STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT,
v.
SPENCER DENIS STOLPEN, APPELLEE; STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT, V. RANDY DE LUCA, MARTIN TACCETTA AND DANIEL RICCIARDI, APPELLEES; STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT, V. VICTOR DAVANZO AND HENRY SANTA LUCIA, APPELLEES; STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT, V. DARIO HERRERA, APPELLEE

Fla. 4th DCA | 1980-07-16
Nos. 79-753, 79-834, 79-929 and 79-981
LETTS, C. J., and SIMONS, STUART M., Associate Judge, concur.
386 So. 2d 581 Florida District Court of Appeal, Fourth District (1980)

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Synopsis

The State of Florida appeals the trial court's suppression of wiretap evidence in a marijuana smuggling investigation. The wiretap authorization was based primarily on a New Jersey court order that the affidavit stated was attached as an exhibit but was never actually provided, and the court affirmed the suppression order because the missing order was crucial to establishing probable cause.


Holding

The court affirmed the suppression of the evidence, holding that the Florida wiretap authorization lacked an adequate basis for probable cause because the New Jersey court order that the affidavit represented was attached was in fact never included, and no evidence was presented that such an order even existed.


Headnotes

[1] A wiretap authorization may be suppressed when the affidavit supporting the application erroneously states that a crucial court order is attached, but the order is instea…

[2] The State bears the burden of demonstrating that an error in an application for a wiretap authorization was inadvertent and to cure the error.

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Key Quotes

“We conclude that the Florida wiretap authorization was based on the New Jersey Court order. The affidavit erroneously stated this order was attached. Since the record does not even reflect the existence of such an order, the trial court properly suppressed the evidence seized pursuant to the authorization.”

Establishes the court's holding that the missing exhibit was fatal to the wiretap authorization and justifies suppression.

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Facts & Procedural History

The State applied for a wiretap authorization in connection with a marijuana smuggling conspiracy investigation. The affidavit supporting the Florida …

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Opinion of the Court
BERANEK, Judge.

BERANEK, Judge.

This is an appeal by the State from an order granting appellees’ motions to suppress oral and wire communications. The content of these communications were seized by the State pursuant to a prior wiretap authorization. We affirm.

In pursuing an investigation surrounding a conspiracy to smuggle marijuana, the State applied to the Circuit Court for a wiretap authorization. The wiretap authorization was issued on the basis of a police officer’s affidavit. The primary basis for the authorization was a prior wiretap allegedly ordered by a trial court in the State of New Jersey in criminal proceedings there. The affidavit supporting the Florida application stated that the New Jersey court order was attached as an exhibit. In fact, the New Jersey court order was not attached as an exhibit. Instead, through an admitted error, an application for a tap on some different phone in the State of New Jersey was attached.

After the Florida tap was authorized and certain conversations recorded, the defendants moved to suppress on grounds that probable cause had not existed to issue the tap authorization in the first place due to the absence of the New Jersey court order.

The trial court granted the motion to suppress after a hearing in which the State conceded that the New Jersey court order had mistakenly been omitted from the application. The State called no witnesses at the hearing on defendants’ motion to suppress and merely argues on appeal that the mistake was inadvertent. We do not find anything in the record on the question of inadvertence and certainly, after admitting the mistake, it was the State’s burden to show how it occurred and to cure what is now urged to have been a clerical error. There is no evidence regarding how or why the mistake occurred. At no time has the State ever introduced the New Jersey court order in question. To this date; we are not aware that such an order even exists. There was more than adequate evidence presented by appellee before the trial court that the initial issuing judge would have ruled differently if the mistake as to the exhibit had been pointed out.

We conclude that the Florida wiretap authorization was based on the New Jersey Court order. The affidavit erroneously stated this order was attached. Since the record does not even reflect the existence of such an order, the trial court properly suppressed the evidence seized pursuant to the authorization. See Hudson v. State, 368 So. 2d 899 (Fla. 3d DCA 1979), cert. denied 378 So. 2d 345 (Fla.1979).

This situation is to be distinguished from State v. Brainard, 376 So. 2d 864 (Fla. 2d DCA 1979), where the missing information had little to do with the substance of the affidavit, and State v. Buffa, 347 So. 2d 688 (Fla. 4th DCA 1977), where a one digit error in a defendant’s street address was held to be insufficient. Here, the New Jersey court order was crucial to issuance of the authorization.

The evidence presented at the hearing on the motion to suppress adequately supports the trial court’s finding that the documentary basis before the issuing judge was insufficient to establish probable cause. Thus, the motion to suppress was properly granted and the trial court’s ruling is affirmed.

AFFIRMED.

LETTS, C. J.,* and SIMONS, STUART M., Associate Judge, concur.


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