State v. White

• Decision Date: 23 December 2004
• Docket Number: No. SC02-2277.,SC02-2277.
• Citation: 891 So.2d 502,29 Fla. L. Weekly S 821
• Parties: STATE of Florida, Petitioner, v. James Christopher WHITE, Respondent.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

891 So.2d 502

29 Fla. L. Weekly S 821

STATE of Florida, Petitioner, v. James Christopher WHITE, Respondent.

No. SC02-2277.

Supreme Court of Florida.

December 23, 2004.

Charles J. Crist, Jr., Attorney General, Tallahassee, FL, Richard L. Polin, Miami Bureau Chief, Criminal Appeals, Miami, FL, James W. Rogers, Tallahassee Bureau Chief, Criminal Appeals and Thomas H. Duffy, Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, FL, for Petitioner.

Nancy A. Daniels, Public Defender and Robert S. Friedman, Assistant Public Defender, Second Judicial Circuit, Tallahassee, FL, for Respondent.

CANTERO, J.

The Jimmy Ryce Act, sections 394.910-.931, Florida Statutes (1999), provides for the involuntary civil commitment of persons found to be sexually violent predators. For someone to be civilly committed under the Ryce Act, a factfinder must determine by clear and convincing evidence that the respondent (1) has been convicted of an enumerated sexually violent offense; and (2) suffers from a mental abnormality or personality disorder that makes the person likely to engage in acts of sexual violence if not confined in a secure facility for long-term control, care, and treatment. See § 394.912(10), Fla. Stat. (1999). The respondent in this case was civilly committed under the Ryce Act. We must decide whether the United States Supreme Court's decision in Kansas v. Crane, 534 U.S. 407, 122 S.Ct. 867, 151 L.Ed.2d 856 (2002), imposed an additional, extra statutory but constitutionally required element necessary to commit a respondent under the Ryce Act, about which the jury must be instructed: namely, that the respondent has serious difficulty controlling behavior. In the decision under review, the First District Court of Appeal held that Crane did impose an additional element. See White v. State, 826 So.2d 1043, 1044 (Fla. 1st DCA 2002). In Hale v. State, 834 So.2d 254, 256 (Fla. 2d DCA 2002), on the other hand, the court held it did not. These two holdings expressly and directly conflict. We accepted jurisdiction to resolve the conflict. See art. V, § 3(b)(3), Fla. Const. For the reasons explained below, we quash the First District's decision and hold that Crane does not impose a fourth element of proof in a civil commitment proceeding under the Ryce Act. Therefore, the jury need not be instructed that the respondent must have serious difficulty controlling behavior.

I.

In 1995, James White was convicted of sexual battery. In 1999, before his release from prison, the State initiated involuntary civil commitment proceedings under the Ryce Act. At the hearing, the trial court gave the following jury instructions concerning the elements necessary to involuntarily commit White:

To prove the Respondent, James Christopher White, is a sexually violent predator the state must prove each of the following three elements by clear and convincing evidence.

Number one, James Christopher White has been convicted of a sexually violent offense. And number two, James Christopher White suffers from a mental abnormality or personality disorder. And number three, the mental abnormality or personality disorder makes the person likely to engage in acts of sexual violence if not confined in a secured facility for long term control, care and treatment.

A "sexually violent offense" is sexual battery.

A "mental abnormality" means mental condition affecting a person's emotional or volitional capacity which predisposes the person to commit sexually violent offenses. "Likely to engage in acts of sexual violence" means a person's propensity to commit acts of sexual violence is of such a degree as to pose a menace to the health and safety of others.

It is undisputed that the trial court used the standard jury instruction for civil commitment under the Ryce Act, and that the standard jury instruction tracked the statutory language.

White requested that, in addition to these instructions, the court also instruct the jury that, to be committed, White must be "unable to control his dangerous behavior."¹ The trial court denied White's proposed instruction. The jury unanimously found White a sexually violent predator subject to civil commitment.

On appeal, the First District found that the trial judge erred in refusing White's "request to instruct the jury as to an essential element of proof" under the Ryce Act. The First District interpreted the Supreme Court's decision in Crane, 534 U.S. at 407, 122 S.Ct. 867, as adding a fourth element of proof — that the respondent has serious difficulty controlling his or her behavior — to the Kansas Sexually Violent Predator Act. White, 826 So.2d at 1044. Therefore, according to the First District, White was entitled to his requested instruction. See id.

