Opinion
A22A1398
06-28-2022
ALDEN B. THOMAS v. THE STATE.
The Court of Appeals hereby passes the following order:
In November 2013, a jury found Alden B. Thomas guilty of rape. Thomas's conviction was affirmed on appeal. See Case No. A20A0784 (decided Sept. 4, 2020). In November 2021, Thomas filed a pro se "Motion to Vacate a Void, Illegal, and Unconstitutional Sentence." The trial court subsequently granted Thomas's motion for the limited purpose of re-sentencing pursuant Upton v. State, 350 Ga.App. 535, 539-540 (3) (829 S.E.2d 791) (2019). In February 2022, counsel was appointed to represent Thomas at the re-sentencing hearing. On March 9, 2022, after the hearing, the trial court re-sentenced Thomas. On April 7, 2022, Thomas filed a pro se notice of appeal from the amended sentence.
"A criminal defendant in Georgia does not have the right to represent himself and also be represented by an attorney, and pro se filings by represented parties are therefore unauthorized and without effect." Tolbert v. Toole, 296 Ga. 357, 363 (3) (767 S.E.2d 24) (2014) (punctuation omitted). Here, the record shows that Thomas was represented by counsel at his re-sentencing hearing, and nothing in the record indicates that the attorney who represented him at that time either withdrew or was relieved from representing Thomas. See White v. State, 302 Ga. 315, 318 (2) (806 S.E.2d 489) (2017) (rejecting defendant's argument that representation terminates upon entry of judgment and sentence and holding that it continues for at least 30 days after entry of judgment). Under these circumstances, Thomas's pro se notice of appeal is a legal nullity. See Soberanis v. State, 345 Ga.App. 403, 405 (812 S.E.2d 800) (2018).
Accordingly, the appeal is hereby DISMISSED.