EARL FREEMAN, APPELLANT,
v.
THE STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Earl Freeman appealed his convictions for two counts of armed robbery, challenging the trial court's denial of his mistrial motion based on a witness statement and certain jury instructions on reasonable doubt. The appellate court affirmed the convictions but modified the judgments to correctly reflect armed robbery rather than attempted robbery convictions.
The court affirmed the convictions, holding that (1) the mistrial motion was properly denied because the witness statement, followed by a proper jury instruction to disregard it, did not deprive Freeman of a fair trial where the prosecution made no adverse inference argument; and (2) the trial court's reasonable doubt instruction did not rise to fundamental error, especially given the proper instructions on reasonable doubt and presumption of innocence as a whole.
[1] A mistrial motion is properly denied when an unresponsive witness statement, though potentially suggestive, does not deprive the defendant of a fair trial, especially whe…
[2] A trial court's jury instruction on reasonable doubt does not constitute reversible error when no objection is made and the instruction, viewed in context with other prop…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“the mere hearing of the request by the jury under the circumstances of this case did not, in our view, deprive the defendant of a fair trial”
Establishes the standard for mistrial denial in cases of unresponsive witness statements, requiring consideration of curative instructions and lack of prosecutorial exploitation.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceFreeman was tried by jury and convicted of two counts of armed robbery. During cross-examination, a robbery eyewitness made an unresponsive statement …
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PER CURIAM.
This is an appeal by the defendant Earl Freeman from judgments and sentences entered upon jury verdicts finding the defendant guilty of two counts of armed robbery. We affirm the judgments of convictions and sentences under review, but hereby modify the subject judgments to state that the defendant was convicted of armed robbery, not attempted robbery as the judgments currently reflect.
First, the trial court did not, as urged, commit reversible error in denying the defendant’s motion for mistrial based on an unresponsive statement which was made by a robbery eye witness on cross examination at trial. The witness stated: “Yeah, I want him [the defendant] to say a few words. I can identify the voice.” Although the defendant could have been compelled at that point to give a sample of his voice to the jury or suffer an adverse infer ence from a refusal to do so, Macias v. State, 515 So. 2d 206, 208 (Fla.1987); Larkin v. State, 474 So. 2d 1282 (Fla. 4th DCA 1985), the prosecution made no such request, the court did not order same, and the prosecuting attorney made no argument to the jury that an adverse inference should be drawn from the defendant’s silence in the face of such a request. Compare Herring v. State, 501 So. 2d 19 (Fla. 3d DCA 1986).
Instead, the trial court instructed the jury to disregard the witness' statement, but denied a motion for mistrial.
We conclude that the mistrial motion was properly denied because the mere hearing of the request by the jury under the circumstances of this case did not, in our view, deprive the defendant of a fair trial.
Second, we find no reversible error in the complained-of portion of the trial court’s jury instruction on reasonable doubt. No objection was made by the defendant to this instruction, and the giving of the instruction does not otherwise rise to the level of fundamental error — especially when considered in context with the balance of the trial court’s extensive and proper jury instructions on reasonable doubt and presumption of innocence which the defendant does not attack on this appeal. See Smith v. State, 521 So. 2d 106, 108 (Fla.1988); Dewey v. State, 135 Fla. 443, 453, 186 So. 224, 228 (1938); Gray v. State, 42 Fla. 174, 183, 28 So. 53, 56 (1900).
Affirmed as modified.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
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Jones v. State, 656 So. 2d 489 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995)…oubt standard constituted fundamental error as it deprived the appellant of his defense, the reliance on the reasonable doubt standard. In arriving at this conclusion, we specifically distinguish the case at bar from the holding in Freeman v. State, 576 So. 2d 415, 416 (Fla. 3d DCA 1991). In Freeman, the court held that a complaint with the reasonable doubt instruction was not preserved and did not amount to fundamental error. The court based its conclusion (that the jury instruction did not rise to the level…
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Donnie Hugh Doctor v. State, 677 So. 2d 1372 (Fla. 3d DCA 1996)…aneous instruction minimized the reasonable doubt standard and rises to the level of fundamental error. Doctor does not raise any error as to the formal jury instructions at the close of the evidence. We adhere to our decision in Freeman v. State, 576 So. 2d 415 (Fla. 3d DCA 1991), and hold that “the giving of the instruction does not otherwise rise to the level of fundamental error_” Freeman, 576 So. 2d at 416. We decline Doctor’s invitation to follow Jones v. State, 656 So. 2d 489 (Fla. 4th DCA), review…1 / 2
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Romeo Cifuentes v. State, 674 So. 2d 743 (Fla. 4th DCA 1996)…r noted that this was a minimization of the reasonable doubt standard that violated the due process clause of both the federal and Florida constitutions. Id. at 490. We also distinguished Jones, from the third district’s opinion in Freeman v. State, 576 So. 2d 415 (Fla. 3d DCA 1991). In Freeman, the court held that there was no reversible error in a complained-of portion of a jury instruction on reasonable doubt. Id. at 416. The court noted that no objection was made by the defendant to this instruction, and…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAuthorities Cited
- Smith v. State, 521 So. 2d 106 (Fla. 1988)
- Gray v. State, 42 Fla. 174 (Fla. 1900)
- Dewey v. State, 135 Fla. 443 (Fla. 1938)
- Herring v. State, 501 So. 2d 19 (Fla. 3d DCA 1986)
- MacIas v. State, 515 So. 2d 206 (Fla. 1987)
- Jordan v. State, 474 So. 2d 1282 (Fla. 4th DCA 1985)
- Talbert v. State, 474 So. 2d 1282 (Fla. 4th DCA 1985)