Duggins v. State, 3D14–1871.

• Decision Date: 17 September 2014
• Docket Number: No. 3D14–1871.,3D14–1871.
• Citation: 146 So.3d 1275
• Parties: Michael DUGGINS, Petitioner/Cross–Respondent, v. The STATE of Florida, Respondent/Cross–Petitioner.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

146 So.3d 1275

Michael DUGGINS, Petitioner/Cross–Respondent

v.The STATE of Florida, Respondent/Cross–Petitioner.

No. 3D14–1871.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Third District.

Sept. 17, 2014.

Carlos J. Martinez, Public Defender, and Susan S. Lerner, Assistant Public Defender, for petitioner/cross-respondent.

Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, and Marlon J. Weiss, Assistant Attorney General, for respondent/cross-petitioner.

Before SUAREZ, EMAS, and LOGUE, JJ.

Opinion

LOGUE, J.

This case comes before us in the unusual posture in which both the defendant, Michael Duggins, and the State petition for mandamus to require the trial court to rule on Duggins's pending motions to suppress. We grant Duggins's petition.

Duggins was charged in November 2012 with aggravated assault and possession of a firearm by a convicted felon. He filed two separate motions to suppress physical evidence. The trial court conducted an evidentiary hearing on the motions on June 23, 2014. During the hearing, Duggins's counsel advised the court that Duggins has been incarcerated for over 600 days awaiting trial. At the conclusion of the hearing, the court indicated that it would issue an order ruling on the motions after the testimony was transcribed. The transcript was filed on July 16, 2014, on which date the court advised the parties that its order on the suppression motions would be issued by August 20, 2014.

On July 28, 2014, after the suppression hearing had been fully concluded and the hearing transcript filed, but before the court had issued its rulings on the motions, Duggins filed a demand for a speedy trial. In response, the trial court immediately entered an order declining to rule on the pending motions concluding that Duggins, by demanding a speedy trial, constructively abandoned them. The trial court set the trial to commence on August 5, 2014, leaving the motions to suppress unresolved. These proceedings followed.

“Where a trial court's refusal to rule has no lawful basis, mandamus is the appropriate remedy.” Quintana v. Barad, 528 So.2d 1300, 1301 (Fla. 3d DCA 1988) ; see also SR Acquisitions–Florida City, LLC v. San Remo Homes at Florida City, LLC, 78 So.3d 636, 638 (Fla. 3d DCA 2011) (“[M]andamus is the proper remedy to compel a court to exercise its discretion and decide a cause, where there is no valid reason to reserve ruling on the matter.”) (citation omitted); Flagship Nat'l Bank of Miami v. Testa, 429 So.2d 69, 70 (Fla. 3d DCA 1983) (“[W]hile a judge may not be told ahead of time how to rule, mandamus lies to require that he rule one way or the other, if there is no justification that the ruling be withheld.”).

Here, the trial court's refusal to rule had no lawful basis. Both the motion to suppress and the demand for speedy trial are vehicles to secure a defendant's constitutional rights. The motion to suppress sounds in the constitutional right to be free from “unreasonable searches and seizures.” U.S. Const. amend. IV & XIV ; Fla. Const. art. 1, § 12. The demand for a speedy trial sounds in the constitutional right to a “speedy and public trial.” U.S. Const. amend. VI & XIV ; Fla. Const. art. 1, § 16 (a). A person does not ordinarily abandon the right to seek suppression of evidence unlawfully seized merely by demanding a speedy trial.

Indeed, the Florida Supreme Court has made clear that a speedy trial demand can be compatible with a pending motion to suppress. State v. Embry, 322 So.2d 515, 518 (Fla.1975) (“[T]he mere filing of a motion to suppress is not tantamount to a finding of law that the speedy trial demander does not have a bona fide desire to obtain trial, that he is not prepared and will not be prepared for trial.”); see also Williams v. State, 548 So.2d 898, 899 (Fla. 4th DCA 1989) (holding a trial court erred in determining that a motion to suppress was waived by a speedy trial demand).

Nor are we persuaded by the trial court's justification for its action. The trial court explained that “the defendant who files a speedy trial demand says that he is ready for trial now; that nothing remains to be done prior to the inception of trial; that all conditions prevenient to the commencement of trial have been satisfied.” In the first place, this argument overlooks the fact that nothing remained for Duggins to do regarding the pending motions to suppress. The motions were timely filed; a full evidentiary hearing had been conducted; the transcript had, at the court's request, been ordered and received; and all that remained was for the trial court to issue rulings on the motions.

In fact, the trial court had time to issue its rulings on the schedule it had established and still set trial to commence within the time required under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.191. The filing of a ...