Smith v. State
| Decision Date | 12 April 1967 |
| Docket Number | No. 35574,35574 |
| Citation | 197 So.2d 497 |
| Parties | Howard SMITH, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida Supreme Court |
Robert E. Jagger, Public Defender, and Carleton L. Weidemeyer, Asst. Public Defender, for appellant.
Earl Faircloth, Atty. Gen., and Stanley D. Kupiszewski, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
The record in this case presents a situation of immense import, especially to the appellant, Howard Smith, and generally to defendants, charged with capital offenses who may entertain the thought of pleading nolo contendere or, for that matter, pleading guilty.
The history of the procedure followed in this case brings into focus the troublesome problem submitted to us for resolution. On 21 March 1966 the appellant was indicted for the crime of rape. Three days later he was arraigned and entered a plea of not guilty. The following month he changed his plea to one of nolo contendere evidently because various persons had reported that the trial judge was personally opposed to capital punishment and he believed that in such circumstances the judge would refrain from imposition of the extreme penalty. Just here we interpolate that in entering such a plea he took a calculated risk that the judge, after all, might inflict the death penalty and the judge was certainly not bound by such information as the appellant had gathered about the judge's personal attitude on the subject. So it might appear that the appellant had fallen into a trap, but if so, it was one that he himself had helped set.
But the problem is not as simple at that. Before proceeding to the more difficult facets of the case, we will resume the history of the procedure. Three days after the plea was changed from not guilty to nolo contendere the judge took testimony without the intervention of a jury, found the defendant guilty and, the next day, sentenced him to execution by electrocution. Then the judge denied motions to reconsider and to allow withdrawal of the plea of nolo contendere combined with an offer to proceed to trial. The following month the appellant filed his notice of appeal to this court and copy of the notice was served on the state attorney by an assistant public defender.
From this record emerges the primary question whether or not a plea of nolo contendere is acceptable in a capital case. The State finds in Peel v. State, 150 So.2d 281 (Fla.App.1963), support for the position that pleas of nolo contendere are entirely appropriate in capital cases but we do not discover in that decision the occasion for the direct holding on that legal problem. Peel was indicted for being an accessory before the fact to the crime of murder in the first degree and was sentenced to life imprisonment. True, his plea had been one of nolo contendere. But no death sentence became involved. Moreover, the plea was entered on condition that the defendant would be given a life sentence. Indeed the court commented that by making such a plea and 'receiving a life sentence, the defendant took his case from under the capital case category.' The court enlarged on this by stating, we apprehend by pure obiter dictum, that since this court had sanctioned pleas of guilty in capital cases there was 'no reason why a plea of nolo contendere * * * (could not) also be accepted in such a case.' According to the Attorney General's brief the ultimate decision in Peel was that the plea of nolo...
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Seay v. State
...281 (Fla.App.2d 1963) and discussion in Roberts v. State, 199 So.2d 340 (Fla.App.2d 1967). We are cognizant of our earlier Smith v. State, 197 So.2d 497 (Fla.1967), holding that a plea of nolo contendere cannot be accepted in a capital case. Smith was, of course, based upon then Fla.Stat. §......
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Fortson v. Hopper, 33811
...See North Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 91 S.Ct. 160, 27 L.Ed.2d 162 (1970); Bruno v. Cook, 224 So.2d 567 (Miss.1969); Smith v. State, 197 So.2d 497 (Fla.1967); Peel v. State, 210 So.2d 14 (Fla.1968), cert. denied, 394 U.S. 939, 89 S.Ct. 1220, 22 L.Ed.2d 472 Judgment affirmed. All the Ju......
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Russell v. State, 2521
...184 So.2d 458; Peel v. State, Fla.App.1963, 150 So.2d 281 (cert. den. 380 U.S. 986, 85 S.Ct. 1359, 14 L.Ed.2d 279); Smith v. State, Fla.1967, 197 So.2d 497.2 F.R.Cr.P. 1.170(a), 33 F.S.A. states 'A defendant may plead not guilty, guilty, or, with the consent of the court, nolo contendere. T......
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Chatman v. State
...guilty cannot be accepted in a capital case in Florida. As authority petitioner relies on the recent Supreme Court case of Smith v. State, Fla.1967, 197 So.2d 497, and a subsequent interpretation of that case by this court in Roberts v. State, Fla.App.1967, 199 So.2d 340. Those cases stand ......