate but very similar incidents. In both incidents, the couple saw a Hispanic male walking along the road as they drove by and offered to give him a ride. After each man accepted this offer, Mr. Murray’s girlfriend drove him to a remote location, at which point Murray emerged from the back seat and beat the unsuspecting passenger with a steel rod, dragged his body from the vehicle, and then took whatever money was in his possession. Shortly after these robberies, the police arrested Mr. Murray and his girlfriend based on a description of their vehicle provided by the two victims.
In June 1999, a Toombs County grand jury indicted Mr. Murray on two counts of armed robbery1 and two counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon2 in connection with his robbery and attack of the two Hispanic males. On September 9, 1999, Mr. Murray —who was represented by counsel —pleaded guilty to all four counts in the Toombs County indictment. During this same hearing, Mr. Murray also pleaded guilty to an Emanuel County robbery charge,3 which alleged that earlier on the same day as the Toombs County robberies, Murray and his girlfriend beat and robbed a 65-year-old man.4 At the conclusion of the hearing, the trial court imposed three twenty-year sentences for the three robbery charges, to run concurrently, and two five-year sentences for the two aggravated-assault charges, to run concurrently with each other but consecutively to the robbery sentences.
