Connolly v. State

• Decision Date: 29 July 2015
• Docket Number: No. 3D09–280.,3D09–280.
• Parties: John J. CONNOLLY, Jr., Appellant, v. The STATE of Florida, Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

172 So.3d 893

John J. CONNOLLY, Jr., Appellant

v.The STATE of Florida, Appellee.

No. 3D09–280.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Third District.

July 29, 2015.

Carlos J. Martinez, Public Defender, and Manuel Alvarez, Assistant Public Defender, for appellant.

Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, and Linda Katz, Assistant Attorney General; Katherine Fernandez Rundle, State Attorney, and Joel D. Rosenblatt and Michael Von Zamft, Assistant State Attorneys, for appellee.

Before SUAREZ, C.J., and WELLS, SHEPHERD, ROTHENBERG, LAGOA, SALTER, EMAS, FERNANDEZ, LOGUE and SCALES, JJ.

ON MOTION FOR REHEARING EN BANC

ROTHENBERG, J.

Based on the State of Florida's (“the State”) motion for rehearing/rehearing en banc, we grant rehearing en banc, withdraw this Court's opinion issued on May 28, 2014, and issue the following en banc opinion affirming John J. Connolly, Jr.'s (“the defendant”) conviction for second degree murder with a firearm in its stead.

As the State correctly noted in its opening statement at the en banc oral argument before this Court, and which is supported by the record:

John Connolly [was] not an innocent FBI Agent sitting at his desk a thousand miles away from the murder. John Connolly [was] the primary mover who started the murder in action. It was his phone call to Whitey Bulger telling him that the FBI [was] going to question—[was] looking for John Callahan—going to squeeze him—if they squeeze him he will talk, if he talks we will all go to jail. You gotta get Johnny Martorano and have him take care of him. That was the initial act which caused the death of the victim.... Defendant's act as an aider and abettor, an accessory before the fact, became a crime once the crime was committed here in Florida.

The defendant and his co-defendants were charged with first degree premeditated murder (Count I) and conspiracy to commit first degree murder (Count II). The defendant and co-defendants were tried separately, and the jury convicted the defendant of second degree murder with a firearm as a lesser included offense of first degree murder. The second degree murder conviction was reclassified from a first degree felony to a life felony pursuant to section 775.087(1), Florida Statutes (1981), based on the jury's specific finding that the defendant was armed with a firearm during the acts giving rise to his liability for second degree murder.

The defendant does not dispute the sufficiency of the evidence relied on by the jury in finding him guilty of second degree murder, nor does he dispute that he carried a firearm on his person during the acts he committed as a principal to the murder. The evidence as to both his participation in the murder and his possession of a firearm during his participation is overwhelming. Rather, the defendant disputes the legality of the reclassification of the second degree murder from a first degree felony to a life felony even though the reclassification was based on his actual possession of a firearm. The reclassification issue is dispositive, as it is undisputed that the indictment was filed in 2005 and the homicide was committed in 1982. Thus, without the reclassification from a first degree felony to a life felony, the defendant's conviction must be vacated due to the expiration of the four-year statute of limitations for first degree felonies pursuant to the law that was in effect in 1982.¹ § 775.15(2)(a), Fla. Stat. (1981).

The defendant contends that the firearm reclassification was error because: (1) there was a defect in the charging document; (2) the jury verdict was insufficient to subject him to reclassification; (3) reclassification cannot be based on a co-defendant's use of a firearm during the commission of the offense; and (4) there was no evidence that the defendant carried a firearm during the commission of the murder.

As will be detailed herein: (1) the defendant failed to raise an objection to any defect in the charging document and therefore waived his objection to the indictment, and no fundamental error has been demonstrated; (2) his argument regarding the verdict form was also not raised and therefore waived, and it is completely without merit; (3) reclassification of the second degree murder was based on the defendant's personal possession of a firearm during the commission of the homicide, not on the vicarious possession of a firearm by a co-defendant; and (4) there was abundant evidence that the defendant personally carried a firearm during the commission of the homicide.

SUMMARY OF THE CASE

The 2005 indictment charged the defendant and his co-defendants in Count I as follows:

Count I

[T]hat on or between the 31st day of July, 1982, and the 2nd day of August, 1982, within the Counties of Miami–Dade and Broward, State of Florida, JAMES J. BULGER, STEPHEN J. FLEMMI, JOHN V. MARTORANO and JOHN J. CONNOLLY, JR., did unlawfully and feloniously kill a human being, to wit: JOHN B. CALLAHAN, from a premeditated design to effect the death of the person killed or any human being, by shooting the said JOHN B. CALLAHAN with a firearm, in violation of s. 782.04(1), s. 775.087 and s. 777.011, Florida Statutes, to the evil example of all others in like cases offending and against the peace and dignity of the State of Florida.

