Carr v. Georgia
Annotate this CaseThe trial court in this case ordered the sheriff to take Ricky Lee Carr into custody solely because Carr had been charged with committing violent crimes and found mentally incompetent to stand trial. The court directed Carr be transferred to and held by the Georgia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities for evaluation within 90 days as to whether there is a substantial probability that he will attain competency in the foreseeable future. In this appeal, Carr argued this detention by the State violated his constitutional due process rights. The Georgia Supreme Court agreed that indefinite or even unreasonably extended detention under OCGA 17-7-130 (c) would be unconstitutional, but did not agree that the statute permitted such extended detention. Instead, the Court construed 17-7-130 (c) as limiting the detention it authorizes to the reasonable time needed to fulfill its purpose. And because Carr initiated this appeal shortly after he was ordered to be detained, he had not yet shown on the record that the duration of his confinement was unreasonable. The Supreme Court agreed automatic detention, without an individualized determination of whether the confinement reasonably advanced the government’s purpose violated a defendant’s right to due process, and therefore held that this part of 17-7-130 (c) could not be applied constitutionally to Carr or similarly situated defendants who were not already being detained on another, lawful ground. Accordingly, the Court affirmed in part and vacated in part the judgment ordering Carr to be detained for inpatient evaluation, and remanded the case for further proceedings.
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