Ohio Criminal Appeals Lawyer Blog

A Cuyahoga County Judge abused their discretion when they refused to accept a plea agreement reached by the Defendant and the State. Although trial judges may use their discretion to accept or refuse plea agreements, they abuse their discretion by rejecting a plea agreement based on a blanket policy they created. For example, in this case the trial judge had a blanket policy of refusing to accept plea agreements in any case where a trial date has already been set. It must go something like, "sorry we already put a date on the calender for trial and so I won't accept the plea agreement reached by the State and Defendant which is beneficial to both parties and would save the taxpayers thousands of dollars. Nope, we have the trial date so we have to have a trial based on my policy. After all, I am the Judge." Read the Court of Appeals decision here.

The decision to grant or deny a defendant's motion to continue his trial is left to the "sound discretion" of the trial judge. The Sixth District Court of Appeals determined that a Lucas County Judge abused her discretion in denying a request for a continuance in State v. Packer, 2010-Ohio-2627.

Packer was representing himself as he faced obstruction of justice and nonsupport of dependents charges and a week before trial he sought Psychiatric care due to serious emotional problems he was having. The doctor prescribed two drugs and those drugs impaired Packer's ability to defend himself. He requested a continuance, but the trial judge denied his request since she felt it was just a "delay tactic" and Packer was just "trying to delay the inevitable."

When Packer did not show for trial the next day, the judge even allowed the State to put on seven witnesses with no defense present whatsoever (now there's justice for you). Thankfully, the Sixth District Court of Appeals reversed on appeal because the trial judge's attitude in denying the requests for a continuance on day one was "unreasonable, arbitrary or unconscionable." Read the decision by clicking here.