SYLVESTER NATHANIEL SMITH
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA
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Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800(a) is not the proper vehicle for raising claims of error under Apprendi v. New Jersey and its progeny.
[1] Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800(a) is not the proper procedural vehicle for raising claims of sentencing error under Apprendi v. …
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceSylvester Nathaniel Smith appealed from a circuit court decision in a criminal case from Polk County. The appeal involved a challenge to sentencing un…
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SIXTH DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
STATE OF FLORIDA
Case No. 6D2024-2639 Lower Tribunal No. 2014-CF-000480
SYLVESTER NATHANIEL SMITH, Appellant,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, Appellee.
Appeal pursuant to Fla. R. App. P. 9.141(b)(2) from the Circuit Court for Polk County. Jalal A. Harb, Judge.
September 18, 2026
PER CURIAM.
AFFIRMED. See, e.g., Maye v. State, 51 Fla. L. Weekly S116, 2026 WL 1346031, at *1 (Fla. May 14, 2026) (holding that Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800(a) “is not the proper vehicle for raising a claim of error under Apprendi [v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466 (2000),] and its progeny"); Wainwright v. State, 411 So. 3d 392, 399 & n.13 (Fla.) ("[E]ven if Erlinger [v. United States, 602 U.S. 821 (2024),] constitutes a change of law, it does not apply retroactively. . . . Although we conduct a state-law analysis, we conclude that Erlinger also does not apply retroactively based on federal law."), cert. denied sub nom., Wainwright v. Florida, 145 S. Ct. 2789 (2025).
MIZE, KAMOUTSAS and PRATT, JJ., concur.
Sylvester Nathaniel Smith, Arcadia, pro se.
James Uthmeier, Attorney General, Tallahassee, and Marilyn Frances Muir, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Tampa, for Appellee.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Apprendi v. New Jersey, 530 U.S. 466 (U.S. 2000)
- Erlinger v. United States, 602 U.S. 821 (U.S. 2024)
- Wainwright v. State, 411 So. 3d 392 (Fla. 2025)