Mobuary v. State, 312 Ga. 337

In 2003 Jason Mobuary pleaded guilty in Fulton County to enticing a child for indecent purposes.
In July 2018 he moved for an out-of-time appeal and for appointed counsel; both motions were denied by the trial court on December 11, 2019.
Mobuary mailed a notice of appeal on May 12, 2020; the trial court received, stamped, and docketed it in late May 2020. The Court of Appeals dismissed the appeal on June 16, 2020 as untimely.
The record showed Mobuary had earlier (Jan. 8, 2020) sought and received an extension to file a discretionary application, filed that application, and the Supreme Court transferred it to the Court of Appeals, which granted discretionary review and ordered Mobuary to file a notice of appeal within ten days.
Chief Justice’s statewide judicial emergency orders (COVID-19) tolled nonconstitutional filing deadlines; the ten-day period in the Court of Appeals’ grant was thus treated as beginning when tolling ended (July 14, 2020), and Mobuary’s notice was filed within that tolled period.
The Supreme Court granted certiorari, held the Court of Appeals erred in dismissing for untimeliness, vacated the dismissal, and remanded for further proceedings; Chief Justice Nahmias dissented, objecting to the use of certiorari for what she characterized as routine error correction.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument (Mobuary)	Defendant's Argument (State)	Held
Whether Mobuary's notice of appeal was timely	His notice was timely because his earlier discretionary-application proceedings and the Court of Appeals’ grant extended the time, and COVID judicial-emergency tolling applied	Notice was untimely; petition conceded tardy	Court held notice was timely when tolling and the discretionary-application timeline are applied; dismissal was erroneous
Effect of Court of Appeals’ May 8, 2020 order requiring a notice within ten days	The ten-day clock was tolled by the statewide judicial emergency orders, so the effective period began July 14, 2020	The State argued the petition was tardy (later rejected)	Court applied tolling and concluded the notice was filed within the allowed period
Whether certiorari was appropriate to correct the Court of Appeals’ dismissal	Certiorari appropriate to resolve tolling application and correct dismissal	The State moved to dismiss certiorari as untimely; dissent argued certiorari should be reserved for issues of great public importance	Majority granted certiorari to address tolling and vacated dismissal; dissent argued the case did not meet certiorari gravity standard

Sanchious v. State, 309 Ga. 580 (2020) (discussing Supreme Court summary dispositions and certiorari practice)
Harper v. State, 310 Ga. 679 (2021) (applying tolling from statewide judicial emergency orders)
Simmons v. State, 276 Ga. 525 (2003) (denial of out-of-time appeal is directly appealable when no direct appeal was taken)
Central of Ga. R. Co. v. Yesbik, 146 Ga. 620 (1917) (historical discussion of certiorari jurisdiction and the gravity standard)