STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT,
v.
GARY WALTER HENDERSON ET AL., APPELLEES
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Florida appellate court reversed suppression order, holding that leaving an unsigned and undated copy of a properly issued and read search warrant with the defendant constitutes only ministerial error insufficient to suppress evidence.
Leaving an unsigned and undated duplicate of an original search warrant with the defendant is ministerial error that does not warrant suppression of evidence when the original warrant was properly signed and read to the defendant before the search.
[1] Leaving an unsigned and undated copy of a properly issued and read search warrant with a defendant constitutes ministerial error insufficient to warrant suppression of ev…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“If an original search warrant was duly signed by the proper officer and was read to the defendant in toto before the search was commenced, the act of leaving an unsigned and undated duplicate of the original search warrant is solely an ad-ministerial act and not such error as would be prejudicial.”
Court's statement of the legal standard for evaluating the defect in the warrant copy left with defendant.
Police conducted a search of the defendant's premises and left an unsigned and undated copy of the original search warrant with the defendant, rather …
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This is an interlocutory appeal from an order of the trial court granting a motion to suppress. The question before this court is:
“whether the police’s error in failing to give appellees an exact duplicate of the original search warrant constitutes such error as to necessitate the suppression of the evidence.”
We reverse.
This opinion is narrowly limited to whether or not an unsigned and undated copy of the original search warrant left with the defendant necessitates the suppression of the evidence.
If an original search warrant was duly signed by the proper officer and was read to the defendant in toto before the search was commenced, the act of leaving an unsigned and undated duplicate of the original search warrant is solely an ad-ministerial act and not such error as would be prejudicial. State v. Featherstone, Fla.App.1971, 246 So.2d 597. Accordingly, the ruling of the trial court suppressing the evidence is reversed and this cause is hereby remanded to the trial court. This decision assumes that an original search warrant was duly issued by the proper officer pursuant to Officer Hobson’s testimony and that said warrant was read to the defendant in toto. The production of the original warrant and the reading of same rests upon and is the burden of the State to prove within the law upon the trial of this cause.
Absent the production of the original warrant at the trial, the trial court should suppress the evidence. See also United States v. Gross, D.C.S.D.N.Y.1956, 137 F.Supp. 244, and Evans v. United States, 6 Cir.1957, 242 F.2d 534.
Reversed and remanded.
WALDEN and OWEN, JJ., concur.
Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus
Citator
Authorities Cited
- Add Evans v. United States, 242 F.2d 534 (6th Cir. 1957)
- State v. Featherstone, 246 So. 2d 597 (Fla. 3d DCA 1971)