New Cases

The First District Court of Appeal has held that a trial court should not appoint postconviction appellate counsel unless it articulates why the appointment is legally required, and that the basis must be apparent from the record. It affirmed. Parrish Anthony George was convicted in Suwannee County of battery on a law enforcement officer and did not appeal. Months later…

The Second District Court of Appeal has affirmed a man’s Hillsborough County convictions for first-degree murder, attempted first-degree murder, and two counts of felony aggravated child abuse, rejecting his argument that his conviction by a six-person jury violated his constitutional rights. The court said that argument “lacks merit under current precedent,” and in the same passage cited the U.S. Supreme…

The Fifth District Court of Appeal has held that a Lake County defendant had a right to be present at a resentencing in which the judge had discretion over the new sentence, and that his lawyer’s oral waiver of his presence was not enough without a record showing he knowingly and voluntarily waived that right. Jason Ganga was convicted of…

The First District Court of Appeal has held that a sentencing judge who rejects a request for a downward departure does not have to state on the record the reasons for that decision, expressly disagreeing with the reasoning of a line of Second District Court of Appeal decisions. Bryan Arthur Weber entered an open no contest plea in Alachua County…

The Second District Court of Appeal has held that a Manatee County judge could not depart below the guidelines for a man convicted of selling cocaine within 1,000 feet of a church because of the small amount of drugs involved or because of the volunteer work he did while jailed awaiting trial. Wayne Carlton Mathis sold 0.8 grams of crack…

The Fifth District Court of Appeal has reversed a Seminole County man’s drug trafficking and possession convictions and ordered him discharged, holding that carrying keys to a third party’s house and to a locked safe that held drugs did not, without independent proof, establish that he constructively possessed the drugs. Officers found Dwight Deon Oliver, who was subject to an…

The First District Court of Appeal has held that section 948.30(2)(a), Florida Statutes, which bars the results of a sex offender probationer’s mandatory polygraph from being used as evidence in court to prove a violation, does not bar admissions the probationer makes when a probation officer or treatment provider questions him about those results. Antonio Velazquez was on sex offender…

The Fourth District Court of Appeal has ordered a new trial for a man convicted in Broward County of two counts of vehicular homicide, holding that a detective who was not an accredited accident reconstructionist was improperly allowed to estimate the vehicles’ speeds using a “momentum formula” without the expert-testimony analysis section 90.702, Florida Statutes, requires. At trial, Detective Michael…

The Second District Court of Appeal has reversed a Sarasota County man’s sexual battery convictions and ordered a new trial, holding that the trial court improperly limited cross-examination of the alleged victim about her own prior denial of the abuse — and that the error was not harmless. Brian K. Johnson was convicted on two of five counts of sexual…

The Third District Court of Appeal has held that a routine toxicology report prepared by a non-testifying analyst as part of a medical examiner’s statutory autopsy duty is not “testimonial” under the Sixth Amendment’s Confrontation Clause — meaning a testifying substitute expert may describe the report’s contents at trial without violating the defendant’s confrontation right. The defendant, convicted of second-degree…