Martin v. Astudillo

CARLEY, Justice.

A jury found Martin Astudillo guilty of rape, armed robbery, burglary and kidnapping. His trial attorney was a Fulton County public defender. When, after trial, that lawyer resigned and accepted employment elsewhere, another attorney in the public defender’s office filed and argued Astudillo’s motion for new trial, in which the effectiveness of trial counsel was never challenged. The trial court denied the motion for new trial, and, when the second attorney also left the public defender’s office, Astudillo was represented on appeal by yet another employee of that office.…