Rossi v. State
| Decision Date | 16 June 1982 |
| Docket Number | No. 80-2029,80-2029 |
| Citation | 416 So.2d 1166 |
| Parties | Thomas Edward ROSSI, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Richard L. Jorandby, Public Defender, and Jon May and Ron McRae, Asst. Public Defenders, West Palm Beach, for appellant.
Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Russell S. Bohn, Asst. Atty. Gen., West Palm Beach, for appellee.
This appeal presents the issue of whether, when a defendant's sole defense to the crimes charged is insanity, the state, in an effort to meet its burden of proving the requisite level of intent to commit the crimes and to negate the insanity defense, may produce evidence of a similar criminal act committed by the defendant some ten years previously. The trial judge permitted such evidence to be admitted and this court agrees with his ruling.
Appellant Thomas Edward Rossi was convicted of kidnapping, sexual battery, and two counts of attempted second degree murder. These convictions resulted from a May 23, 1980 incident in which appellant shot and blinded the victim as she was driving on Sample Road in Fort Lauderdale; kidnapped her under the pretext of taking her to a hospital; committed a sexual battery upon her in his apartment; and fled. After a pretrial hearing, the trial judge ruled that the state could introduce evidence that appellant, on August 21, 1970, had struck another woman with his car as she rode her bicycle in New Paltz, New York; kidnapped her under the pretext of taking her to a doctor; sexually attacked her in the woods; and fled. In ruling such evidence admissible, the judge took into consideration the fact that appellant had been imprisoned during most of the period between the two crimes, a factor which he felt made evidence of the earlier crime more relevant than it might otherwise have seemed. The judge also instructed the jury on several occasions that evidence of the earlier crimes was to be considered only for the limited purpose of showing appellant's "motive, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, or the absence of mistake or accident" regarding the crimes for which appellant was then on trial. 1
In his brief appellant states that the "only question before this court is whether appellant's mental condition in 1970 was relevant to his mental condition in 1980." The state responds that evidence of the collateral crimes was necessary not only to negate the insanity defense but also to prove the requisite level of intent necessary to convict appellant of the crimes charged.
In Florida a defendant is entitled to be acquitted if he was insane at the time of the offense:
A person cannot be legally punished for an act committed by him while insane, although such act would be criminal if done by a sane person. If by reason of insanity a person is incapable of forming intent, he cannot be regarded by the law as guilty. The mental derangement which will excuse must be of such a nature as to render the one afflicted incapable of forming a criminal intent. (Footnote omitted.)
14 Fla.Jur.2d Criminal Law, § 27 (1979).
Since sanity is the normal and usual condition of mankind and the law presumes that every individual is sane, the burden devolves on the one charged with a crime to overcome such presumption and establish his plea of insanity by showing that he was legally insane at the time of the commission of the act in question. But where an accused has raised a reasonable doubt as to his sanity at the time of the offense, or even where such reasonable doubt appears from the prosecutor's case, the sanity of the accused must be proved by the prosecution as any other element of the offense, beyond a reasonable doubt. (Footnotes omitted.)
14 Fla.Jur.2d Criminal Law, § 35 (1979). See also State ex rel. Boyd v. Green, 355 So.2d 789 (Fla.1978).
In essence appellant's defense in this case was that his actions against the victim resulted from an isolated and temporary mental breakdown. In considering the validity of such assertion we believe the jury was entitled to know that the appellant had engaged in virtually the identical conduct on a prior occasion. This evidence, of course, may...
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Chandler v. State, 60790
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