This case was precipitated by the prosecution of Sandra Widner for murder and possession of a firearm during the commission of a crime. J. Brown Moseley, who was the District Attorney of the South Georgia Judicial Circuit at that time, entered into a plea agreement with Ms. Widner. Pursuant to that agreement, she pled guilty to voluntary manslaughter in exchange for a 15-year sentence. Thereafter, Ms. Widner filed a petition with the Georgia Sentence Review Panel Panel and sought a reduction in her sentence. Notwithstanding her plea bargain with Moseley, the Panel reduced her sentence to eight years. Moseley brought this action against the Panel, its members and other officials, seeking mandamus and injunctive relief. The gravamen of the complaint was the constitutionality of the Panel’s authority to review and reduce sentences imposed on certain criminal defendants by the trial courts of this state. See OCGA § 17-10-6 a. After conducting a hearing, the trial court granted the Panel’s motion to dismiss, concluding that Moseley lacked standing because, in his capacity as the district attorney, he is only authorized to recommend a sentence to be imposed at the discretion of the trial court and, thus, has no interest at stake when the Panel reduces a sentence imposed against a defendant whom he has prosecuted. Moseley brought this appeal from that order of the trial court, but he retired prior to the docketing of the case in this Court. The current district attorney of the South Georgia Judicial Circuit has appeared as his counsel of record on the appeal. 1. Moseley contends that he has standing under OCGA § 9-6-24 to challenge the constitutionality of the Panel. However, that provision relates to standing to seek mandamus relief. The purpose of a writ of mandamus is “to compel a due performance of an official duty, if there is no other specific legal remedy for the legal rights.” OCGA § 9-6-20. OCGA § 9-6-24 confers standing to seek the writ in those cases wherein the defendant owes a public duty which the plaintiff, as a member of the public, is entitled to have enforced. Adams v. Ga. Dept. of Corrections , 274 Ga. 461 553 SE2d 798 2001. Under that provision, Moseley could certainly have sought to compel the Panel to perform the public duties that the General Assembly has conferred upon it. However, he actually sought the converse. Moseley’s objective was to prevent the Panel from performing its official duties, based on a determination that the legislation pursuant to which it acts is unconstitutional. He has not cited, and we have not discovered, any authority for the proposition that the Panel has a public duty, enforceable by means of a writ of mandamus, to initiate and pursue litigation which challenges the constitutionality of its statutory authority to reduce certain criminal sentences.
Because Moseley’s complaint does not seek enforcement of the Panel’s performance of its public duties, but challenges the validity of the public duties that the General Assembly has authorized it to exercise, the trial court correctly found that he lacked standing under OCGA § 9-6-24 to attack the constitutionality of OCGA § 17-10-6 by means of mandamus.
