State v. Little, 80-304
| Decision Date | 01 July 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. 80-304,80-304 |
| Citation | 400 So.2d 197 |
| Parties | STATE of Florida, Appellant, v. Robert L. LITTLE, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and C. Michael Barnette, Asst. Atty., Gen., Daytona Beach, for appellant.
Raymond E. Cramer, St. Cloud, for appellee.
We have for consideration before us an order of the trial court declaring
ORDERED AND ADJUDGED that Section 732.663 F.S. (sic) 1 does not charge a crime. It mere sets our a penalty for unlawfully poaching. Further, if this Section states a crime the State would have to prove the elements of poaching, that is the trespass and violation of sporting rights. Therefore the Motion to Dismiss is granted.
The order of the trial court is unclear. We are confused first by the "order that Section 732.663 (sic) does not charge a crime." We assume the order was meant to say "state" a crime and, if so, the implication is that the trial judge felt the statute was unconstitutionally vague. We have also been led to suspect the trial judge might have meant to say the statute does not allow for a prosecution for a crime because it fails to define the elements of poaching which were, at common law, as the order says, the trespass upon another's land and the violation of his "sporting rights." That means, essentially, the taking of game animals from another's property, either private or public. In order to take a wild animal, a game animal, it is obviously necessary to kill or capture it. Of course this is true of any animal which does not want to come, or cannot, by its own volition.
As has been often said it is our obligation to find an allegedly unconstitutionally vague statute constitutional if the application of ordinary logic and common understanding would permit. Board of Public Instruction of Broward County v. Doran, 224 So.2d 693 (Fla.1969). See Newman v. Carson, 280 So.2d 426 (Fla.1973) ().
Having read this statute and the information charging the crime we must conclude there is nothing vague or indistinct about what the Legislature meant when it wrote the statute and what the appellees were alleged to have done to violate it. This statute is surrounded by others which are obviously meant to protect alligators. Although this particular statute is the only one we have found which uses the word "poaching" or the word poach in any form, we cannot see how a person would be misled as to what acts are proscribed by the statute.
There are a number of statutes which provide for the penalty for the commission of acts which were under the common law, and still are, crimes. Just because the...
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