JOHN DUDLEY, APPELLANT,
v.
JUWANNA SMITH, APPELLEE
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Florida appellate court reversed an injunction against repeat violence because the evidence showed insufficient incidents to meet statutory requirements for such relief, despite acknowledging the defendant's harassing conduct.
An injunction for repeat violence under Fla. Stat. § 784.046(l)(b) requires at least four incidents of harassment, and the evidence here was insufficient to support the injunction.
[1] An injunction for repeat violence under Fla. …
Previewing 1 of 1 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“Injunctions against repeat violence, as important as they may be in appropriate cases, should be carefully considered when such injunction restricts one from entering a public facility or from using a public conveyance.”
Opening statement establishing the court's concern about the scope of injunctions affecting access to public facilities and transportation.
Dudley, a frequent Votran bus rider, followed Smith (a bus driver) to lunch, sat with her, attempted conversation, followed her back to the bus statio…
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HARRIS, J.
Injunctions against repeat violence, as important as they may be in appropriate cases, should be carefully considered when such injunction restricts one from entering a public facility or from using a public conveyance. Here, Dudley, a frequent rider of Votran buses, was barred from boarding any bus driven by Smith because, despite being told to leave Smith alone, Dudley followed Smith to lunch, sat at a table with her and attempted to talk with her, and then followed her back to the bus station. Dudley subsequently boarded a bus being driven by Smith and talked to her in a manner which she described as threatening. There was also testimony that Dudley would write down Votran bus drivers’ operator tag numbers to find out where they lived. Although the conduct of Dudley is not condoned and, if continued, might properly lead to the entry of an injunction, we find the injunction entered herein to be unauthorized and we reverse.
Section 784.046(l)(b), Fla. Stat., requires at least four incidents of harassment before an injunction for repeat violence may be entered. Repeat violence requires two incidents of “violence or stalking” and stalking itself requires “repeated” harassment. In this case, the evidence was simply insufficient to support the injunction entered.
REVERSED.
COBB and PALMER, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
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Lukacs v. Luton, 982 So. 2d 1217 (Fla. 1st DCA 2008)…e evidence supported the trial court’s determination that the appellant’s actions caused the appellee substantial emotional distress, “which is all that is required when the injunction is predicated upon repeated acts of stalking”); Dudley v. Smith, 786 So. 2d 630, 631 (Fla. 5th DCA 2001) (holding that repeat violence requires “two incidents of ‘violence or stalking’ ”). Accordingly, I would reverse the injunction.…1 / 3
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Slack v. Jean-Michel Kling, 959 So. 2d 425 (Fla. 2d DCA 2007)…ingle voice message is not a course of conduct. Cf. Poindexter v. Springer, 898 So. 2d 204, 207 (Fla. 2d DCA 2005) (concluding that the act of mailing three letters in one envelope was insufficient to establish a course of conduct); Dudley v. Smith, 786 So. 2d 630, 631 (Fla. 5th DCA 2001) (concluding that at least four incidents of harassment are required before an injunction for repeat violence may be entered). Because Kling failed to allege and prove two separate incidents of stalking, I agree that the Fina…
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Poindexter v. Springer, 898 So. 2d 204 (Fla. 2d DCA 2005)…e trial court entered the permanent injunction against repeat violence. . At least one court has concluded that at . least four acts of harassment are required to support an injunction against repeat violence based on stalking. See Dudley v. Smith, 786 So. 2d 630, 631 (Fla. 5th DCA 2001).…
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