Harris v. State, 83-1378
| Decision Date | 28 March 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-1378,83-1378 |
| Citation | 450 So.2d 512 |
| Parties | Donald George HARRIS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Richard L. Jorandby, Public Defender, and Gary Caldwell, Asst. Public Defender, West Palm Beach, for appellant.
Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Joan Fowler Rossin, Asst. Atty. Gen., West Palm Beach, for appellee.
This is an appeal from a conviction for conspiracy to traffic in cannabis. The main issue on appeal is the sufficiency of the evidence to prove an agreement between the appellant and his alleged coconspirators, the purchasers of the cannabis, in a transaction in which the appellant allegedly acted as a broker. We affirm.
In essence, the proof below relied on by the state to sustain the conviction, reflected that the appellant brought together the purchasers and sellers of the cannabis involved. The sellers turned out to be undercover police officers who arrested appellant shortly after paying him an agreed upon commission. The state's evidence reflected that although the appellant was not directly involved in the final negotiations between the purchasers and the undercover agents, he was actively involved in procuring the purchasers to buy the cannabis. His actions included testing a sample of the cannabis, frequent contacts to keep the negotiations going, an agreement with the sellers to receive a commission, and collection of that commission. There was also evidence presented that appellant's alleged coconspirators stated to the undercover agents that they intended to cut the appellant out of any future deals between the two groups.
At the conclusion of the trial, the jury was instructed:
Before you can find the defendants guilty of criminal conspiracy, the State must prove the following two elements beyond a reasonable doubt:
1. The intent of the defendants was that the offense of trafficking would be committed. In order to carry out the intent, the defendants agreed with each other to cause trafficking to be committed, either by them or one of them, or by some other person.
It is not necessary that the agreement to commit the trafficking be expressed in any particular words, or that words pass between the conspirators.
It is not necessary that the defendant do any act in furtherance of the offense conspired.
In State v. Cristodero, 426 So.2d 977, 980 (Fla. 4th DCA 1982), this court held that direct proof of an agreement between alleged conspirators was not necessary to sustain a conviction:
[D]irect proof of the agreement is not necessary to establish the conspiracy; a jury is free to infer from all of the circumstances involved that there was a common purpose to commit the crime. As the court said in McCain [v. State, 390 So.2d 779 (Fla. 3d DCA 1980) ]:
This court has previously considered the nature of proof necessary in a conspiracy case. As defendant points out, an...
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Arguelles v. State, 4D00-1602.
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