192
Stevens, J., dissenting
plurality scrounges to find case law support, but the result barely registers on the radar screen.
Furthermore, the plurality thinks that there is "no authority" for the proposition that entry of judgment is generally considered to be a "ministerial" matter. Ante, at 174. In a related context, however, the Virginia Supreme Court has observed:
"The rendition of a judgment is to be distinguished from its entry in the records. The rendition of a judgment is the judicial act of the court, whereas the entry of a judgment by the clerk on the records of the court is a ministerial, and not a judicial, act. . . . The entry or recordation of such an instrument in an order book is the ministerial act of the clerk and does not constitute an integral part of the judgment." Rollins v. Bazile, 205 Va. 613, 617, 139 S. E. 2d 114, 117 (1964) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted).
In any event, there is a more critical point to be made about the plurality's entry-of-judgment distinction. In relying on that distinction, the plurality is necessarily abandoning the very understanding of Simmons that it purports to be following. As explained above, to the extent that the availability of Rule 3A:15(b) motions undermines the inevitability of a defendant's prior verdicts (and therefore his parole ineligibility) under state law, it does so whether or not judgment has been entered on the verdict. So why is it that Simmons does not apply when there is no entry of judgment?
The answer simply cannot be that, under state law, and at the time of sentencing, the defendant will not inevitably be
cases in Virginia surely demonstrates that setting aside a verdict by post-trial motion is a rarity; if those two instances make the verdict uncertain, then one might as well cite the solitary case in which the Governor granted a pardon after the verdict but before the entry of judgment. See Blair v. Commonwealth, 66 Va. 850 (1874).
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