STATE OF FLORIDA, PETITIONER,
v.
WILBUR SPEIGHTS, RESPONDENT
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Florida Supreme Court held that while burglary prosecutions need not allege intent to commit a specific offense, the information must allege the essential statutory element of intent to commit some offense, and reversed the district court's dismissal where the element was properly alleged.
A burglary information under section 810.02 must allege intent to commit an offense but need not specify which offense.
[1] A burglary information must allege intent to commit an offense as an essential statutory element but need not allege intent to commit a specific offense.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceSpeights was charged with burglary under section 810.02, Florida Statutes (1981). The trial court dismissed the information for failure to charge inte…
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SHAW, Justice.
This cause is before the Court on petition to review the decision of the district court of appeal in State v. Speights, 417 So. 2d 1168 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982). The district court affirmed a trial court order dismissing an information charging burglary under section 810.02, Florida Statutes (1981), for failure to charge the intent to commit a specific offense as part of the burglary charge. In reaching this decision, the district court certified a question of great public importance:
In a prosecution for burglary under section 810.02, Florida Statutes (1981), is it necessary for the State to allege an intent to commit a specific offense?
Id. at 1169. We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. Const. The certified question is identical to that which we have since answered in the negative. State v. Waters, 436 So. 2d 66 (Fla.1983). The information, however, must allege the essential statutory element of intent to commit an offense. Id. This essential element was properly alleged in the present case.
The decision of the district court of appeal is quashed and the cause is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
ALDERMAN, C.J., and ADKINS, BOYD, OVERTON, McDonald and EHRLICH, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
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Lucio John Salas v. State, 544 So. 2d 1040 (Fla. 4th DCA 1989)…burglary, it is not necessary for the state to allege intent to commit a specific offense, but the information must allege the essential statutory element of intent to commit an offense. Ellis v. State, 442 So. 2d 213 (Fla.1983); State v. Speights, 437 So. 2d 1387 (Fla.1983); State v. Waters, 436 So. 2d 66 (Fla.1983); State v. Fields, 390 So. 2d 128 (Fla. 4th DCA 1980). Furthermore, the omission in the information of an essential element of the crime of burglary is a defect that can be raised for the first ti…
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State v. Carlton Barnes, 441 So. 2d 626 (Fla. 1983)…hat “an indictment or information charging burglary need not specify the offense the accused is alleged to have intended to commit, although it must allege the essential element of intent to commit an offense.” Id. at 68. See also State v. Speights, 437 So. 2d 1387 (Fla.1983); State v. Rozier, 436 So. 2d 73 (Fla.1983). In the instant case, the respondent “was tried under an information which alleged that he unlawfully entered the victim’s dwelling with the intent to commit an offense therein, in that he entere…
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State v. Wade, 442 So. 2d 309 (Fla. 1st DCA 1983)…PER CURIAM. Understandably relying on a long history of case law requiring of a burglary charge an intent to commit a specific offense, see, e.g., State v. Speights, 417 So. 2d 1168 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982), quashed and remanded, 437 So. 2d 1387 (1983), the trial court dismissed the burglary charge against appel-lee. Since the trial court’s order dismissing this information, however, the Florida Supreme Court has held that a burglary information need only allege the essential element of int…
Authorities Cited
- State v. Waters, 436 So. 2d 66 (Fla. 1983)
- Gulf & W. Food Prods. & Nat'l Emp'rs Co. v. Audley Campbell, 417 So. 2d 1168 (Fla. 1st DCA 1982)