STATE OF FLORIDA, ON THE RELATION OF AUTLEY CARTY, BY HIS MOTHER, EUDEAN CARTY, ON HIS OWN BEHALF AND ON BEHALF OF ALL OTHERS SIMILARLY SITUATED, PETITIONER,
v.
E. WILSON PURDY, AS SHERIFF AND DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC SAFETY OF METROPOLITAN DADE COUNTY, FLORIDA, HIS AGENTS, SERVANTS AND EMPLOYEES, RESPONDENT

Fla. | 1970-10-07
No. 40211
ERVIN, C. J., and ROBERTS, DREW, ADKINS and BOYD, JJ., concur.
240 So. 2d 480 Florida Supreme Court (1970) Negative Treatment
Cited by 20 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.


Holding

The court denied the petition for a writ of mandamus because the petitioner had already been released and his charges dismissed, rendering the request moot.


Headnotes

[1] A petition for writ of mandamus will be denied when the underlying issue has become moot due to the petitioner no longer being in custody and the charges having been dism…

[2] Law enforcement officers are required to present arrested individuals before a magistrate without unnecessary delay.

Previewing 2 of 4 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

Facts & Procedural History

A minor, arrested and released on bond, sought to compel the sheriff to comply with statutes requiring prompt presentment before a magistrate. By the …

The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.


Opinion of the Court
PER CURIAM.

PER CURIAM.

Petitioner here seeks to compel respondent sheriff, his agents, servants and employees to comply with the mandatory re•quirements of Fla.Stat. §§ 901.06 and 901.-23 (1969), F.S.A. requiring that persons arrested with or without a warrant be presented before a magistrate “without unnecessary delay” for a hearing as authorized by Fla.Stat. Ch. 902, F.S.A. Petitioner, a minor, through his mother purports to represent a class composed of all persons arrested by respondent Purdy and his agents who, upon arrest, are not being presented to a magistrate in violation of the above statutes.

The pleadings establish that the petitioner was arrested August 20, 1970, taken into custody, booked into the Dade County jail, and released into his mother’s custody at a special bond hearing on the following day. On the day of filing for issuance of an alternative writ of mandamus, he had not yet been presented to a magistrate pursuant to the aforementioned statutes.

On the 21st day of September, 1970, the day of the oral presentation of this cause, the petitioner through his attorney filed here an affidavit advising the Court that a preliminary hearing had been accorded petitioner September 17, at which time the charges against petitioner were dismissed and that he was no longer in custody. Under such circumstances, there is no purpose to be served by this Court ordering the issuance of the alternative writ. The application therefor is hereby denied.

*481This case again brings to this Court’s attention the failure of the law enforcement officers of this state to observe the requirements of these statutes which have been part of the statutory law of this state for many decades. The sanctions we have heretofore imposed and the pointed criticism that we — and the Attorney General of Florida — have made of law enforcement officers for failure to comply with these statutes have obviously been ineffective. Therefore we now approve and adopt as the views of this Court the following excerpt from the dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Drew in Dawson v. State, 139 So.2d 408, 422 (Fla.1962):

“The right of a free man to be presented to a sworn judicial officer promptly upon his arrest is not a technical or trivial right. Such rights are the bedrock of our liberties and have grown out of mankind’s experiences over hundreds of years. These rights are so fundamental in our concept of justice that they are embodied in the written laws of every state in this nation. I cannot accept the proposition that the lawmakers, in enacting statutes such as these, ever intended that the positive mandate of immediate presentment could be ignored by the public officials if the evidence showed the ultimate product to be otherwise voluntary. Practical men know that the question of whether a confession is freely and voluntarily made is determined by weighing the evidence produced by those who obtained the confession and are responsible for it. Every person who can read is familiar with the methods used in some areas of the world to obtain confessions. The methods there used have become commonly known as brainwashing. We have not applied that definition in this country but the evidence revealed by the record in this case makes it rather difficult to distinguish what has happened here from what often hap-
pens there. The mandates of the written law are as clear as the noon day sun and it certainly is imposing no hardship upon the sworn officers of the law to require their adherence to it.13 Moreover, prompt adherence to the requirements of the law in every instance would add immensely to the validity of a confession thereafter obtained and would remove from the minds of the judge and jury many of the doubts and uncertainties so often present in these cases.

In the specially concurring opinion of Mr. Justice Thornal in Dawson v. State, supra, the McNabb-Mallory Rule [See McNabb v. United States, 318 U.S. 332, 63 S.Ct. 608, 87 L.Ed. 819 (1942)] was discussed, and he pointed out that such rule was not applicable to confessions obtained by Florida law enforcement officers. We deem it appropriate — and timely — to observe here that we can no longer countenance a continual and, it seems, deliberate course of conduct designed to frustrate not only the clear legislative mandate but the decisions of this Court in this area. We could, of course, adopt the McNabb-Mallory Rule, or even expand it. Such action may he compelled by a continuance of this conduct. If it is and if the courts are then required to order the release of obviously guilty criminals, the responsibility will then be on those who have failed in their duty to enforce the laws as written by the Legislature and interpreted by this Court.

We further point out that violation of the law or misconduct in office may well warrant drastic action by the Chief Magistrate of this State.

ERVIN, C. J., and ROBERTS, DREW, ADKINS and BOYD, JJ., concur.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Cited By

  • Beasley v. State, 774 So. 2d 649 (Fla. 2000)
    …ces surrounding the unfortunate incident indicate that there was sufficient time for appellant to have formed the intent to kill [the victim] and that he did form and carryout this design”), criticized on other grounds, State ex rel. Carty v. Purdy, 240 So. 2d 480, 481 (Fla.1970). In our view, record evidence clearly supports the verdict based upon premeditated murder. Beasley also argues that the evidence is insufficient to support his conviction for first-degree murder based upon felony murder (robbery). S…
  • Oliver v. State, 250 So. 2d 888 (Fla. 1971)
    …itiation of the interrogations. This Court has intimated that a failure to bring a defendant before a magistrate would likely result in strong action by this Court. Milton v. Cochran, 147 So. 2d 137, at 141 (Fla.1962); State ex rel. Carty v. Purdy, 240 So. 2d 480, at 481 (Fla.1970), [in which the views of the late Mr. Justice Thornal as given in Dawson v. State, 139 So. 2d 408, at 422 (Fla.1962), were adopted]. We find that the totality of circumstances in these cases manifestly requires nullification of the…
  • Roosevelt Stride "Teddy" Jacobs v. State, 248 So. 2d 515 (Fla. 1st DCA 1971)
    …ult in the McNabb rule, or some version thereof, being adopted in this! State or being imposed on our state courts by decisions of federal courts. Recent history promises this as an event reasonably to be expected.” In State ex rel. Carty v. Purdy, 240 So. 2d 480, 481 (Fla.1970), the Supreme Court of Florida adopted and approved as the views of that Court the following excerpt from a dissenting opinion of Mr. Justice Drew in Dawson v. State, 139 So. 2d 408, 422 (Fla.1962): “ ‘The right of a free man to be p…

Previewing 3 of 10 citing cases — full citator treatment, depth of discussion, and citing context are member features.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Authorities Cited

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw