JAMES LEE WILLIAMS, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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.
The court held that the jury was not properly instructed on all elements of the offense of resisting a retail merchant, requiring a new trial.
Appellant was convicted of resisting a retail merchant, but acquitted of theft. He argued that the inconsistent verdicts entitled him to acquittal on …
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.
Explore caselaw by topic → Browse Inconsistent Jury Verdicts cases and more on FLexlaw
PER CURIAM.
Appellant challenges his conviction of resisting a retail merchant in violation of section 812.015(6). We reverse and remand for a new trial.
We reject appellant’s argument that the jury’s verdicts of not guilty on the charge of theft and guilty on the charge of resisting a retail merchant were “true” inconsistent verdicts, entitling him to acquittal on the latter charge. Cf. State v. Connelly, 24 Fla. L. Weekly S387, — So. 2d -, 1999 WL 628784 (Fla.1999); Fayson v. State, 684 So. 2d 270 (Fla. 1st DCA), aff'd 698 So. 2d 825 (Fla.1997).
Appellant correctly argues that the jury should have been instructed that in order to convict appellant of resisting a retail merchant it had to find that appellant was committing or had committed theft. Section 812.015(6), Florida Statutes (1997), provides, in relevant part:
(6) An individual who, while committing or after committing theft of property ... resists the reasonable effort of a ... merchant [or] merchant’s employee ... to recover the property ... which the merchant [or] merchant’s employee ... had probable cause to believe the individual had concealed or removed from its place of display or elsewhere ... commits a misdemeanor of the first degree....
Because the jury was not instructed on all elements of the offense, it is necessary to remand for a new trial on this charge.
REVERSED and REMANDED.
BARFIELD, C.J., ERVIN and WOLF, JJ„ CONCUR.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Cited By
-
Lane v. State, 867 So. 2d 539 (Fla. 1st DCA 2004)…ould have required acquittal, yet the theft element was also omitted from the jury instruction defining the crime of resisting a merchant’s employee’s efforts to recover stolen property. As we have held, such an omission is error. Williams v. State, 745 So. 2d 465, 466 (Fla. 1st DCA 1999) (“Appellant correctly argues that the jury should have been instructed that in order to convict appellant of resisting a retail merchant it had to find that appellant was committing or had committed theft.”). Because this el…
Authorities Cited
- Fayson v. State, 698 So. 2d 825 (Fla. 1997)
- Fayson v. State, 684 So. 2d 270 (Fla. 1st DCA 1996)