The Florida Supreme Court is in summer recess. The next regular opinions are expected 26 August 2010.
In HUDSON v. STATE, No. 2D07-6044 (Fla. 2d DCA Jul. 16, 2010), a police officer in a stadium parking lot received an anonymous tip by radio that a middle-aged black male was burglarizing vehicles. The officer immediately saw the Defendant, who met that description and was walking hurriedly away from the stadium carrying two nylon duffle bags. The officer conducted an investigatory stop. He noticed several bulges in the Defendant's pants pockets, conducted a pat-down, and located a switchblade knife. The Defendant was arrested for carrying a concealed weapon. The DCA held that while the tip itself was insufficient to provide reasonable suspicion, the observable conduct of the Defendant in the parking lot after the officer received the radio message provided the necessary reasonable suspicion to initially detain him. Based on the direction of his travel, the items in his hands, and the hurried nature of his walk, the officer could draw a reasonable inference that the Defendant was in the parking lot for some non-stadium-related activity. That coupled with the information that a person resembling the Defendant had been seen burglarizing cars in that very lot, were specific and articulable facts from which the officer could conclude that a reasonable suspicion existed to justify the stop.
In STATE v. TOWNSEND, No. 2D09-4102 (Fla. 2d DCA Jul. 16, 2010), a deputy obtained evidence during a search of the Defendant's vehicle following his arrest for violating a driver's license restriction. In his motion to suppress, the Defendant argued that under Arizona v. Gant, 129 S.Ct. 1710 (2009), the deputy conducted an illegal search incident to arrest. The DCA agreed, but held that because the vehicle was obstructing the right of way, the deputy properly impounded the vehicle following the standard operating procedure of his agency. The DCA reasoned that in Gant, the Supreme Court stated that when a search of a vehicle is not justified as incident to an arrest, the search "will be unreasonable unless police obtain a warrant or show that another exception to the warrant requirement applies." Id. at 1723-24. An inventory search as part of the impoundment of a vehicle, conducted according to standardized procedures, is an exception to the warrant requirement. It is the nature of the search, not the label the officer places upon it, that controls. The trial court's factual findings show that the search was a proper inventory search, conducted in accordance with standardized police procedures.
In ABBEY v. STATE, No. 2D08-6306 (Fla. 2d DCA Jul. 16 2010), the Defendant was sentenced to a term of community control followed by a term of probation. He committed a new criminal offense while he was on community control and an affidavit was filed, but no warrant issued until after he had begun serving the term of probation. The DCA held that the revocation process did not begin until the court signed the arrest warrant, after the Defendant had completed his term of community control. Consequently, the trial court lacked jurisdiction to revoke the Defendant's community control. A determination by the trial court that it retained jurisdiction so long as the Defendant was under supervision, whether it was community control or probation, was error because the State only alleged a violation of community control; there was no allegation of a violation of any condition of probation. Further, the Defendant was not yet on probation at the time of the new law violation, so the State could not have alleged his new offense was a violation of his probation.
In STATE v. BUITRAGO, No. 2D09-1730 (Fla. 2d DCA Jul. 16, 2010), the State unintentionally lost or destroyed certain audio recordings which the Defendant claimed were exculpatory in nature, a violation of the rule in Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 87 (1963). The trial court dismissed the charge as a sanction. The DCA held that because there was no showing of bad faith and the evidence was not material but only potentially useful to the defense, the due process violation was not sufficiently severe to warrant dismissal of the case because the recordings could be helpful, but were not a material fact that disproves the State's theory of guilt. The State might possess other evidence that connect the Defendant to the crime, but that could only be determined if the State had the opportunity to present its case.
In HICKS v. STATE, No. 2D09-2549 (Fla. 2d DCA Jul. 16, 2010), the Defendant was adjudicated guilty of both vehicular homicide and second-degree murder based on a single death, although the trial court did not sentence him on the vehicular homicide. The DCA held that where there is a single death, dual homicide convictions for one defendant cannot stand, even where sentencing on one conviction has been withheld. That was fundamental error, which may be raised for the first time on appeal.
