Thomas v. Jenne

766 So. 2d 320, 2000 WL 314524
CourtDistrict Court of Appeal of Florida
DecidedMarch 29, 2000
Docket4D99-3794
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 766 So. 2d 320 (Thomas v. Jenne) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court of Appeal of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Thomas v. Jenne, 766 So. 2d 320, 2000 WL 314524 (Fla. Ct. App. 2000).

Opinion

766 So.2d 320 (2000)

Robert THOMAS, Petitioner,
v.
Ken JENNE, as Sheriff of Broward County, Florida, Respondent.

No. 4D99-3794.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.

March 29, 2000.

Alan H. Schreiber, Public Defender, Seventeenth Judicial Circuit, and Debra A. Bookout, Assistant Public Defender, Fort Lauderdale, for petitioner.

Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, Tallahassee, and Leslie T. Campbell, Assistant Attorney General, West Palm Beach, for respondent.

PER CURIAM.

Petitioner Robert Thomas was charged by information with grand theft and resisting arrest without violence. After his arrest, he was released after posting a $1,000 bond. He failed to appear for arraignment. A "no bond" capias was issued for his arrest. Thomas surrendered on the capias and was arraigned.

*321 Thomas filed a pro se motion for reconsideration of bond, in which he claimed that his failure to appear for arraignment was not willful. He asked the court to release him on his own recognizance or to reinstate his original bond.

The court held a hearing on Thomas's motion. After listening to Thomas's testimony, the trial court ruled that he had been properly noticed for arraignment and stated that his testimony was not credible. The state argued that Thomas had used numerous aliases and different birthdates in previous court proceedings and that he had committed offenses in different counties in Florida. The trial court denied Thomas's motion to set bond.

Thomas filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus seeking to quash the trial court's order denying bond and directing the trial court to set a reasonable bond.

As we ruled on December 14, 1999 before the issuance of this opinion, we deny the petition on the authority of Bradshaw v. Jenne, 754 So.2d 109 (Fla. 4th DCA 2000).

STONE and HAZOURI, JJ., concur.

GROSS, J., concurs in part and dissents in part with opinion.

GROSS, J., concurring in the opinion, dissenting from the denial of the motion for rehearing en banc.

After the petition was denied in this case on December 14, 1999, but before the issuance of an opinion, Thomas moved for rehearing en banc citing a number of cases from this court, primarily tracing back to Merdian v. Cochran, 654 So.2d 573 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995), Metzger v. Cochran, 694 So.2d 842 (Fla. 4th DCA 1997), and Paul v. Jenne, 728 So.2d 1167 (Fla. 4th DCA), rev. granted, 741 So.2d 1137 (Fla.1999). The court declined to rehear the case en banc.

I would grant the motion for rehearing, not to conform this case to Merdian, Metzger, and Paul, but to recede from that line of cases.

In those cases, this court unintentionally and fundamentally changed the way in which trial courts were required to deal with defendants who violated conditions of their bond.

Before the Merdian trilogy, a trial court's handling of pretrial release after a bond violation was a discretionary decision, once the court made the finding that criminal conduct or a willful violation had occurred. This court has narrowed the scope of that discretion by forcing the proceeding to filter through section 907.041, Florida Statutes (1999), a section not intended to cover violations of an existing bond or condition of release.

The statute we have misapplied is section 907.041, Florida Statutes (1999), entitled "Pretrial detention and release." That statute does not apply to the situation at issue in this case, where a defendant has willfully violated a condition of an existing bond. Section 907.041 comes into play when the state seeks to have the defendant held in jail without bond for defined "dangerous crimes," from the time of arrest until trial. The legislative intent set forth at section 907.041 states:

It is the policy of this state that persons committing serious criminal offenses, posing a threat to the safety of the community or the integrity of the judicial process, or failing to appear at trial be detained upon arrest.

(Italics supplied). The statute's reference to "failing to appear at trial" and the reference in section 907.041(4)(b)1. to previous violations of conditions of release are best understood as referring to violations that occurred on a previous offense when pretrial release is opposed for the current offense. See Houser v. Manning, 719 So.2d 307, 311 (Fla. 3d DCA 1998). Such information is typically provided by the state to the judge at the first appearance; section 907.041(4)(c)4. requires the arresting agency, after an arrest, to promptly provide the state attorney with information pertaining to the defendant's past conduct *322 and present conduct, including any record of convictions, previous flight to avoid prosecution, or failure to appear at court proceedings.

One factor most heavily weighs in favor of the interpretation that section 907.041 applies to release after arrest on a new charge—the procedures outlined in section 907.041 all contemplate events occurring shortly after arrest on a new substantive charge.[1]

The procedures and required findings set forth in section 907.041 bring an initial denial of pretrial release within article I, section 14 of the Florida Constitution which states that in non-capital cases, a defendant "shall be entitled to pretrial release on reasonable conditions." That section of the constitution also affords the trial judge wide latitude in the decision to deny bond:

If no conditions of release can reasonably protect the community from risk of physical harm to persons, assure the presence of the accused at trial, or assure the integrity of the judicial process, the accused may be detained.

Id. This quoted language was added to the constitution in 1982. Section 907.041 tucks neatly into this constitutional provision by defining the standards for the type of pretrial detention which commences from the inception of a case. See § 907.041(3), Fla. Stat. (1999). Section 907.041 thus implemented the 1982 constitutional amendment in those non-capital cases where the state seeks to hold a person in jail from the time of arrest. See Houser, 719 So.2d at 310-11. Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.132 establishes the procedures for handling the state's motion for pretrial detention.

A separate statutory and rule framework apply to the situation where a defendant violates a condition of an existing bond by committing criminal acts. Sections 903.046-903.047, Florida Statutes (1999), have been ignored by this court. Unlike the more narrow focus of section 907.041, sections 903.046-903.047 broadly define the powers of the court in all bail/pretrial release situations. As set forth in the statute,

[t]he purpose of a bail determination in criminal proceedings is to ensure the appearance of the criminal defendant at subsequent proceedings and to protect the community against unreasonable danger from the criminal defendant.

§ 903.046(1), Fla. Stat. (1999). Section 903.047(1)(a) makes it a condition of all forms of pretrial release that the "defendant refrain from criminal activity of any kind." As Judge Cope has written, revocation of bond has always been within the inherent power of a court where a defendant willfully violates a condition of release or engages in further criminal conduct. See Houser, 719 So.2d at 308-309.

Section 903.046 was passed in the same legislative session as section 907.041.

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Related

McClellan v. State
872 So. 2d 420 (District Court of Appeal of Florida, 2004)
State v. Paul
783 So. 2d 1042 (Supreme Court of Florida, 2001)
Barns v. State
768 So. 2d 529 (District Court of Appeal of Florida, 2000)

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766 So. 2d 320, 2000 WL 314524, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/thomas-v-jenne-fladistctapp-2000.