Knight v. State

• Decision Date: 27 February 2013
• Docket Number: No. 5D11–2875.,5D11–2875.
• Citation: Knight v. State, 107 So.3d 449 (Fla. App. 2013)
• Parties: Jonathon KNIGHT, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
• Court: Florida District Court of Appeals

107 So.3d 449

Jonathon KNIGHT, Appellant,

v.STATE of Florida, Appellee.

No. 5D11–2875.

District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fifth District.

Jan. 18, 2013.

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc Denied Feb. 27, 2013.

James S. Purdy, Public Defender, and Robert E. Wildridge, Assistant Public Defender, Daytona Beach, for Appellant.

Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, Tallahassee, and Ann M. Phillips, Assistant Attorney General, Daytona Beach, for Appellee.

LAWSON, J.

Jonathon Knight appeals from his conviction on a single charge of possession of cannabis (more than 20 grams), arguing that the trial court should have granted his motion for judgment of acquittal. Reviewing the matter de novo, see Pagan v. State, 830 So.2d 792, 803 (Fla.2002), we affirm. Although Knight's argument finds support in opinions from other districts applying a “special” circumstantial evidence standard,¹ we disagree with the way that standard has been used in those cases on similar facts. For this reason, we certify conflict with Evans v. State, 32 So.3d 188 (Fla. 1st DCA 2010); P.M.M. v. State, 884 So.2d 418 (Fla. 2d DCA 2004); N.K.W., Jr. v. State, 788 So.2d 1036 (Fla. 2d DCA 2001); E.H.A. v. State, 760 So.2d 1117 (Fla. 4th DCA 2000); S.B. v. State, 657 So.2d 1252 (Fla. 2d DCA 1995); and Cook v. State, 571 So.2d 530 (Fla. 1st DCA 1990). Additionally, although we certify conflict based upon application of the special circumstantial evidence standard, as we understand it, we also question the continued use of this standard for appellate review and suggest to the Florida Supreme Court that it reconsider the law in this area.

Facts

In the early morning hours of November 21, 2010, Knight was driving a yellow 2010 Camaro owned by a friend, who was riding in the front passenger seat of the vehicle, when Orange County Deputy Sheriff Donald Murphy pulled alongside the Camaro, activated his emergency lights, and signaled Knight to pull over. Knight complied, and stopped in an adjacent 7–Eleven convenience store parking lot. Deputy Murphy ordered Knight out of the car, explaining that he had stopped Knight because of excessively loud music emanating from the car, and walked him to the front of his patrol car.

Serendipitously, a K–9 officer pulled into the 7–Eleven parking lot within minutes of the stop, while Murphy was issuing a noise violation citation to Knight. After Murphy released Knight, Knight walked into the 7–Eleven to buy a drink. At approximately the same time, the K–9 officer made an “impromptu” decision to run his dog, Endo, around the Camaro. Endo alerted to the passenger side door, and Murphy re-detained Knight when he walked out of the 7–Eleven. Murphy then searched the vehicle, locating a small bag of suspected cannabis in a “small carry-on style rolling-type suitcase” which contained a luggage tag identifying Knight as the owner of the suitcase. The suitcase had been sitting on the backseat of the car. Murphy seized the substance, which ultimately tested positive as cannabis and weighed 24.4 grams. Deputy Murphy did not locate any drug paraphernalia typically associated with marijuana usage in the vehicle. After completing the vehicle search, Murphy arrested Knight for possession of cannabis. In a search incident to the arrest, Murphy discovered $2,400 cash in Knight's pockets.²

The State charged Knight with both possession of cannabis with intent to sell or deliver and possession of more than 20 grams of cannabis. At trial, the State presented the testimony summarized above, and rested. Knight moved for a judgment of acquittal, which the trial court denied.

Knight called as his first witness Chaka Miller, the friend who had been in the front passenger seat at the time of the stop which led to Knight's arrest. Miller testified that he, Knight and another friend (Chad Harris) were visiting Orlando for the weekend to attend the “Florida Classic” football game on the date of Knight's arrest. He testified that the cannabis found in the car did not belong to him, but that he had not seen Knight with marijuana—or heard him discuss marijuana—at all during the trip. He testified that the group usually paid cash for their hotel rooms when they traveled. Finally, although he did not contradict the State's evidence that the suitcase belonged to Knight, he did testify that Chad Harris was left in the backseat of the car next to the suitcase after Deputy Murphy removed Knight from the vehicle to issue the citation—implying that Harris could have placed the cannabis in the suitcase at that time.

