Cameron v. State

804 So. 2d 338, 2001 WL 803716
District Court of Appeal of Florida·Decided July 18, 2001·No. 4D99-4169·Published·Cited by 10 cases

Opinion

804 So.2d 338 (2001)

Stanley CAMERON, Appellant,
v.
STATE of Florida, Appellee.

No. 4D99-4169.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.

July 18, 2001.
Rehearing Denied December 10, 2001.

*340 Kevin J. Kulick of Kevin J. Kulick, P.A., Fort Lauderdale, for appellant.

Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, Tallahassee, and Steven R. Parrish, Assistant Attorney General, Fort Lauderdale, for appellee.

FARMER, J.

While driving his boat at a high rate of speed defendant collided with another boat and killed six people. After the accident, defendant was rushed to the hospital where, the odor of alcohol from his breath being apparent to hospital personnel, police asked the attending nurse to draw a blood sample and test it for alcohol. The nurse responded that she would provide a blood sample but could not get to it until later as defendant was going into emergency surgery. The following day, a prosecutor obtained a court order for release of the promised blood sample pursuant to the implied consent statutes,[1] and the hospital turned over to police a sample of defendant's blood. To be sure, the actual sample had been drawn upon defendant's arrival at the hospital, i.e. before the police request. Later testing of the sample showed that defendant's blood alcohol level was .21 at approximately 45 minutes after the collision.

Defendant was charged with six counts of manslaughter while operating the vessel (boating) under the influence of alcohol (BUI), six counts of manslaughter with an unlawful blood alcohol level (UBAL), one count of BUI injury, one count of UBAL injury, one count of BUI property damage, and one count of UBAL property damage. The jury found defendant guilty on all *341 counts.[2]

Before trial, defendant filed a motion to suppress his blood alcohol level test results. He argued that because the sample was not actually drawn directly in response to a police request the implied consent law did not apply. He further argued that because the state was then seeking nothing less than part of his hospital medical records the state was required first to give notice to him of the request under State v. Rutherford, 707 So.2d 1129 (Fla. 4th DCA 1997). The trial court denied the motion, holding that the sample was obtainable under the implied consent law and without notice to defendant. We agree.

In Rutherford, the prosecutor had sought a patient's medical file in addition to the sample of blood drawn pursuant to an officer's request. It served an investigative subpoena duces tecum on the hospital but did not give notice to the defendant. We affirmed the suppression of the medical records because of noncompliance with section 395.3025(4), which creates a general right of privacy in a patient's hospital records. We reasoned that under section 395.3025(4):

"a patient's medical records [are] protected under Florida's right to privacy.... Where a right to privacy attaches, the state may vindicate an encroachment on that right if it demonstrates that the intrusion is justified by a compelling state interest and that the state has used the least intrusive means to accomplish its goal."

707 So.2d at 1131. To acquire such records, the prosecutor should have provided notice to the defendant of the subpoena and, if defendant objected, obtained court permission upon a showing that the records were relevant to a criminal investigation. See also Hunter v. State, 639 So.2d 72, 74 (Fla. 5th DCA), review denied, 649 So.2d 233 (Fla.1994).

This case is distinguishable. Here rather than a patient's hospital records, the police simply asked the hospital staff for a vessel operator's blood sample, as they are clearly allowed to do under section 327.352(3).[3] That statute provides that:

"Notwithstanding any provision of law pertaining to the confidentiality of hospital records or other medical records, information relating to the alcoholic content of the blood or breath or the presence of chemical substances or controlled substances in the blood obtained pursuant to this section shall be released to a court, prosecuting attorney, defense attorney, or law enforcement officer in connection with an alleged violation of s. 327.35 upon request for such information." [e.s.]

Section 395.3025(4), the statute at issue in Rutherford, is clearly one of the other provisions of law "pertaining to the confidentiality of hospital records" mentioned in the introductory clause in section 327.352(3).

In contrast to Rutherford's section 395.3025(4), the boating consent statute, section 327.352(3), allows the police and prosecutor to have blood alcohol samples merely upon the asking, so long as the *342 request is "in connection with an alleged violation of s. 327.35." No notice to a defendant of a police request under section 327.352(3) was required because he had already consented to it, and the police clearly had probable cause at the time of the request to arrest and charge defendant with a section 327.35 violation. Moreover, the police did not also seek defendant's other medical records, as the prosecutor did in Rutherford. While the hospital personnel in this case gave blood from a sample actually drawn upon defendant's arrival at the hospital and before the police request was made, it is still a sample to which defendant is deemed to have consented by operating his vessel. See § 327.352(1)(e)1, Fla. Stat. (1997) ("However, the failure of a law enforcement officer to request the withdrawal [e.s.] of blood shall not affect the admissibility of a test of blood withdrawn for medical purposes."). Hence the blood test results were properly admitted and support the UBAL convictions.

As the state concedes, however, we must nevertheless reverse and remand for a new trial on all of the BUI counts. As regards these charges only, it was error for the trial court to instruct the jury on the statutory presumptions of impairment.[4] Because the state did not opt to adduce blood alcohol test results complying with the testing procedures set forth in section 327.354(3), that statutory presumption was not available.[5] Where the state elects to adduce blood sample test results drawn by hospital personnel and given to police under section 327.352(3) and which do not comply with 327.354(3), a trial court may not instruct the jury as to the statutory presumptions of impairment. State v. Miles, 775 So.2d 950, 956-57 (Fla.2000); Robertson v. State, 604 So.2d 783, 792 (Fla. 1992). It is true that Miles and Robertson arose under the motor vehicle statutes and not the boating statutes, but the two statutory schemes are identical and the result under the latter should be no different than the result under former.

Nor can we find beyond a reasonable doubt that this error had no affect on the jury's verdict. See Goodwin v. State, 751 So.2d 537, 541 (Fla.1999) (explaining that to find an error harmless it must be beyond a reasonable doubt that the error could not have affected the jury). All of the BUI counts required the jury to find that defendant was operating the boat under the influence of alcohol. The erroneous jury instruction told the jury to presume that very fact. Clearly it was prejudicial. *343 On these counts only, therefore, defendant is entitled to a new trial.

We do find that th

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