Mayrelis Zamora v. City of Miami

• Court: District Court of Appeal of Florida
• Decided: March 27, 2024
• Docket: 2022-1336
• Status: Published

Opinion

Third District Court of Appeal State of Florida

Opinion filed March 27, 2024. Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.

________________

No. 3D22-1336 Lower Tribunal No. 16-18369 ________________

Mayrelis Zamora, et al., Appellants,

vs.

City of Miami, Appellee.

An Appeal from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Peter R. Lopez, Judge.

Wasson & Associates, Chartered, and Roy D. Wasson; Law Offices of Vincent Duffy, P.A., and Vincent Duffy (Deerfield Beach), for appellants.

Victoria Méndez, City Attorney, and Eric J. Eves, Senior Appellate Counsel, for appellee.

Before SCALES, MILLER and GORDO, JJ.

PER CURIAM. Affirmed. See Harder v. Edwards, 174 So. 3d 524, 530 (Fla. 4th DCA

2015) (“To state a cause of action for false imprisonment, the plaintiff must

establish four elements: ‘1) the unlawful detention and deprivation of liberty

of a person 2) against that person's will 3) without legal authority or ‘color of

authority’ and 4) which is unreasonable and unwarranted under the

circumstances.’” (quoting Mathis v. Coats, 24 So. 3d 1284, 1289 (Fla. 2nd

DCA 2010))); Fisher v. Payne, 113 So. 378, 380 (Fla. 1927) (“Arrest under

a warrant, valid in form, issued by competent authority on a sufficient

complaint, is not false imprisonment . . . .” (quoting Whitten v. Bennett, 86

F. 405, 406 (2nd Cir. 1898))); Dodson v. Solomon, 183 So. 825, 826 (Fla.

1938) (“If the imprisonment is under legal authority it may be malicious but

it cannot be false. This is true where legal authority is shown by valid

process, even if irregular or voidable.” (quoting S.H. Kress & Co. v. Powel,

180 So. 757, 762 (Fla. 1938))); Florez v. Broward Sheriff’s Office, 270 So.

3d 417, 421-422 (Fla. 4th DCA 2019) (“When a claimant is arrested by an

agency based on a facially sufficient and validly issued arrest warrant, that

person cannot satisfy the elements of a false arrest claim because the

warrant confers ‘legal authority’ on the arresting agency. This is true even if

the warrant was erroneously issued by another entity but still appears to be

facially valid to the arresting agency . . . The reason for this appears to be

2 that law enforcement does not have the discretion to disregard a facially

valid warrant issued by an entity authorized to issue warrants.”) (footnote

omitted); Andrews v. Fla. Parole Comm’n, 768 So. 2d 1257, 1263 (Fla. 1st

DCA 2000) (“[E]ven if the warrants upon which [the plaintiff] had been

arrested were issued improperly by the [Parole] Commission based upon a

mistake as to the facts or the law, the trial court correctly dismissed the

false imprisonment claim against [the Department], because [the

Department] was entitled to accept the warrants as lawful, as they were

regular on their face and issued by a legal body having authority to issue

warrants.”); ACandS, Inc. v. Redd, 703 So. 2d 492, 493-94 (Fla. 3d DCA

1997) (stating that a loss of consortium claim is a derivative right that is

dependent on the spouse’s ability to recover against the same defendant).