We must now consider two issues: first, whether Crane imposes a fourth element required for civil commitment and, therefore, requires an additional jury instruction; and second, whether under Crane there was sufficient proof in this case that White has serious difficulty controlling his behavior.

II.

We first consider whether Crane imposes any new requirements. We begin by reviewing the relevant United States Supreme Court decisions on the issue. We next review the statute at issue here — the Ryce Act. We then analyze cases from Florida and other states considering the Ryce Act and similar statutes in light of Crane.

A.

We first examine the two United States Supreme Court decisions relevant to this issue. In Kansas v. Hendricks, 521 U.S. 346, 117 S.Ct. 2072, 138 L.Ed.2d 501 (1997), the Court addressed a challenge to the Kansas Sexually Violent Predator Act, which, like the Ryce Act, "establishes procedures for the civil commitment of persons who, due to a `mental abnormality' or a `personality disorder,' are likely to engage in `predatory acts of sexual violence.'" Hendricks, 521 U.S. at 350, 117 S.Ct. 2072. The Kansas Supreme Court had invalidated the act, holding that it violated Hendricks's substantive due process rights because the act's definition of "mental abnormality" did not satisfy what the court perceived to be the Supreme Court's "mental illness" requirement in the civil commitment context. In re Hendricks, 259 Kan. 246, 912 P.2d 129, 138 (1996). The Supreme Court, however, held that the Kansas Act's definition of "mental abnormality" satisfied substantive due process requirements. Hendricks, 521 U.S. at 356, 117 S.Ct. 2072. Specifically, the Court stated:

The challenged Act unambiguously requires a finding of dangerousness either to one's self or to others as a prerequisite to involuntary confinement.... The statute thus requires proof of more than a mere predisposition to violence; rather, it requires evidence of past sexually violent behavior and a present mental condition that creates a likelihood of such conduct in the future if the person is not incapacitated. As we have recognized, "[p]revious instances of violent behavior are an important indicator of future violent tendencies."

A finding of dangerousness, standing alone, is ordinarily not a sufficient ground upon which to justify indefinite involuntary commitment. We have sustained civil commitment statutes when they have coupled proof of dangerousness with the proof of some additional factor, such as a "mental illness" or "mental abnormality." These added statutory requirements serve to limit involuntary civil confinement to those who suffer from a volitional impairment rendering them dangerous beyond their control. The Kansas Act is plainly of a kind with these other civil commitment statutes: It requires a finding of future dangerousness, and then links that finding to the existence of a "mental abnormality" or "personality disorder" that makes it difficult, if not impossible, for the person to control his dangerous behavior. The precommitment requirement of a "mental abnormality" or "personality disorder" is consistent with the requirements of these other statutes that we have upheld in that it narrows the class of persons eligible for confinement to those who are unable to control their dangerousness.

Id. at 357-58, 117 S.Ct. 2072 (citations omitted). The Court concluded that Hendricks's admitted lack of volitional control, coupled with a prediction of future dangerousness, adequately distinguished him "from other dangerous persons who are perhaps more properly dealt with exclusively through criminal proceedings." Id. at 360, 117 S.Ct. 2072. Therefore, the statute satisfied substantive due process requirements. Id.

Three years later, the Kansas Supreme Court interpreted Hendricks. It held that Hendricks required "a finding that the defendant cannot control his dangerous behavior" — even if problems of "emotional capacity" and not "volitional capacity" prove the "source of bad behavior" warranting commitment. In re Crane, 269 Kan. 578, 7 P.3d 285, 289-90 (2000). The Kansas Supreme Court interpreted Hendricks as requiring the state always to prove that a dangerous individual is completely unable to control his behavior. On review, the United States Supreme Court held that Hendricks imposed no requirement of total or complete lack of control. Crane, 534 U.S. at 411, 122 S.Ct. 867. The Court interpreted Hendricks as follows:

Hendricks referred to the Kansas Act as requiring a "mental abnormality" or "personality disorder" that makes it "difficult, if not impossible, for the [dangerous] person to control his dangerous behavior." The word "difficult" indicates that the lack of control to which [the Supreme Court] referred was not absolute.... Insistence upon absolute lack of control would risk barring the civil commitment of highly dangerous persons suffering severe mental abnormalities.

Id. at 411-12, 122 S.Ct. 867 (citations omitted). In other words, "[i]t is enough to say that there must be proof of serious difficulty in controlling behavior." Id. at 413, 122 S.Ct. 867.

The Supreme Court noted that in Hendricks, it did not give to the phrase "lack of control" a particularly narrow or...