FIRST DISTRICT
COURT OF APPEALS
THESE SUMMARIES ARE NEITHER APPROVED IN ADVANCE NOR ENDORSED BY THE COURT. THEY ARE NOT HEADNOTES OR SYLLABI. INTERESTED PARTIES SHOULD OBTAIN COPIES OF THE ACTUAL DECISIONS FROM THE CLERK OF THE COURT OF APPEALS.
DATE: Wednesday, April 16, 2025
CAPTION: STATE V. WILLIAMS
Appeal NoS. C-240409, C-240410, C-240411
TRIAL NoS. B-2304341, B-2400196, B-2400924
KEY WORDS: GUILTY PLEA — COMPETENCE TO STAND TRIAL — STIPULATED REPORT — ARSON-OFFENDER REGISTRY — PLEA COLLOQUY — AGREED SENTENCE – DOUBLE JEOPARDY – ALLIED OFFENSES
SUMMARY: The trial court did not err when it found defendant competent to stand trial and then accepted defendant’s guilty pleas because defendant stipulated to the psychologist’s competency report and the trial court based its competency determination on the stipulated report, which accounted for defendant’s history, mental-health issues, and concerning behavior and concluded that defendant was competent to stand trial.
Defendant’s guilty pleas were not unknowingly, unintelligently, or involuntarily entered despite the trial court’s misstatement regarding defendant’s duty to register as an arson offender for life where defendant failed to demonstrate that the trial court’s misstatement affected his decision to plead guilty.
Where defendant forfeited the issue of allied offenses or double jeopardy when he failed to raise the issues to the trial court as it imposed the jointly-recommended sentences and defendant failed to argue plain error on appeal, defendant cannot show that his jointly-recommended sentences are not authorized by law.
JUDGMENTS: AFFIRMED
JUDGES: OPINION by BOCK, J.; KINSLEY, P.J., and NESTOR, J., CONCUR.
CAPTION: STATE V. THOMAS
APPEAL NO.: C-240151
TRIAL NO.: B-2205931
KEY WORDS: CONSTITUTIONAL LAW/CRIMINAL — BRADY — COUNSEL — MOTION FOR NEW TRIAL — DISCOVERY VIOLATION — EVIDENCE — MANIFEST WEIGHT — IDENTITY
SUMMARY: Defendant’s due process rights under Brady v. Maryland, 337 U.S. 83 (1963), were not violated by the State’s disclosure of exculpatory evidence during closing arguments of defendant’s bench trial because the new evidence was disclosed during trial, the trial court granted a three-month continuance for the parties to investigate the newly disclosed evidence, and defendant was able to admit the evidence and effectively use it; while defendant argued on appeal that he would have presented a different alternate-suspect theory of the case had he known about the exculpatory report prior to trial, defendant was not denied a fair trial given that defendant had suggested an alternate suspect might have been the shooter at trial.
Defendant cannot show that he received the ineffective assistance of counsel based on his trial counsel’s failure to pursue DNA testing and investigate potential alternate suspects as the results of these potential investigations were not in the record and accordingly defendant could not show prejudice in his direct appeal; defendant’s further argument that his counsel was ineffective for failing to maintain a request for a mistrial failed because defendant’s argument amounted to a disagreement with his trial counsel’s trial strategy.
The trial court did not abuse its discretion in denying defendant’s motion for a mistrial where the State’s nondisclosure of exculpatory evidence was not willful and the trial court’s three-month continuance and allowing defendant to introduce the withheld evidence was a reasonable method of mitigating any prejudice that defendant suffered from the late disclosure.
Defendant’s convictions stemming from a shooting were not against the manifest weight of the evidence where, although an eyewitness’s statements to police the night of the shooting were inconsistent with her trial testimony, these inconsistencies were noted at trial and the remaining evidence was undisputed that defendant engaged in a heated argument with the eyewitness, drove away in a maroon car, and the eyewitness was shot at by someone in that maroon Ford a few hours later.
JUDGMENT: AFFIRMED
JUDGES: OPINION by BOCK, J.; KINSLEY, P.J., and ZAYAS, J., CONCUR.
CAPTION: WHITE V. EPPS
Appeal No. C-240312
TRIAL Nos. SK-2400258, SK-2400259
KEY WORDS: CIV.R. 41 — INVOLUNTARY DISMISSAL
SUMMARY: The trial court did not abuse its discretion when it sustained petitioners’ objections to the magistrate’s orders dismissing their petitions for civil-stalking-protection orders against respondent based on uncontested facts, and petitioners’ prompt objections to the orders dismissing their petitions were contrary to having abandoned their petitions.
JUDGMENTS: AFFIRMED
JUDGES: OPINION by BOCK, J.; ZAYAS, P.J. and MOORE, J., CONCUR.
CAPTION: STATE V. RAKHIMOV
Appeal No. C-240460
TRIAL No. B-2304590
KEY WORDS: SENTENCING — R.C. 2953.09(A)(2) — R.C. 2929.13(B)(1)(b)(iv) — APPELLATE REVIEW/CRIMINAL
SUMMARY: Where defendant was convicted of gross sexual imposition, a fourth-degree felony, sentenced to 16 months in prison, and did not seek leave to appeal his sentence, he had no right to appeal his sentence under R.C. 2953.08(A)(2) where the trial court sentenced him to a prison term after it found that he was convicted of a sex offense, and the presumption of community control for fourth-degree felonies does not apply to sex offenses under R.C. 2929.13(B)(1)(b)(iv).
JUDGMENT: APPEAL DISMISSED
JUDGES: OPINION by BOCK, J.; ZAYAS, P.J., and MOORE, J., CONCUR.