MICHAEL WAYNE BROCK, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Appellant Brock pled guilty to selling stolen diamonds and was sentenced to community control. The trial court initially declined to order restitution based on erroneous information about the diamonds' value, but four-and-one-half months later imposed $700 restitution anyway. The appellate court held the trial court lacked jurisdiction to modify the sentence outside the 60-day window under Florida Criminal Procedure Rule 3.800.
The trial court lacked jurisdiction to impose restitution four-and-one-half months after sentencing. The failure to impose restitution renders a sentence incomplete rather than illegal, making it subject to modification only within 60 days under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800. Since restitution was imposed outside that window, the court was without jurisdiction.
[1] A trial court lacks jurisdiction to impose restitution after the sixty-day period following sentencing has expired, unless the sentence was illegal.
[2] Failure to impose restitution at sentencing renders the sentence incomplete, not illegal, for purposes of post-sentencing modification.
Previewing 2 of 4 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“Under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800, a trial court may reduce or modify a legal sentence within sixty days of imposition; it may correct an illegal sentence at any time.”
Establishes the fundamental jurisdictional framework governing the trial court's authority to modify sentences.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceOn June 5, 1991, Brock appeared unannounced and pled guilty to selling three stolen diamonds to a pawnbroker for $700. At sentencing, the court declin…
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CAMPBELL, Acting Chief Judge.
Appellant argues that the court did not have jurisdiction to order him to pay $700 in restitution four-and-one-half months after appellant pled guilty and was sentenced. We agree.
On June 5, 1991, appellant appeared at the courthouse unannounced, desiring to plead guilty to the two charges against him stemming from his alleged sale of three stolen diamonds to a pawnbroker for $700.
Even though appellant’s case was not on the docket for that day, the court was able to receive appellant’s plea and proceed to sentencing. After sentencing appellant to two concurrent terms of community control, the court stated: “No restitution to the pawnbroker. He has no business pawning these if they were worth $45,000.” The $45,000 figure had been given to the court by the Assistant State Attorney Tsourakis, who did not have appellant’s office file with him because appellant had not been scheduled for that day.
On October 29, 1991, almost four-and-one-half months later, Assistant State Attorney Michael Rosen appeared before the judge explaining that he had placed the case on the docket again because there was a restitution issue. Rosen had learned that the $45,000 value given the court by Tsou-rakis was erroneous; the actual value was closer to $2,000. Rosen reasoned that since the trial court’s earlier statements and ruling regarding restitution were based on erroneous information, the court had jurisdiction to order restitution and would do so now. The state never moved to modify the original sentence. The court ordered appellant to pay $700 in restitution to the pawnbroker, over appellant’s objection on jurisdictional grounds.
On November 25, 1991, appellant filed a petition for writ of certiorari that this court ordered treated as a direct appeal.
Under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800, a trial court may reduce or modify a legal sentence within sixty days of imposition; it may correct an illegal sentence at any time. Since the restitution here was imposed more than sixty days after appellant was sentenced, the original sentence must have been deemed illegal in order for the trial court to have had the jurisdiction to subsequently order appellant to pay restitution.
The failure to impose restitution, however, does not render a sentence illegal. State v. Butz, 568 So. 2d 537 (Fla. 4th DCA 1990). See also Weaver v. State, 588 So. 2d 53 (Fla. 3d DCA 1991). Rather, the failure to impose restitution renders the sentence incomplete and subject to modification within sixty days. See Butz.
Thus, the court’s initial failure to order restitution did not result in an illegal sentence and, consequently, the trial court was without jurisdiction to impose restitution four-and-one-half months after appellant was sentenced.
Although the state argues that the pawnbroker was never afforded an opportunity to establish his financial loss at the original sentencing thus making the second hearing for restitution the completion of that initial hearing, we are not so persuaded. See Weaver. We reverse.
PARKER and BLUE, JJ., concur.
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Citator
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L'Heureux v. State, 968 So. 2d 628 (Fla. 2d DCA 2007)…ereafter. See State v. Sanderson, 625 So. 2d 471, 473 (Fla.1993). This is so because “the failure to impose restitution [*630] renders [a] sentence incomplete and subject to modification” within the sixty-day period of rule 3.800(c). Brock v. State, 604 So. 2d 32, 33 (Fla. 2d DCA 1992). Indeed, a trial court may properly order restitution within sixty days after failing to order restitution at sentencing and failing to reserve jurisdiction to do so. See Selwyn v. State, 903 So. 2d 361, 362 (Fla. 2d DCA 2005)…
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Consuela Michelle McLEMORE v. State, 638 So. 2d 610 (Fla. 1st DCA 1994)…der Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800(a), this Court has held that a failure to impose restitution does not render a sentence illegal within the meaning of this rule. Campbell v. State, 614 So. 2d 600, 602 (Fla. 1st DCA 1993); Brock v. State, 604 So. 2d 32, 33 (Fla. 2d DCA 1992). “Rather, the failure to impose restitution results in an incomplete sentence, which is subject to modification within sixty days.” Campbell, 614 So. 2d at 602. The Florida Supreme Court has also recognized that “an order of r…
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Campbell v. State, 614 So. 2d 600 (Fla. 1st DCA 1993)…t render the sentence illegal, hence subject to correction at any time. Rather, the failure to impose restitution results in an incomplete sentence, which is subject to modification within sixty days. Fairweather, 596 So. 2d at 1277; Brock v. State, 604 So. 2d 32 (Fla. 2d DCA1992). The trial court’s restitution statement at the sentencing proceeding in this case is virtually identical to the restitution statement made by the trial court in King. At the sentencing proceeding in King, the trial judge stated:…
Authorities Cited
- State v. Butz, 568 So. 2d 537 (Fla. 4th DCA 1990)
- Weaver v. State, 588 So. 2d 53 (Fla. 3d DCA 1991)