Holmes v. State

Benham,. Chief Justice,

concurring specially.

While I agree with the affirmance of appellant’s conviction, I cannot endorse the plurality’s unnecessary expansion of the “necessity exception” to the rule against the admission of hearsay. In Smith v. State, 266 Ga. 827 (4) (470 SE2d 674) (1996), we expressly declined to determine whether the inability of law enforcement officers to locate a missing witness made that witness “unavailable” for purposes of the necessity exception to the hearsay rule, and the plurality opinion in the case at bar does not convince me that the exception should be…