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Opinion released March 17, 2000

SUPREME COURT OF LOUISIANA

No. 99-KO-1124 c/w 99-KO-1327 STATE OF LOUISIANA v. RAYMOND LAUGAND

On Writ of Certiorari to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal

PER CURIAM:* A judge may not respond to an unexpected disruption of the court's trial schedule, caused by a conflict in defense counsel's own trial schedule which results in counsel's absence on the morning of trial, by denying a motion for a continuance and forcing the defendant to trial without an attorney. State v. Wisenbaker, 428 So.2d 790 (La. 1983); City We observed

of Baton Rouge v. Dees, 363 So.2d 530 (La. 1978).

in Wisenbaker, 428 So.2d at 793, that "[i]f counsel, and not defendant, was at fault for counsel's failure to appear or to give timely notice to the trial court of a conflict in schedule, then sanctions must be taken against counsel, not the defendant." (footnote omitted); see also Dees, 363 So.2d at 532 ("Whatever may have been the court's right to discipline counsel if the present motion for continuance was untimely or ill-founded, the client cannot be penalized, by the loss of his constitutional right to legal representation at his trial, for his lawyer's lapse arising out of a conflict in the lawyer's trial schedule."). Similarly, a trial judge

Calogero, C.J., not on panel. Part II,

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