WILLIE C. HENRY, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE

Fla. 4th DCA | 1978-03-14
No. 77-1067
CROSS and DAUKSCH, JJ., concur.
356 So. 2d 61 Florida District Court of Appeal, Fourth District (1978) Caution
Cited by 16 cases


Opinion of the Court
ALDERMAN, Chief Judge.

ALDERMAN, Chief Judge.

The defendant appeals his convictions for sexual battery and false imprisonment. Three points have been raised, but only one, involving the admission of “Williams Rule” evidence, has merit and requires reversal.

The defendant was charged with abducting a young woman as she was leaving a nightclub known as the Embassy Club, and then raping her. Over defendant’s objection, another young woman was allowed to testify that he had raped her about three weeks after the offenses for which he was being tried. We hold that the trial court erred in allowing the testimony of the second rape victim. Evidence of collateral crimes may not be admitted if the effect is merely to show bad character or a propensity to commit crime on the part of the defendant. Williams v. State, 110 So. 2d 654 (Fla.1959). In this case there is no more than a very general similarity between the two crimes. Two women were, on different occasions, raped by a man with whom they made contact at or near the Embassy Club. There the similarity between the two incidents virtually ends.

REVERSED and REMANDED for a new trial.

CROSS and DAUKSCH, JJ., concur.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Cited By

  • Sneed v. State, 397 So. 2d 931 (Fla. 5th DCA 1981)
    …it would otherwise have been allowed to. Leonard v. State, 386 So. 2d 51 (Fla.2d DCA 1980). Cross examination regarding an irrelevant criminal incident constitutes reversible error.. Pack v. State, 360 So. 2d 1307 (Fla.2d DCA 1978); Henry v. State, 356 So. 2d 61 (Fla. 4th DCA 1978). The nature of the crime for which appellant was previously convicted is not relevant to any issue in this case. Since appellant’s credibility was a critical factor for the jury’s consideration, we have no way of knowing how the…
  • Adams v. Adams, 385 So. 2d 688 (Fla. 3d DCA 1980)
    …So. 2d 673 (Fla. 2d DCA 1967). When a change of custody is sought, a trial court has considerably less discretion, and such a change must be supported by substantial evidence. Bennett v. Bennett, supra; Bel-ford v. Belford, supra; Tash v. Oesterle, 356 So. 2d 61 (Fla. 3d DCA 1978); Frye v. Frye, 205 So. 2d 310 (Fla. 4th DCA 1967). Neither the husband’s remarriage nor his increased material wealth constitutes a change in circumstances sufficient to justify modification of custody. Anderson v. Anderson, 309 S…
  • MacKlin v. State, 395 So. 2d 1219 (Fla. 3d DCA 1981)
    …sufficient similarity between the collateral crime of February 12, 1977, and the crimes for which Macklin was on trial, but see Bradley v. State, 378 So. 2d 870 (Fla. 2d DCA 1979); Davis v. State, 376 So. 2d 1198 (Fla. 2d DCA 1979); Henry v. State, 356 So. 2d 61 (Fla. 4th DCA 1978), we consider Macklin's involvement in the criminal episode of February 12, 1977, to have become a feature not an incident of his trial in violation of the caveat in Williams v. State, 117 So. 2d 473 (Fla.1960)5; accord, Ashley v.…
    1 / 2

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