Moore v. State
| Decision Date | 12 February 2020 |
| Docket Number | No. 3D19-1466,3D19-1466 |
| Citation | 298 So.3d 1208 |
| Parties | Zanniya MOORE, Petitioner, v. The STATE of Florida, Respondent. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Carlos J. Martinez, Public Defender, and John Eddy Morrison, Assistant Public Defender, for petitioner.
Ashley Moody, Attorney General, and Christina L. Dominguez, Assistant Attorney General, for respondent.
Before EMAS, C.J., and SCALES and LOBREE, JJ.
Petitioner Zanniya Moore was convicted of two misdemeanors stemming from an altercation at her daughter's elementary school. During Petitioner's trial in county court, the trial judge directed Petitioner's husband – who was to be tried separately for his arrest from the same incident – to step outside of the courtroom during Petitioner's testimony. Petitioner appealed her convictions to the Miami-Dade County Circuit Court and argued that the removal of her husband from the courtroom violated her right to a public trial under the Sixth Amendment of the United States Constitution.
The circuit court appellate division affirmed Petitioner's convictions. Petitioner seeks second-tier certiorari relief from this Court. We deny the petition because the appellate division applied the correct law when it adjudicated Petitioner's appeal.
On February 14, 2017, Petitioner entered the premises of her daughter's elementary school after her daughter was involved in an altercation with another student. Petitioner confronted the other student, and the school principal was forced to intercede and ask Petitioner to leave the school. When Petitioner refused, the principal called the police.
The police arrived and found Petitioner and her husband, Bernard Darling, engaged in further confrontational behavior in the vicinity of students. When Petitioner and Mr. Darling refused the police request to leave, the police arrested Mr. Darling. Petitioner then interfered with Mr. Darling's arrest and the police arrested Petitioner as well. By information, the State charged Petitioner with resisting an officer without violence, disturbing a school assembly, trespass on school grounds after warning, and disorderly conduct.1
Petitioner and her husband were tried separately. Petitioner's trial occurred first, on May 25-26, 2017. Prior to Petitioner's testimony on the second day of trial, the State sought Mr. Darling's removal from the courtroom. The State explained to the trial court that Petitioner's husband was scheduled for a separate trial commencing just days later on May 30, 2017. Over Petitioner's counsel objection, the trial court found the State's request "reasonable" and asked Mr. Darling to "step out" during Petitioner's testimony.
The entire exchange between the trial judge and the prosecutor, including Petitioner's counsel's objection, appears below:
After the trial court rendered its judgment and sentence based on the jury's guilty verdict, Petitioner appealed her two convictions to the circuit court appellate division. The sole basis of Petitioner's appeal, below, was that the trial court violated Petitioner's right to a public trial when it partially closed the trial proceedings by ordering Petitioner's husband to leave the courtroom during Petitioner's testimony.
While the appellate division recognized that there are circumstances in which a person may be removed from a courtroom during proceedings, it explained that, prior to removal, "a court must conduct an appropriate analysis as set forth by the Waller doctrine." The United States Supreme Court established the requirements for a courtroom closure in Waller v. Georgia, 467 U.S. 39, 48, 104 S.Ct. 2210, 81 L.Ed.2d 31 (1984), as follows:
[T]he party seeking to close the hearing must advance an overriding interest that is likely to be prejudiced, the closure must be no broader than necessary to protect that interest, the trial court must consider reasonable alternatives to closing the proceeding, and it must make findings adequate to support the closure.
In affirming Petitioner's conviction, the appellate division's decision acknowledged that the trial court did not undertake a formal Waller analysis. Nonetheless, the appellate division upheld Petitioner's convictions because it found that, because the courtroom closure was only "partial" (i.e., Mr. Darling alone was excluded) – as opposed to the complete courtroom closure that occurred in Waller – the trial court satisfied an applicable lesser standard than the "overriding interest" test articulated in Waller. Citing to several federal decisions as support for applying the more relaxed standard,2 the appellate division found that the trial court complied with a "substantial reason" test when it ordered the partial courtroom closure.
The appellate division determined that the State had advanced a substantial reason to remove Mr. Darling from the courtroom during his wife's testimony because of a potential taint to his testimony in his upcoming trial. Thus, the appellate division concluded that the trial court did not violate Petitioner's right to a public trial. Arguing that only the Waller "overriding interest" test is applicable to any courtroom closure – either complete or partial – Petitioner urges this Court to quash the appellate division's opinion below.
At the outset, we note that our second-tier certiorari review of an opinion of the circuit court appellate division is limited to whether the appellate division applied the correct law and afforded Petitioner due process. Haines City Cmty. Dev. v. Heggs, 658 So. 2d 523, 530 (Fla. 1995). As was the case with her appeal below, Petitioner's sole basis for certiorari relief is her assertion that the trial court violated the Sixth Amendment by sequestering her husband during Petitioner's testimony in her criminal trial.
Specifically, as relevant to our review, Petitioner argues that the appellate division applied the incorrect law when, instead of applying Waller's "overriding interest" test, it applied the less stringent "substantial reason" test. Petitioner relies primarily on the Florida Supreme Court decision in Kovaleski v. State, 103 So. 3d 859 (Fla. 2012).
In Kovaleski, the defendant was convicted of lewd and lascivious acts on a minor. Id. at 860. In conformity with section 918.16(2) of the Florida Statutes – a statute allowing for the partial closure of a courtroom during the testimony of a sexual abuse victim3 – the trial court partially closed the courtroom during the testimony of the victim. Id. at 861. The defendant challenged his conviction, asserting that the trial court's closing of the courtroom pursuant to the statute violated his Sixth Amendment right...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
The trial (conduct of trial, jury instructions, verdict)
...proceeding, and it must make findings adequate to support the closure.” ( Waller v. Georgia , 467 U.S. 39, 48 (1984)). Moore v. State, 298 So. 3d 1208 (Fla. 3d DCA 2020) An unmuted video of defendant’s arrest was entered into evidence. Defendant argued that it was improper for the trial jud......