Louisiana v. Bazile
Annotate this CaseDefendant Timothy Bazile was indicted by a grand jury for the second degree murder of his wife, Kendra. The indictment was returned on October 13, 2010, and defendant arraigned on October 15. The district court set a trial date of October 3, 2011; notice of the trial date was given to the defendant and his counsel in open court. Defendant waived his right to a jury trial after a colloquy with the district judge. The state objected to the defendant's action, arguing the waiver of the defendant's right to a jury was made in violation of the amendment to La. Const. art. I, sec. 17(A). On the first day of trial, defense asked for a continuance on the ground the state failed to fully comply with discovery requests. The prosecutor objected to the request for continuance. Overruling the prosecutor's objection, the district court set a new trial date of October 11, 2011. Giving effect to the defendant's earlier jury trial waiver, the new trial was set to proceed before the district judge. The prosecutor again objected, arguing the defense failed to waive trial by jury within the required time limitations under the state constitution. In an attempt to overcome the state's objection, defense counsel offered to re-set trial beyond forty-five days from the earlier waiver. The prosecutor objected to this offer, arguing a continuance does not extend the forty-five day period provided by the state constitution. The prosecutor contended whenever the trial was held, the mode of trial would be a trial before a jury since the forty-five day period contemplated by the state constitution had already run before the original October 3, 2011 trial date. The district judge held a defendant had a right to waive a jury trial at any time before trial under the federal constitution; thus, the state constitutional provision which imposed limits on that right was unconstitutional. The state appealed, and was denied without comment by a vote of 2-1. The state then applied to the Supreme Court for review. After its review of the record, the Supreme Court concluded the constitutionality of La. Const. art. I, sec. 17(A) was not raised by the parties in the district court, rather, raised sua sponte by the district judge. When the matter was once more before the district court, the defendant filed a "Motion to Declare Constitutional Amendment Unconstitutional," claiming La. Const. art. I, sec. 17(A), as amended in 2010, violated the federal constitution. The Supreme Court found the district court's ruling to be erroneous, and accordingly reversed and remanded the case for further proceedings.
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