To understand the murder of John B. Callahan (“Callahan”) and the defendant's involvement in Callahan's murder, a summary of the evidence established at trial is necessary. The evidence at trial revealed that Callahan's murder was the last of several murders committed by and/or for the benefit of James “Whitey” Bulger, Stephen Flemmi, John Martorano, and the Winter Hill Gang, an organized crime organization working out of Boston, Massachusetts. The chain of events that led to Callahan's murder began in 1973.

In 1973, the defendant, an agent working for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (“FBI”), was transferred to the Boston office of the FBI where he was assigned to the organized crime division. In 1975, the defendant recruited Bulger and Flemmi to work as FBI informants, and over time, the defendant became corrupted by his relationship with Bulger, Flemmi, and the Winter Hill Gang. Although he provided some of the information he obtained from Bulger and Flemmi to the FBI, the defendant also submitted false and misleading information and reports to the FBI to protect Bulger and Flemmi, and he provided Bulger and Flemmi with confidential FBI and law enforcement information, which enabled Bulger and Flemmi to avoid arrest and prosecution by federal, state, and local law enforcement.

Flemmi testified that the defendant was considered a member of their criminal organization and that he was essentially on their payroll. In exchange for the defendant's services (providing misleading and false information to the FBI and giving Bulger and Flemmi confidential law enforcement information), the defendant was paid large sums of money. Bulger and Flemmi also used the defendant as a conduit for the delivery of cash and gifts from Bulger and Flemmi to other FBI agents. Thus, the defendant was working both sides and profiting from each. He benefited professionally by providing organized crime information to the FBI, and he benefited personally and financially by assisting Bulger and Flemmi.

The jury learned about some of the confidential information the defendant provided to Bulger and Flemmi. For example, in 1976, the defendant warned Bulger and Flemmi that Richard Castucci, another FBI confidential informant, had given the FBI the location of two Winter Hill Gang members who were federal fugitives. Based on the information provided to them by the defendant, Bulger and Flemmi warned the two fugitives, and they, along with Martorano, murdered Castucci for his disclosures to the FBI. In 1978, the defendant also warned Bulger and Flemmi that they were about to be indicted in a federal racketeering case, but the defendant told them that if they agreed not to kill Anthony “Tony” Ciulla, who was cooperating with the government as a witness against members of their criminal organization, Bulger and Flemmi would not be indicted. Additionally, the defendant warned Bulger and Flemmi that Martorano was going to be indicted. As a result, Martorano went into hiding in Miami.

In 1978, Callahan, the victim in the instant case, was the owner and president of World Jai Alai. When Callahan learned that the authorities in Connecticut had discovered his ties to the Winter Hill Gang and other organized crime figures in Boston, he sold World Jai Alai to Roger Wheeler (“Wheeler”). Four years later, when Callahan decided that he wanted to repurchase World Jai Alai from Wheeler, but Wheeler refused to sell, Callahan solicited Bulger, Flemmi, and Martorano to murder Wheeler. On May 27, 1981, Martorano shot and killed Wheeler at a country club in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

During its investigation of the Wheeler murder, the FBI began searching for members of the Winter Hill Gang to cooperate with the FBI. Brian Halloran (“Halloran”), a member of the Winter Hill Gang who had been indicted for an unrelated murder in Boston, agreed to cooperate with the FBI in the Wheeler murder investigation in order to obtain leniency in his pending case.

When the defendant learned from his supervisor, Special Agent John Morris, that Halloran was cooperating with the FBI and that Halloran had implicated Bulger and Flemmi in the Wheeler murder, the defendant warned Bulger and Flemmi. After this initial warning, the defendant contacted Bulger and Flemmi again to warn them that the FBI had outfitted Halloran with a body wire and had directed Halloran to meet with Callahan. After being alerted by the defendant, Bulger and Flemmi warned Callahan that Halloran intended to inform on him, and Bulger, with the help of other Winter Hill Gang members, murdered Halloran.

Because the Halloran murder was committed on a public street in Boston, the investigation intensified. In an effort to deflect suspicion away from Bulger, Flemmi, and the Winter...