Corn v. State

332 So. 2d 4
CourtSupreme Court of Florida
DecidedMarch 19, 1976
Docket46922
StatusPublished
Cited by34 cases

This text of 332 So. 2d 4 (Corn v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Corn v. State, 332 So. 2d 4 (Fla. 1976).

Opinion

332 So.2d 4 (1976)

John W. CORN, Appellant,
v.
STATE of Florida, Appellee.

No. 46922.

Supreme Court of Florida.

March 19, 1976.
Rehearing Denied June 4, 1976.

*5 Herman W. Goldner of Goldner, Marger & Davis, St. Petersburg, for appellant.

Robert L. Shevin, Atty. Gen., and Richard G. Pippinger, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.

ROBERTS, Justice.

This cause is before us to review the decision of the County Court in and for Pinellas County which upholds the constitutionality of Section 821.01, Florida Statutes. We have jurisdiction pursuant to Article V, Section 3(b)(1), Constitution of Florida.

Appellant was informed against for violation of Section 821.01, Florida Statutes, providing:

"Trespass after warning. — Whoever willfully:
(1) Enters into the enclosed land and premises of another or into any private residence, house, or building of another, having been forbidden so to enter by the lawful occupant;
(2) Not having previously been forbidden, is warned to depart therefrom and refuses to do so;
(3) Having departed, reenters without the previous consent of the lawful occupant; or
(4) Having departed, remains about in the vicinity, using profane or indecent language shall upon conviction be punished as provided in § 821.38."

in that on September 13, 1974, he willfully entered onto the premises of The Gateway *6 Mall, after having previously been forbidden to enter and after having been warned to depart. He pled nolo contendere and the trial court adjudicated him guilty of violating Section 821.01(3), Florida Statutes, and fined him $100.00 plus $27.00 court costs. In his order, the trial court determined that Section 821.01, Florida Statutes, is constitutional, that the State of Florida has established a prima facie case, and ordered that since the defendant has challenged the constitutionality of Section 821.01, Florida Statutes, the question of constitutionality is preserved for defendant's appeal.

The record before us clearly supports the trial judge's conclusion that the State has made a prima facie case for violation of Section 821.01, Florida Statutes, by the defendant. His activity is clearly within the purview of that conduct sought to be prohibited by the statute. He carried on in the Mall in a boisterous manner and after having been asked to leave and having been instructed that if he returned he would be prosecuted for trespassing, he did shortly thereafter return and told the officers to go ahead and arrest him because he was trespassing. His attack on the constitutionality of the statute is limited to an argument of unconstitutionality on the sole basis of violation of his right to equal protection under the law. However, in the same argument, he concedes that he was not discriminated against by being asked to leave the Mall or by subsequently being arrested for trespass, because of race, color, religion or national origin or on the basis of any arbitrary classification. In fact, he does not show how his right to equal protection is violated by the statute. The act in question does not apply arbitrarily and discriminatorily to appellant. Lasky v. State Farm Insurance Company, 296 So.2d 9 (Fla. 1974); Erwin v. State, 262 So.2d 677 (Fla. 1972); Jackson v. Consolidated Government of City of Jacksonville, 225 So.2d 497 (Fla. 1969); McKee v. State, 203 So.2d 321 (Fla. 1967); Finlayson v. Conner, 167 So.2d 569 (Fla. 1964); Insurance Co. of Texas v. Rainey, 86 So.2d 447 (Fla. 1956); and DiLustro v. Penton, 106 Fla. 198, 142 So. 898 (1932). He contends that the questioned statute appropriately applies to family residences and other buildings where the public is not invited but should not apply to public or quasi-public places because to the extent that a property owner, for his own financial advantage, opens his premises to the public, the more his ownership rights become limited, and urges that a strict construction of the statute and application of ejusdem generis require that the Mall not be included within the meaning of the statutory language.

Review of his brief reveals no convincing argument on his behalf that his freedom of speech rights were violated. In Adderley v. Florida, 385 U.S. 39, 87 S.Ct. 242, 17 L.Ed.2d 149 (1966), the Supreme Court of the United States upheld the constitutionality of another portion of our trespass statute, Section 821.18, Florida Statutes (1968), and expressly stated:

"The State, no less than a private owner of property, has power to preserve the property under its control for the use to which it is lawfully dedicated. For this reason there is no merit to the petitioners' argument that they had a constitutional right to stay on the property, over the jail custodian's objections, because this `area chosen for the peaceful civil rights demonstration was not only "reasonable" but also particularly appropriate . .. .' Such an argument has as its major unarticulated premise the assumption that people who want to propagandize protests or views have a constitutional right to do so whenever and however and wherever they please. That concept of constitutional law was vigorously and forthrightly rejected in two of the cases petitioners rely on, Cox v. Louisiana, supra, [379 U.S. 536] at 554-555 [85 S.Ct. 453, at 464 and 480, 13 L.Ed.2d 471] and [379 U.S.] 563-564 [85 S.Ct. 476, 13 L.Ed.2d *7 487]. We reject it again. The United States Constitution does not forbid a State to control the use of its own property for its own lawful nondiscriminatory purpose."

All natural persons have the inalienable right to acquire, possess, and protect their property. Article I, Section 2, Constitution of Florida. It has long been recognized that the rights in property are basic civil rights. Lynch et al. v. Household Finance Corp., 405 U.S. 538, 92 S.Ct. 1113, 31 L.Ed.2d 424 (1972). The original of private property is founded in nature. 1 Blackstone 138. In Wilkinson v. Leland et al., 27 U.S. 627 at 657, 7 L.Ed. 542 (1828), the Supreme Court of the United States emphasized the importance of the right to private property as basic to the foundation of our democratic system of government in the following language:

"The fundamental maxims of a free government seem to require, that the rights of personal liberty and private property should be held sacred."

Cf. State v. City of Stuart, 97 Fla. 69, 120 So. 335 at 346-347 (1929). The right of property has been characterized as a sacred right, the protection of which is an important object of government. 16 Am.Jur.2d, Constitutional Law Section. Relative to the significance of this right, the Supreme Court of Texas in Spann v. City of Dallas, 111 Tex. 350, 235 S.W. 513 at 515 (1921), explicated:

"To secure their property was one of the great ends for which men entered into society. The right to acquire and own property, and to deal with it and use it as the owner chooses, so long as the use harms nobody, is a natural right. It does not owe its origin to constitutions. It existed before them.

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Bluebook (online)
332 So. 2d 4, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/corn-v-state-fla-1976.