CECIL ANTHONY DORTCH, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Appellant Dortch was convicted of possession of cocaine with intent to sell or deliver following a jury trial. The appellate court reversed the conviction, finding the evidence legally insufficient to establish the essential element of intent to sell, and remanded for entry of judgment on the lesser offense of simple possession.
The evidence was legally insufficient to establish intent to sell. The conviction for possession of cocaine with intent to sell or deliver was reversed, and the case was remanded with directions for the trial court to enter judgment for the lesser offense of simple possession of cocaine and resentence appellant accordingly.
[1] Evidence is legally insufficient to establish intent to sell cocaine when it does not go beyond mere suspicion and is not inconsistent with personal use.
[2] A motion for judgment of acquittal should be granted when the evidence, viewed in a light most favorable to the state, is legally insufficient to establish an essential e…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“the evidence (viewed in a light most favorable to the state) was legally insufficient to establish the essential element of intent to sell”
Establishes the standard of review and the court's conclusion that the evidence failed to meet the legal sufficiency threshold for the intent-to-sell element.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAppellant was charged with and convicted by jury of possession of cocaine with intent to sell or deliver. The trial court denied appellant's motions f…
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PER CURIAM.
In this direct criminal appeal, appellant seeks review of his conviction, following a jury trial, for possession of cocaine with intent to sell or deliver. We agree with appellant that the trial court should have granted his motion for judgment of acquittal, made at the close of the state’s case and renewed at the close of all the evidence, because the evidence (viewed in a light most favorable to the state) was legally insufficient to establish the essential element of intent to sell. See, e.g., Jackson v. State, 818 So. 2d 539 (Fla. 2d DCA 2002) (reversing the defendant’s conviction for possession of cocaine with intent to sell based on the defendant’s possession of five grams of cocaine packaged in six ring baggies contained within a larger baggie where the quantity, even as packaged, was not so large as to imply intent to sell absent additional evidence); McCullough v. State, 541 So. 2d 720 (Fla. 4th DCA 1989) (holding that the defendant’s possession of a film cannister containing 15 rocks of cocaine weighing 6.15 grams merely raised a suspicion of intent to sell and was not inconsistent with the defendant’s reasonable hypothesis of personal use); Williams v. State, 573 So. 2d 124 (Fla. 4th DCA 1991) (holding that the defendant’s possession of $521 was insufficient to show that the defendant had the intent to sell cocaine because it raised no more than suspicion to sell). We conclude that appellant’s remaining arguments are without merit.
We reverse appellant’s conviction for possession of cocaine with intent to sell or deliver, and remand with directions that the trial court enter judgment for the lesser offense of possession of cocaine and resentence appellant accordingly. See § 924.34, Fla. Stat. (2000). In all other respects, we affirm.
AFFIRMED IN PART; REVERSED IN PART; and REMANDED, with directions.
WEBSTER, PADOVANO and HAWKES, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Jackson v. State, 818 So. 2d 539 (Fla. 2d DCA 2002)
- Worth Moses McCULLOUGH v. State, 541 So. 2d 720 (Fla. 4th DCA 1989)
- Williams v. State, 573 So. 2d 124 (Fla. 4th DCA 1991)