Knight then took the stand in his own defense, also testifying that the cannabis was not his. He claimed that the money on his person was for his weekend trip expenses, and did not come from selling drugs.³ He flatly denied selling drugs (“I don't sell drugs.”), and further elaborated that he had that much cash to spend for the weekend because he had received settlements from two separate personal injurycases, one involving a motorcycle accident and another involving a fight. He digressed to describing his injuries in detail: “I had two brain surgeries, four plates in my head, and I have a 50 percent use of my right shoulder....” Finally, he reiterated that Chad Harris was seated in the back of the car next to the suitcase, and was left there between the time he was removed from the car and the search several minutes later. Knight also did not contradict the State's evidence that the suitcase belonged to him, and seemed to acknowledge it as his—instead focusing on the fact that Harris had an opportunity to place the marijuana in the suitcase and denying that he had put any marijuana in his luggage.⁴ On cross-examination the State immediately sought to have Knight reiterate what it obviously viewed as Knight's admission that the suitcase was his, but Knight then denied owning the suitcase and also denied that his name was on the luggage tag—directly contradicting Deputy Murphy's testimony.

At the close of the evidence, Knight renewed his motion for judgment of acquittal, which was denied. After deliberations, the jury returned a verdict of not guilty on the charge of possession with intent to sell or deliver and a verdict of guilty on the charge of possession of more than 20 grams of cannabis.

Analysis

A. Possession Cases Generally and Cases Supporting Reversal.

“Proof of possession of a controlled substance may be actual or constructive.” Taylor v. State, 13 So.3d 77, 80 (Fla. 1st DCA 2009). The State acknowledges that Knight was not in actual possession of the cannabis at the time in question, and relies on a theory of constructive possession. In order to prove constructive possession, the State must prove that the accused had dominion and control over the contraband and that he had knowledge that the contraband was in his presence. J.J.N. v. State, 877 So.2d 806, 809 (Fla. 5th DCA 2004).⁵ When the place where the contraband is found is not in the exclusive possession of a defendant, knowledge of the presence of the contraband on the premises and the accused's ability to maintain control over it will not be inferred, but must be established by independent proof. Id. at 809–10. “Mere proximity to contraband is not sufficient to establish constructive possession.” Id.

In this case, Knight does not challenge the State's evidence as to “dominion and control.” The State presented evidence that the cannabis was found in a suitcase that belonged to Knight, in the passenger compartment of the car he was driving. This evidence was clearly sufficient to establish Knight's dominion and control over the cannabis. Instead, Knight focuses on the knowledge element, arguing that because Chad Harris had unsupervised access to the luggage after Deputy Murphy removed Knight from the car, Harris could have slipped the marijuana into the luggage without Knight's knowledge shortly before the vehicle search. This is the same argument that Knight made at trial in support of his motion for judgment of acquittal.

With respect to this argument, we believe Knight's case to be indistinguishable from the Second District's decision in N.K.W. In that case, a juvenile, N.K.W., had been adjudicated delinquent for possession of LSD. Police found the LSD in N.K.W.'s wallet on a shelf during execution of a search warrant at a residence. N.K.W. was inside the residence attending a party when police found the LSD in his wallet. N.K.W., 788 So.2d at 1037. Although the juvenile admitted that the wallet was his, he denied knowledge of the LSD—hypothesizing that because the party was hosted in part to celebrate his upcoming birthday, one of his friends could have placed the LSD in his wallet without his knowledge, as a surprise birthday gift. Citing to Cook, the Second District held that reversal was required because the state failed to present any “direct evidence” that was inconsistent with N.K.W.'s “reasonable hypothesis of innocence” that someone else placed the LSD in his wallet. Id. at 1038.

In Cook, the defendant was arrested and charged with possession of a crack pipe and its residue that had been found in her purse, during the raid of a bar where she worked as a dancer. The defendant testified that she had left her purse on the bar—where others had access to it—during her dance routines, and hypothesized that someone else could have placed the crack pipe there without her knowledge. Because the evidence “suggesting that [the defendant] knew of the presence of the crack pipe within her purse was entirely circumstantial [,]” the First District held that the state was required to produce evidence “inconsistent with the defendant's reasonable hypothesis of innocence [.]” Cook, 571 So.2d at 531–32. Because the state presented no evidence inconsistent with the hypothesis that someone else could have place the contraband in the defendant's purse, the court held that the motion for judgment of acquittal should have been granted, and reversed the conviction. Id. at 532.

These two ...