The applicant for leave to appeal was convicted on July 6, 1960 under two indictments for robbery with a deadly weapon and under one indictment for attempted robbery with a deadly weapon. He was sentenced on December 13, 1960 to a total of thirty (30) years in the Maryland Penitentiary. On direct appeal the convictions were affirmed by the Court of Appeals, 226 Md. IS (1961) and certiorari was denied by the Supreme Court on January 8, 1962, (
*472 This application for leave to appeal was filed October 10, 1966 from an order denying relief of October 4, 1966 of Judge Albert E. Sklar sitting in the Criminal Court of Baltimore on the applicant’s second petition for post conviction relief filed July 27, 1966. Relief was denied without appointment of counsel or hearing. The applicant made the following allegations of error in his petition and his amended petitions:
1. That the crimes charged in two of the indictments should have been merged into one offense, and that therefore, petitioner is a victim of “Double Jeopardy.”
2. That his constitutional rights were violated because the consolidation of two (2) distinct cases created a prejudicial atmosphere, which influenced a witness in the second case to change her testimony to the detriment of applicant.
This application for leave to appeal fails to contain a statement of the reasons why the order should be reversed and could therefore be denied under Maryland Rules, BK 46b.
Goetzke v. Warden,
In any event, applicant’s contentions are without merit. In this State “the true test of whether one criminal offense has
*473
merged into another is held to be not whether the two criminal acts are successive steps of the same transaction, but whether one crime necessarily involves the other.”
Chittum v. State,
The granting of separate trials by a trial judge is discretionary under Maryland Rules, 735 and there is no absolute right to separate trials on separate indictments.
Brown v. State,
Application denied.
