Opinion
A25A0561
12-09-2024
CHARLIE BRANNER, JR. v. THE STATE.
The Court of Appeals hereby passes the following order:
Charlie Branner, Jr. pled guilty to three counts of child molestation. In his first appeal to this court, Branner sought to challenge the court's denial of his motion to withdraw his guilty plea. We vacated the court's order because Branner's motion was a nullity. See Branner v. State, Case No. A20A0424 (May 7, 2020).
We subsequently dismissed an appeal from a speedy trial claim, see Branner v. State, Case No. A21A0619 (May 26, 2021), and dismissed an appeal from a motion to modify sentence for failure to file an appellate brief, see Branner v. State, Case No. A23A0372 (Oct. 25, 2022).
Branner now seeks to appeal from the trial court's order denying all pending motions in the case. The trial court noted that Branner had filed over 30 motions after his guilty plea. We lack jurisdiction.
Branner's appeal is barred as a matter of law because the issues raised by his motions have or could have been litigated in prior appeals. See Echols v. State, 243 Ga.App. 775, 776 (534 S.E.2d 464) (2000) ("It is axiomatic that the same issue cannot be relitigated ad infinitum. The same is true of appeals of the same issue on the same grounds.") (punctuation omitted); Jackson v. State, 273 Ga. 320, 320 (540 S.E.2d 612) (2001) (a party "is not entitled to another bite at the apple by way of a second appeal"). See also Ross v. State, 310 Ga.App. 326, 327 (713 S.E.2d 438) (2011) (dismissal of previous appeal constitutes the binding law of the case, even though the appeals court did not reach the merits of the claim in the prior case).
Accordingly, this appeal is hereby DISMISSED.