TONY KEARSE, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE

Fla. 5th DCA | 2003-11-14
No. 5D02-2973
ORFINGER and MONACO, JJ., concur.
858 So. 2d 1247 Florida District Court of Appeal, Fifth District (2003) Positive Treatment
Cited by 9 cases

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

Tony Kearse appeals his conviction and sentence for sale of cocaine, claiming his guilty plea was involuntary due to misleading information about sentencing. The court dismisses the appeal based on a procedural defect: Kearse filed his notice of appeal before filing his motion to withdraw his plea, divesting the trial court of jurisdiction to hear the withdrawal motion.


Holding

The court held that it lacks jurisdiction to hear the appeal because Kearse failed to properly preserve his right to challenge a dispositive issue before filing his notice of appeal. By filing the notice of appeal first, Kearse divested the trial court of jurisdiction to subsequently rule on his motion to withdraw the plea, and a guilty plea without an express reservation of the right to appeal a legally dispositive issue provides no right to direct appeal.


Headnotes

[1] A trial court loses jurisdiction to rule on a motion to withdraw a plea once a defendant files a notice of appeal.

[2] A defendant who pleads guilty without expressly reserving the right to appeal a legally dispositive issue generally may not appeal the judgment or sentence.

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Key Quotes

“The jurisdictional problem arises because, by filing his notice of appeal, Wilson divested the trial court of jurisdiction to enter any further rulings in the case, including a ruling on Wilson's subsequently filed motion to withdraw his plea.”

Establishes the core procedural rule that filing a notice of appeal strips the trial court of jurisdiction to rule on subsequently filed motions

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Facts & Procedural History

Kearse entered an open plea to the court for sale of cocaine and received a 30-year sentence as a habitual felony offender. After sentencing, Kearse t…

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Opinion of the Court
SAWAYA, C.J.

SAWAYA, C.J.

Tony Kearse appeals his judgment and sentence for the offense of sale of cocaine. As a result of his open plea to the court, Kearse received a sentence of thirty years in prison as a habitual felony offender. In his motion to withdraw his plea, Kearse claims that he was misled by the court as to the sentence he would receive in exchange for his plea. We are unable to address the merits of Kearse’s appeal because procedural infirmities require that we dismiss this appeal.

After sentencing, Kearse timely filed his notice of appeal. Thereafter, he filed a motion to withdraw his plea, which the trial court denied. The State argues that because Kearse filed the notice of appeal before he filed his motion to withdraw the plea, the trial court was without jurisdiction to decide the withdrawal motion. Since the only ground presented by Kearse to set aside his conviction and sentence is set forth in his motion to withdraw his plea, the State contends that this court should either dismiss this appeal or affirm the judgment of conviction and sentence.

The instant case does not involve the appeal of a prior dispositive order rendered by the trial court.1 Therefore, the grounds Kearse may assert in this appeal are limited. Fla. R.App. P. 9.140(b)(2)(A). The argument Kearse makes, that his conviction and sentence should be set aside because his plea was involuntary, is one that may only be asserted if it is preserved by a motion to withdraw the plea. Once Kearse filed his notice of appeal, the trial court did not have jurisdiction to decide Kearse’s subsequently filed motion to withdraw his plea. Wilson v. State, 814 So. 2d 1203, 1204 (Fla. 2d DCA 2002) (“The jurisdictional problem arises because, by filing his notice of appeal, Wilson divested the trial court of jurisdiction to enter any further rulings in the case, including a ruling on Wilson’s subsequently filed motion to withdraw his plea.”).

Because Kearse pled guilty and did not properly preserve his right to appeal a dispositive issue, and because the trial court did not have jurisdiction to hear his motion to withdraw his plea, this court does not have jurisdiction to hear Kearse’s appeal. §§ 924.051(4), .06(3), Fla. Stat. (2002); Wilson; Hampton v. State, 680 So. 2d 581 (Fla. 3d DCA 1996).2 We therefore dismiss this appeal without prejudice to Kearse to file an appropriate motion for postconviction relief or to file another appeal after the trial court properly rules on his pending motion to withdraw his plea.

APPEAL DISMISSED.

ORFINGER and MONACO, JJ., concur. . Section 924.051(4), Florida Statutes, provides that "[i]f a defendant pleads nolo con-tendere without expressly reserving the right to appeal a legally dispositive issue, or if a defendant pleads guilty without expressly reserving the right to appeal a legally disposi-tive issue, the defendant may not appeal the judgment or sentence." See also § 924.06(3), Fla. Stat. (2002) ("A defendant who pleads guilty with no express reservation of the right to appeal a legally dispositive issue, or a defendant who pleads nolo contendere with no express reservation of the right to appeal a legally dispositive issue, shall have no right to a direct appeal.”).

. Although we do not have jurisdiction to hear this appeal, we have jurisdiction to determine whether we have jurisdiction. See Griffin v. State, 760 So. 2d 205 (Fla. 2d DCA 2000).


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Citator

Cited By

  • Murphy v. State, 898 So. 2d 1031 (Fla. 5th DCA 2005)
    …reserving the right to appeal a legally dispositive issue” the defendant may not appeal the judgment). See also State v. T.G., 800 So. 2d 204 (Fla.2001) (failed to preserve); West v. State, 888 So. 2d 730 (Fla. 5th DCA 2004) (same); Kearse v. State, 858 So. 2d 1247 (Fla. 5th DCA 2003) (same); Binder v. State, 853 So. 2d 537 (Fla. 5th DCA 2003) (same); Jones v. State, 806 So. 2d 590 (Fla. 5th DCA 2002) (issue not dispositive). . A "knock and talk,” Morford explained, is a procedure used by police officers to i…
  • Smith v. State, 113 So. 3d 110 (Fla. 5th DCA 2013)
    …ng him a hearing. We find no error in the dismissal of Smith’s first motion to withdraw plea, filed on March 3, 2012, because the trial court lacked jurisdiction to entertain the motion during the pendency of his direct appeal.2 See Kearse v. State, 858 So. 2d 1247, 1248 (Fla. 5th DCA 2003) (once a notice of appeal is filed, the trial court does not have jurisdiction to decide a subsequently filed motion to withdraw plea). Because Smith’s second motion to withdraw plea, filed on March 29, 2012, was untimely, w…
  • Glover v. State, 908 So. 2d 484 (Fla. 5th DCA 2005)
    …PER CURIAM. DISMISSED. See Kearse v. State, 858 So. 2d 1247 (Fla. 5th DCA 2003). SHARP, W., GRIFFIN and PALMER, JJ., concur.…

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