Kramer

By information filed by the district attorney, Thomas D. Kramer was charged in Count I with the crime of armed robbery and in Counts II to V, inclusive, with the crime of forgery in violation of section 470 of the Penal Code. Defendant was also charged with one prior offense, the crime of issuing a check without sufficient funds on or about April 17, 1958. Defendant pleaded not guilty and denied the prior conviction.

At the time of trial defendant’s attorney made a motion to be relieved upon the ground that he could no longer continue to represent defendant; he asserted defendant was insisting upon acting in his own behalf by such actions as filing independent petitions for writs of habeas corpus. The trial judge made every effort to have defendant either employ private counsel or if he did not have the funds with which to do so to accept an appointment by the court of the public defender. Defendant rejected these efforts and as the trial judge put it upon the hearing of the motion for a new trial, “we have here a young man who simply apparently enjoyed the drama of representing himself.” As the trial progressed and defendant found himself more and more hopelessly incapable of…