Long v. State

Orth, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court. A person convicted of a crime in a circuit court of one of the counties or in the Criminal Court of Baltimore may be admitted to bail, pending sentence or appeal, in the discretion of the judge who presided at the trial. Maryland Rule 777 b. See Code, Art. 26, §§ 33, 34. 1 Such person is not entitled to an appeal directly from the decision of the trial judge either with regard to a refusal to admit him to bail or with regard to the amount fixed for his admittance to bail.

He may seek to attack such de ³⁷³ cisión collaterally, however, by way of habeas corpus. Rules Z40-56; Curtis James Lewis v. Warden, 16 Md. App. 339 . Prior to 1 July 1972 there was no appeal from the habeas corpus proceeding, Hudson v. Superintendent, 11 Md. App. 253 , but chapter 392, Acts 1972, authorized the seeking of leave to appeal as to such habeas corpus petitions as were filed after 1 July 1972. Codified as Art. 42, § 20, the Act provides: “A person who has sought habeas corpus relief either from the refusal of a judge to admit him to bail or from the judge’s determination requiring an allegedly excessive bail, either prior to trial or at any time following conviction, but prior to final judgment, may apply to the Court of Special Appeals for leave to appeal from the refusal by such judge to issue the writ of habeas corpus applied for or to grant the relief sought in the writ.” 2 Two applications for leave to appeal have come before us under the new statute, Bigley and Fleming v. Warden, supra, and Lewis v. Warden, supra.

Each was properly before us as brought by a person who had sought habeas corpus relief after 1 July 1972 as to bail and who has been denied the relief sought. We denied the application in each case finding no abuse of judicial discretion. In Bigley we stated that there was “no mathematically precise formula or equation to determine the allowance vel non of bail after conviction” and concluded that each case must be decided on its own particular circumstances. 16 Md. App. at 14 . 3 In Lewis we pointed out the error of ³⁷⁴ the State’s position that Rule 777 prevailed over Rules Z40-56, “Habeas Corpus”, and of its claim that application for leave to appeal must be from the initial decision of the trial judge denying bail, or fixing an amount alleged to be excessive, without the intervention of a habeas corpus proceeding. The instant case is not properly before us.

WILLIAM ALEXANDER LONG was found guilty by a jury in the Criminal Court of Baltimore of murder in the first degree for which he was sentenced to imprisonment for the balance of his natural life and of assault with intent to murder for which he was sentenced to 15 years to run consecutively to the life sentence. A timely appeal from the judgments was noted and is now pending in this Court. He prayed that the trial judge admit him to bail pending appeal, as he may do under Rule 777 b, and