Brown v. State
| Decision Date | 23 August 1974 |
| Docket Number | No. 73--1438,73--1438 |
| Citation | 299 So.2d 37 |
| Parties | Richard BROWN, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Richard L. Jorandby, Public Defender, and Elliot R. Brooks, Asst. Public Defender, West Palm Beach, for appellant.
Robert L. Shevin, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Thomas M. Carney, Asst. Atty. Gen., West Palm Beach, for appellee.
We reverse appellant's conviction upon two counts of delivery of heroin.
A police officer, accompanied by a confidential informant, was involved in the deliveries. It was appellant's position that he had been illegally entrapped by the confidential informant, one Charles Jackson, a lifelong friend of the appellant. However (and this is the point of this appeal), appellant was not permitted to testify as to the conversations he had with the confidential informant prior to the time of the deliveries because the court ruled that same were hearsay. While a portion of the conversations may have filtered out in testimony, the state's objections were uniformly sustained, the conversations were stricken and the jury told to disregard them. Further, appellant was prevented from proffering same for the record.
The confidential informant was not at the trial and his whereabouts was not known.
Clearly, the conversations were relevant to the defense of entrapment. It is indeed basic that 'one who is instigated, induced, or lured by an officer of the law or other person, for the purpose of prosecution, into the commission of a crime which he otherwise had no intention of committing may avail himself of the defense of entrapment; . . .' and further, See 9 Fla.Jur., Criminal Law § 409 (1972). See also 13 Fla.Jur., Evidence § 274 (1957); Darty v. State, 161 So.2d 864 (2d D.C.A.Fla.1964); Thomas v. State, 152 Fla. 756, 13 So.2d 148 (1943), as concerns verbal act evidence to show the mental attitude or intent of a defendant at...
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Duncan v. State, 91-3889
...legally distinguishable situations involving section 90.803(3) are not pertinent and merit no further discussion. See Brown v. State, 299 So.2d 37 (Fla. 4th DCA1974), cert. den., 310 So.2d 740 (Fla.1975); Ehrhardt, Sec. 801.2 at Accordingly, the conviction is REVERSED and the cause is REMAN......