RAYMOND WILLIAM KARZ, PETITIONER,
v.
BEN F. OVERTON, CIRCUIT JUDGE, AS CRIMINAL ADMINISTRATOR OF THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE SIXTH JUDICIAL CIRCUIT IN AND FOR PINELLAS COUNTY, FLORIDA, RESPONDENT

Fla. 2d DCA | 1971-05-14
No. 71-339
LILES, J., concurs., PIERCE, C. J., concurs in conclusion.
249 So. 2d 763 Florida District Court of Appeal, Second District (1971) Positive Treatment
Cited by 4 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

Mandamus does not lie to compel a preliminary hearing for a defendant held in custody for less than thirty days after being charged by information.


Headnotes

[1] Mandamus does not lie to compel a preliminary hearing for a defendant charged by information who has been in custody for less than thirty days, as Florida Statutes § 907.…

[2] The requirement to take an arrested person before a committing magistrate without unnecessary delay does not apply to those arrested on a capias issued upon the filing of…

Previewing 2 of 5 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

Karz, charged by information and held in custody for less than thirty days, sought mandamus to compel a preliminary hearing. Florida Statutes § 907.04…

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
MANN, Judge.

MANN, Judge.

The dictum of a distinguished jurist, Judge Reed, of the Fourth District Court of Appeal,1 prompted Karz to seek mandamus to compel the trial judge to grant a preliminary hearing. Florida Statutes, § 907.045 (1970), F.S.A.2 provides a mandatory preliminary hearing for those charged by indictment or information only after the defendant has been held in custody thirty days. Karz was charged by information and has been in custody less than thirty days. Hence mandamus does not lie. In Shailer, a trial judge had exercised his authority to grant a preliminary hearing for cause thought sufficient. Our *764sister court properly held there that prohibition, which asserts the trial court’s lack of power to do something in the same way that mandamus asserts his powerlcssness to refuse to do some required act, did not lie. In short, the provision for mandatory preliminary hearing after thirty days’ incarceration does not forbid discretionary allowance of a hearing prior to that time.

We note with approval our Supreme Court’s opinion in State ex rel. Carty v. Purdy, 1970, 240 So.2d 480, adopting Mr. Justice Drew’s dissent in Dawson v. State, Fla. 1962, 139 So.2d 408. We share the view that no American citizen should remain long in custody without judicial review of the cause which the state has to confine him. But we think that the requirement in Fla.Stat. § 901.06, F.S.A., that one arrested by virtue of a warrant be taken without unnecessary delay before a committing magistrate does not apply to those arrested on a capias issued upon filing of an indictment or information. There is no case specifically holding that it does. That it does not seems tacitly suggested in several cases.3 It is the settled doctrine in the federal courts that there is no necessity for a preliminary hearing where an indictment has been found.4 The federal constitution forbids filing of an information on serious charges without indictment unless waived by the defendant.5 Florida prosecutors have vastly more power to initiate criminal charges without the intervention of either a committing magistrate or grand jury.6 Like all power, theirs is subject to abuse. We certainly agree with out sister court7 that prohibition does not lie to forbid the allowance of a preliminary hearing to one charged in an information. Instances are easily imaginable in which a preliminary hearing should be granted to one dubiously charged with crime on the information of a prosecutor. As a matter of policy, there is good reason to consider whether preliminary hearing should be granted, as a matter of right, to one jailed under an information for far less than thirty days. But we are neither the Supreme Court nor the Legislature. We think Fla.Stat. § 907.045 (1970) requires denial of mandamus in this case.

Designed to afford prompt judicial determination of probable cause for detainment, the preliminary hearing has understandably been used by defense counsel as a tactic for discovering the state’s case. Liberalized discovery procedures under the new criminal rules, employed in this case, provide defendant’s counsel with knowledge the preliminary hearing might otherwise disclose, and in the usual case should do it more effectively. Perhaps there should be some provision for preliminary hearing where the capias is issued on information, but we must patiently allow innovation to come from the Supreme Court or the Legislature. As interpreters, we must hold that our law differentiates be*765tween the rights of those merely arrested, with or without a warrant, on the one hand, and those indicted or informed against, on the other.8

As the law now stands, mandamus will not lie to compel, nor prohibition to forbid, the granting of a preliminary hearing to one charged under an information who has been held in custody less than thirty days.

Mandamus denied.

LILES, J., concurs.

PIERCE, C. J., concurs in conclusion.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Cited By

  • …ently used for discovery purposes, but the liberal discovery provisions found in the Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure allow defendant to accomplish this purpose. See Harrison v. Wainwright, 243 So. 2d 427 (Fla.App.1st, 1971). In Karz v. Overton, 249 So. 2d 763 (Fla.App.2d, 1971), the Court held that mandamus would not lie to compel the trial judge to grant a preliminary hearing to a defendant who was charged by information and had been in custody for less than thirty days. We approve the reasoning in that…
  • Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U.S. 103 (U.S. 1975)
    …lenged in this case. See infra, at 117 n. 19. This statute may have been construed to make the hearing permissive instead of mandatory. See Evans v. State, 197 So. 2d 323 (Fla. App. 1967); Fla. Op. Atty. Gen. 067-29 (1967). But cf. Karz v. Overton, 249 So. 2d 763 (Fla. App. 1971). It may also have been superseded by the subsequent amendments to the Rules of Criminal Procedure. In re Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, 272 So. 2d 65 (1972). The Florida rules do not suggest that the issue of probable cause c…

Authorities Cited (11 total)

View all 11 cited authorities →

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw