THE STATE OF FLORIDA
v.
ALEXANDER VINOKUROV
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The FWC had authority to conduct a brief stop of the defendant's motorboat to inspect licenses, registration, and safety equipment, and evidence discovered in plain view during that lawful encounter was admissible.
[1] A law enforcement officer's subjective intentions are irrelevant to Fourth Amendment probable cause analysis; the legality of a stop depends on objective facts and circum…
[2] The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has statutory authority to conduct brief, limited stops of motorboats to inspect fishing licenses, registration cert…
Previewing 2 of 3 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“In sum we find that the state's interest in random stopping and brief detention of motorboats for the limited purpose of checking fishing permits, registration certificates and safety equipment outweighs a person's interest in being completely free from such limited intrusion.”
State v. Casal, 410 So. 2d 152, 155 (Fla. 1982), cited for the proposition that motorboat spot checks are not unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.
The FWC stopped a motorboat operated by Alexander Vinokurov to inspect licenses, registration, and safety equipment. During the encounter, another occ…
The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.
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Third District Court of Appeal State of Florida
Opinion filed August 28, 2024. Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.
________________
No. 3D23-1930 Lower Tribunal No. 22-2345-A-K ________________
The State of Florida, Appellant,
vs.
Alexander Vinokurov, Appellee.
An Appeal from the County Court for Monroe County, Albert L. Kelley, Judge.
Ashley Moody, Attorney General, and Kayla Heather McNab, Assistant Attorney General, for appellant.
The Law Office of Robert David Malove, P.A., Robert David Malove, and Hani Demetrious (Fort Lauderdale), for appellee.
Before LINDSEY, MILLER and GOODEN, JJ.
PER CURIAM.
2
This is an appeal by the State of an order suppressing evidence obtained by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (“FWC”). We reverse the trial court’s order. See Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806, 813 (1996) (“Subjective intentions play no role in ordinary, probablecause Fourth Amendment analysis.”). The FWC had authority to stop the boat to inspect licenses, registration, and safety resource equipment. State v. Casal, 410 So. 2d 152, 155 (Fla. 1982) (“In sum we find that the state’s interest in random stopping and brief detention of motorboats for the limited purpose of checking fishing permits, registration certificates and safety equipment outweighs a person’s interest in being completely free from such limited intrusion. In light of the absence of less restrictive alternatives which would accomplish the state’s goals, spot checks of motorboats are not unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.”); State v. Starkey, 605 So. 2d 963, 965 (Fla. 1st DCA 1992) (“A person’s expectation of privacy in a motorboat is less than the same expectation of privacy in an automobile.”); § 328.48(4), Fla. Stat. During this encounter, another occupant of the boat voluntarily opened the boat’s cooler without a request by the FWC officer and the illegal catch was in plain view. Cf. Miranda v. State, 354 So. 2d 411, 414 (Fla. 3d DCA 1978).
Reversed and remanded for further proceedings.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Miranda v. State, 354 So. 2d 411 (Fla. 3d DCA 1978)
- State v. Constantino Casal and Omar Garcia, 410 So. 2d 152 (Fla. 1982)