MARCUS PRESSEY, PETITIONER,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, RESPONDENT

Fla. 4th DCA | 1998-04-29
No. 98-0472
GUNTHER and TAYLOR, JJ., concur.
710 So. 2d 688 Florida District Court of Appeal, Fourth District (1998)

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

Petitioner sought a writ of prohibition to disqualify a trial judge who allegedly announced a predetermined 36-month sentence before the probation revocation hearing. The appellate court denied the petition, finding the case distinguishable from prior precedent because no transcript was provided and the judge's statement could not be conclusively interpreted as announcing a predetermined sentence regardless of evidence.


Holding

The court denied the petition for writ of prohibition because the case was distinguishable from Hayes and Torres. Without a transcript or sworn factual allegations showing the context and precise wording of the judge's statement, the court was unwilling to interpret the judge's statement as equivalent to the condemned conduct of announcing a predetermined sentence regardless of evidence or argument.


Headnotes

[1] A judge's announced intention before a scheduled hearing to make a specific ruling, regardless of any evidence or argument to the contrary, constitutes the paradigm of ju…

[2] Allegations in a motion to disqualify a judge are not legally sufficient without a transcript or sworn factual allegations showing the context in which the trial judge's…

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

Key Quotes

“A trial judge's announced intention before scheduled hearing to make a specific ruling, regardless of any evidence or argument to the contrary, is the paradigm of judicial bias and prejudice.”

Establishes the legal standard for judicial disqualification based on predetermined rulings, cited from prior case law.

Previewing 1 of 3 key quotes on this case — the court’s exact language, pinpointed for members.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Facts & Procedural History

On January 22, 1998, petitioner appeared for a pretrial conference on a probation violation charge. Petitioner's counsel requested more time to discus…

The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.


Opinion of the Court
KLEIN, Judge.

KLEIN, Judge.

Petitioner seeks a writ of prohibition directed to an order denying his motion to disqualify the trial judge. The basis of the motion to disqualify was that the trial judge had announced the sentence he would impose before petitioner’s hearing on revocation of probation took place. Hayes v. State, 686 So. 2d 694 (Fla. 4th DCA 1996) and cases cited therein.

The material portions of the petition for writ of prohibition allege:

1. On January 22, 1998, Petitioner was before the Court for a pretrial conference.

2. At the hearing, the undersigned told the Court that more time was needed to discuss the offer of settlement with Petitioner. 3. The Court reached for the Court file and after reviewing it stated on the record that Petitioner’s sentence, if convicted, would be thirty-six (36) months for Violation of Probation.

4. For Violation of Probation petitioner eould receive thirty-three (33) to fifty-five (55) months Department of Corrections.

5. Fla. Stat. 948.06 alows a trial court to modify or continue probation, rather than revoke and sentence a violator to anything s/he could have received when the plea was entered.

6. Because Judge Philips has announced Petitioner’s sentence prior to the presentation of any evidence and Petitioner’s elgibilty to receive modification or continuation of his probation, the Court’s denial of the motion to disqualify was error and should be overturned. See Torres v. State, 697 So. 2d 175 (Fla. 4th DCA 1997)(Judge’s announced polcy that no probation violator would receive time served held to be sufficient grounds for disqualification because defendant was eligible for time served settlement.)

In Hayes we quoted from our opinion in Gonzalez v. Goldstein, 633 So. 2d 1183, 1184 (Fla. 4th DCA 1994), as follows:

A trial judge’s announced intention before scheduled hearing to make a specific ruling, regardless of any evidence or argument to the contrary, is the paradigm of judicial bias and prejudice. We could not imagine a more telling basis for a party to fear that he will not receive a fair hearing.

The case cited in the petition for writ of prohibition, Torres v. State, 697 So. 2d 175 (Fla. 4th DCA), rev. denied, 703 So. 2d 477 (Fla.1997) was factually identical to Hayes (trial judge made statements that he never sentences defendants to time served on violations of probation).

We find the present ease distinguishable from the above cases. As the allegations which we quoted reflect, the petitioner was asking the court for more time in order to discuss a plea offer with the state, and in response, the court reviewed the file and stated that he would sentence the petitioner to thirty-six months if there was a violation. Neither the petitioner nor the state have furnished us with a transcript, although they have both addressed the lack of one. We are unwilling, on the basis of this record, to interpret the characterization of what the judge said to be the equivalent of the conduct we condemned in Hayes and the cases cited therein. See Ellis v. Henning, 678 So. 2d 825 (Fla. 4th DCA 1996), rev. denied, 699 So. 2d 1373 (Fla.1997)(without a transcript or sworn factual allegations showing the context in which the trial judge’s criticism of law firm was made, allegations in motion to disqualify were not legally sufficient). We therefore deny the petition for writ of prohibition.

GUNTHER and TAYLOR, JJ., concur.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Authorities Cited

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw