Bates v. State

• Decision Date: 07 October 1999
• Docket Number: No. 86,180.,86,180.
• Citation: 750 So.2d 6
• Court: Florida Supreme Court
• Parties: Kayle Barrington BATES, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.

750 So.2d 6

Kayle Barrington BATES, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.

No. 86,180.

Supreme Court of Florida.

October 7, 1999.

Rehearing Denied December 10, 1999.

Thomas H. Dunn, Rochester, New York, for appellant.

Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, and Mark S. Dunn, Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, Florida, for appellee.

PER CURIAM.

Kayle Bates appeals the sentence of death which he received on resentencing for the 1982 murder of Janet Renee White. We have jurisdiction, art. V, § 3(b)(1), Fla. Const., and affirm.

In 1983, a jury convicted appellant of first-degree murder, kidnapping, attempted sexual battery, and armed robbery. After the penalty phase proceeding, the trial judge sentenced appellant to death for the first-degree murder conviction in accordance with the jury's recommendation, to two terms of life imprisonment for the kidnapping and armed robbery convictions, and to fifteen years for the attempted sexual battery conviction.

In sentencing appellant to death, the trial court found the following aggravating circumstances: capital murder committed during the commission of three felonies; capital murder committed to avoid arrest; capital murder committed for pecuniary gain; capital murder which was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel (HAC); and capital murder committed in a cold, calculated, and premeditated manner (CCP). On appeal, this Court affirmed the convictions and the sentences on the noncapital convictions. Bates v. State, 465 So.2d 490, 491 (Fla.1985). However, we struck the CCP and avoid-arrest aggravating circumstances and remanded the case to the trial court for reconsideration of appellant's sentence for the first-degree murder conviction.

On remand, the trial court again imposed a death sentence. This Court affirmed. Bates v. State, 506 So.2d 1033 (Fla.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 873, 108 S.Ct. 212, 98 L.Ed.2d 163 (1987). The Governor signed appellant's first death warrant in November 1989. Appellant subsequently filed a motion to vacate his death sentence pursuant to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850, claiming that his trial counsel in the original sentencing proceeding was ineffective for failing to investigate appellant's background adequately. The trial court granted the motion and ordered resentencing before a jury. This Court affirmed. Bates v. Dugger, 604 So.2d 457 (Fla.1992), cert. denied, 507 U.S. 992, 113 S.Ct. 1600, 123 L.Ed.2d 163 (1993).

After appellant's second resentencing proceeding, the jury recommended death by a vote of nine to three. The court found three aggravating circumstances: capital murder committed during an enumerated felony (kidnapping and attempted sexual battery); capital murder committed for pecuniary gain; and HAC. The court found two statutory mitigating circumstances: no significant history of prior criminal history (significant weight); and appellant's age of twenty-four at the time he committed the murder (little weight). The court found eight nonstatutory mitigating circumstances: appellant was under some emotional distress at the time of the murder (significant weight); appellant's ability to conform his conduct to the requirements of the law was impaired to some degree (significant weight); appellant's family background (some weight); appellant's national guard service (little weight); appellant was a dedicated soldier and patriot (little weight); appellant's low-average IQ (little weight); appellant's love for his wife and children and being a supportive father (some weight); and appellant was a good employee (little weight).

After weighing the relevant factors, the court determined that the aggravators outweighed the mitigators and imposed the death penalty. Appellant raises nine issues on appeal.¹ We dismiss without discussion part of issue eight as well as issue nine, as they are without merit.²

In his first and second issues and part of his third issue, appellant contends that the trial court erred in refusing to instruct the jury that if he were sentenced to life in prison for the murder committed in 1982, his sentence would be without any possibility of parole, as section 775.082(1), Florida Statutes (1995), provided at the time of the resentencing in 1995. Appellant claims that the trial court's refusal to apply section 775.082(1), Florida Statutes (1995), retroactively denied him due process and a fundamentally fair capital sentencing under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.

In Florida, without clear legislative intent to the contrary, a law is presumed to apply prospectively. See State v. Lavazzoli, 434 So.2d 321, 323 (Fla.1983)

; McCarthy v. Havis, 23 Fla. 508, 2 So. 819, 821 (1887); Bond v. State, 675 So.2d 184, 185 (Fla. 5th DCA 1996). Retroactive application of the law is generally disfavored, see Herbert Broom, Legal Maxims 24 (8th ed. 1911) ("Retrospective laws are, as a rule, of questionable policy, and contrary to the general principle that legislation by which the conduct of mankind is to be regulated ought to deal with future acts, and ought not to change the character of past transactions carried on upon the faith of the then existing law."); and any basis for retroactive application must be unequivocal and leave no doubt as to the legislative intent. See Larson v. Independent Life & Accident Ins. Co., 158 Fla. 623, 29 So.2d 448 (1947); see also Broom, supra at 25 ("It is a general principle of our law that no statute shall be construed so as to have a retrospective operation, unless its language is such as plainly to require that construction.").

In 1994, the Legislature enacted chapter 94-228, Laws of Florida, section 1 of which amended the statute on penalties for crimes to make life without the possibility of parole the alternative punishment to a death sentence for the crime of first-degree murder. See § 775.082(1), Fla.Stat. (Supp.1994). Section three of the session law states that "[t]his act shall take effect upon becoming a law." The act was approved by the Governor and became effective May 25, 1994. Thus, the amended sentencing statute applies to all crimes committed after May 25, 1994. We find no unequivocal language that the Legislature intended this amendment to apply retroactively

We have previously held that this statute was not applicable to crimes committed before its effective date. Hudson v. State, 708 So.2d 256 (Fla.1998); Williams v. State, 707 So.2d 683, 684 n. 1 (Fla.1998); Craig v. State, 685 So.2d 1224, 1230 n. 12 (Fla.1996). We similarly reject appellant's contention.³

Our analysis of this issue causes us to reject appellant's waiver arguments. Because the 1994 amendment can have no effect on appellant's sentencing, we conclude that the waiver of an ex post facto claim in respect to the 1994 amendment to section 775.082 is of no consequence. The waiver of ex post facto rights would only be an issue if the statute could have an effect on appellant's sentence which, as we have stated, it cannot.⁴ Appellant's alternate contention, that the jury should have been advised that appellant would agree to waive the possibility of parole, is also unavailing under Florida's capital sentencing scheme because, as the trial court ruled, "[a] defendant cannot by agreement confer on the court the authority to impose an illegal sentence." Williams v. State, 500 So.2d 501, 503 (Fla.1986). At the time appellant committed this murder, the Legislature had not established life without the possibility of parole as punishment for this crime.

In his second issue, appellant argues that the State took advantage of the trial court's failure to instruct the jury on a sentence of life without the possibility of parole during cross-examination of appellant's witnesses and closing argument by making future dangerousness an issue for the jury. Appellant did not object to either the State's cross-examination or closing argument on this ground, and the issue is therefore procedurally barred. Steinhorst v. State, 412 So.2d 332, 338 (Fla. 1982). Moreover, after reviewing the record, we do not agree that the State's cross-examination or argument raised the specter of appellant's future dangerousness.

Within this issue appellant focuses on a question posed by the jury during its deliberations: "[A]re we limited to the two recommendations of life with minimum 25 years or death penalty. Yes. No. Or can we recommend life without a possibility of parole. Yes. No." In response to this question, the trial court informed the jury by written response, "The court has advised you what advisory sentences you may recommend. Please refer to your copy of the jury instructions." We find that the trial court's response was appropriate and is in accordance with our decisions in Whitfield v. State, 706 So.2d 1, 5 (Fla.1997), and Waterhouse v. State, 596 So.2d 1008, 1015 (Fla.1992).

As part of his third issue, appellant contends that the fact that he was already sentenced to two life terms plus fifteen years and that those sentences were to run consecutively to the sentence for the murder was relevant mitigation "in the sense that [it] might serve as a basis for a sentence less than death." We have rejected similar arguments in Franqui v. State, 699 So.2d 1312, 1326 (Fla.1997); Marquard v. State, 641 So.2d 54 (Fla.1994); and Nixon v. State, 572 So.2d 1336 (Fla.1990).

These other sentences are not relevant mitigation on the issue of whether appellant will actually remain in prison for the length of those sentences. The length of actual prison time is affected by many factors other than the length of the sentence imposed by the sentencing court. The introduction of this evidence would open the door to conjecture and speculation as to how much time a prisoner serves of a sentence and distract jurors from the relevant issue of what is the appropriate sentence for the murder conviction. Regarding this issue appellant's brief states "[T]he state argued that [appellant]...