Gregory Gun v. State of Florida
Gregory Gun v. State of Florida
Opinion of the Court
ON APPELLANT’S MOTION FOR REHEARING
We deny the appellant’s motion for rehearing. Because of the inclusion of a dissent to our denial of the motion for rehearing, we re-issue our April 8, 2015 opinion with the addition of the dissent to allow the appeal to be considered in full context.
The defendant appeals from the circuit court’s order finding that he violated his community control by possessing synthetic marijuana. The defendant argues that “synthetic marijuana,” as that term was used in the violation affidavit, is not includ
We affirm. This argument was not raised to the circuit court, and thus was not preserved. See Filan v. State, 768 So.2d 1100, 1101 (Fla. 4th DCA 2000) (“An issue or objection is ‘preserved’ within the meaning of [section 924.051(l)(b), Florida Statutes,] if it was timely raised and ruled on by the trial judge and if the objection was ‘sufficiently precise that it fairly apprised the trial court of the relief sought and the grounds therefor.’”) (emphasis added; citation omitted). Due to this lack of preservation, we issue no opinion at this time on whether the defendant’s argument on appeal has merit.
Further, given that the defendant admitted possessing the substance at issue and ultimately acknowledged that the substance was illegal, we conclude that if any technical defect or error existed in the lack of specificity for which the violation was charged, we do not consider that error to be fundamental. See Holley v. State, 128 So.3d 111, 113 (Fla. 4th DCA 2013) (“Technical defects in a VOP affidavit ... would not deprive the trial court of jurisdiction or constitute fundamental error that could be raised for the first time on direct appeal.”) (citations omitted); Chadwick v. State, 118 So.3d 827, 830 (Fla. 2d DCA 2012) (“An affidavit of VOP, like a criminal information, is ‘fundamentally defective only where it totally omits an essential element of the crime or is so vague, indistinct or indefinite that the defendant is misled or exposed to double jeopardy.’ ”) (citation omitted). As our supreme court stated in Hines v. State, 358 So.2d 183 (Fla. 1978):
[A]n affidavit upon which a permanent revocation of probation is to be based must allege the basic facts concerning the alleged violation, such as its nature, time, and place of occurrence. However, an allegation concerning the commission of a crime need not be set forth with the specificity required in criminal indictments and informations. The primary goal is notice composing with minimal due process rights. If a probationer needs additional information in order to properly prepare a defense to the charges, the various methods of discovery under our rules are available to [the probationer].
Id. at 185 (emphasis added; footnote omitted).
Affirmed.
Dissenting Opinion
dissenting.
I write separately to respectfully dissent because no error could be more fundamental than to send a citizen to prison for committing an act that is not a crime. The defendant’s violation affidavit stated that he violated his probation by “committing the criminal offense of I. Possession of Synthetic Marijuana on 5/28/2103.” (Emphasis added.) There is no such criminal offense. Certainly possession of some chemical compounds that may be found in some synthetic cannabinoids is prohibited by law. However, there is no law in this state criminalizing the possession of any and all synthetic marijuana/synthetic can-nabinoids irrespective of the compounds that it contains.
During the 2011 legislative session, the legislature amended the pertinent statute, section 893.03, “to add additional synthetic cannabinoid[s] ... to Schedule I of Florida’s controlled substance schedules.” Fla.
“Where an offense is defined by statute, the offense must be charged in the very language of the statute, or in language of equivalent import and nothing can be taken by intendment.” Bowden v. State, 642 So.2d 769, 770 (Fla. 1st DCA 1994). “When a word is substituted for that used in the statute, the substituted word must necessarily be within the terms of the statute in order to charge an offense.” Id. (citing Gibbs v. Mayo, 81 So.2d 739, 740 (Fla. 1955)). Otherwise, we must conclude that the violation affidavit “totally omit[ted] an essential element of the crime,” namely, the crime itself. Chadwick v. State, 118 So.3d 827, 830 (Fla. 2d DCA 2012). “The complete failure of an accusatory instrument to charge a crime is a defect that can be raised at any time— before trial, after trial, on appeal, or by habeas corpus.” State v. Gray, 435 So.2d 816, 818 (Fla. 1983).
Furthermore, even if the defendant or his counsel stated that “synthetic marijuana” was illegal, that admission does not make it so. The Legislature gets to decide what is and is not illegal in the State of Florida, not criminal defendants or the judicial system. State v. Adkins, 96 So.3d 412, 417 (Fla. 2012) (“Enacting laws — and especially criminal laws — is quintessentially a legislative function.”) (quoting Fla. House of Representatives y. Crist, 999 So.2d 601, 615 (Fla. 2008)). Had the Legislature seen fit to criminalize all synthetic marijuana, it could have done so (and perhaps it should have done so
Criminal laws must be construed strictly, with any ambiguity resolved in favor of the defendant. § 775.021(1), Fla. Stat. We have previously stated that:
[I]f the information wholly fails to charge a crime against the defendant it is fundamental error and • a conviction founded upon an information which wholly fails to charge a crime under the laws of the state is void and must be set aside, though the defendant may have entered a plea of guilty to such charge.
Catanese v. State, 251 So.2d 572, 573 (Fla. 4th DCA 1971) (internal citations omitted). Here, the defendant’s violation affidavit failed to allege any criminal act; thus, this was not a mere “technical defect” in a VOP affidavit, as characterized by the majority opinion. Therefore, the defendant’s conviction should be set aside. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.
. See Timothy P. Stackhouse, Regulators in Wackyland: Capturing the Last of the Designer Drugs, 54 Ariz. L.Rev. 1105, 1110 (2012) ("Efforts to control synthetic cannabinoids and cathinone derivatives have failed. The traditional approach of individually listing drugs as they become a problem is too slow, and there are too many new compounds to replace them as soon as they are banned.”).
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.