CHARLES ANTHONY BROWN, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Charles Anthony Brown appealed from a probation violation order, arguing that the written order included a violation finding (condition 5) not made in the trial court's oral pronouncement. The appellate court affirmed, holding that because Brown failed to preserve the error by raising it in the trial court, the court lacked power to correct the discrepancy, and established precedent bars appellate correction of such patent errors in sentencing orders with no quantitative effect.
An appellate court is powerless to correct a patent error in a written sentencing or probation violation order that has no quantitative effect on a defendant's sentence or probation when the error has not been preserved by raising it in the trial court. The oral pronouncement controls over the written order, but relief requires that the defendant or his counsel bring the discrepancy to the trial court's attention.
[1] An appellate court cannot correct an error in a written sentencing order that has no quantitative effect on a defendant's sentence if the error was not preserved in the t…
[2] An appellate court is powerless to correct even a patent error in a written sentencing order that has no quantitative effect on a defendant’s sentence if the error is not…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“an appellate court is powerless to correct even a patent error in a written sentencing order that has no quantitative effect on a defendant's sentence”
Establishes the core holding that appellate courts cannot correct unpreserved errors in written orders lacking quantitative effect
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceCharles Brown was found to have violated his sex offender probation. The trial court orally ruled that Brown violated conditions 8, 7, and 16 of his p…
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Charles A. Brown appeals from an order finding that he violated his sex offender probation. As Mr. Brown correctly asserts, the trial court orally ruled that he violated conditions 8, 7 and 16 of this probation; however, the written order makes an additional finding that Mr. Brown violated condition 5. Had Mr. Brown, or more accurately, his attorney, informed the trial court of the error, either at sentencing or by filing a timely motion under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800(b), he would be entitled to relief as the oral pronouncement would control and the written order would have been corrected to conform to the oral ruling. However, Mr. Brown never raised this issue with the trial court, and the error is unpre-served.
Neither Mr. Brown nor the State discuss preservation of this issue in their respective briefs. This issue of law was settled more than a decade ago in Thomas v. State, 763 So.2d 316 (Fla.2000), which held that an appellate court is powerless to correct even a patent error in a written sentencing order that has no quantitative effect on a defendant’s sentence. We reiterated that holding in Parris v. State, 974 So.2d 415 (Fla. 5th DCA 2007). Notably, Mr. Brown’s counsel also represented Mr. Parris. In Parris, we admonished counsel for both parties to be more thorough in their research as both overlooked Thomas, reminding them of their responsibility to advise the court of controlling precedent. 974 So.2d at 415 n. 3. Despite that admonishment to the same attorney that represents Mr. Brown, we again find that controlling precedent, indeed the identical precedent, has not been cited to us. To say the least, this is disappointing and again calls into question the thoroughness of counsel’s research.
AFFIRMED.
ORFINGER, C.J., GRIFFIN and EVANDER, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Thomas v. State, 763 So. 2d 316 (Fla. 2000)
- Charles v. State, 763 So. 2d 316 (Fla. 2000)
- Parris v. State, 974 So. 2d 415 (Fla. 5th DCA 2007)