White v. Miami Home Milk Producers Ass'n
| Citation | 197 So. 125,143 Fla. 518 |
| Parties | WHITE v. MIAMI HOME MILK PRODUCERS ASS'N et al. |
| Decision Date | 21 June 1940 |
| Court | United States State Supreme Court of Florida |
Rehearing Denied July 12, 1940.
Error to Circuit Court, Dade County; Paul D. Barns, Judge.
Action by Charles A. White against the Miami Home Milk Producers Association and others, for malicious prosecution, false imprisonment, and conspiracy. To review a judgment on a directed verdict for defendants, plaintiff brings error.
Affirmed.
COUNSEL Knight & Green, of Miami, for plaintiff in error.
George L. Patterson, of Miami, for defendants in error.
Plaintiff and defendants in error were plaintiff and defendants respectively in the trial court and will, for the sake of brevity, be designated in this opinion by these original titles.
The declaration charged, in the first count, that the defendant association through its agents, the individual defendants with malice and without probable cause, complained to the county solicitor that the plaintiff embezzled money from the association and caused an information to be filed and a warrant to be issued resulting in the incarceration of defendant; that he was tried and found not guilty.
The second count contained allegations that the defendant association by its agents caused the defendant to be wrongfully detained of his liberty.
In the third count it was averred that the association by the individuals '* * * maliciously conspired and confederated [with the individuals] to maliciously prosecute the plaintiff so as to injure him in his name and reputation and cause him to lose the position held by him * * *'; that to consummate the plan the association through its agents and without reason or probable cause made the complaint in the manner and with the result appearing from our analysis of the first count.
Damages were sought for loss of work, reputation, credit and injury to mind, body and business.
The three counts respectively were calculated to present cases of malicious prosecution, false imprisonment and conspiracy.
One hundred and fifty-nine pleas were filed buy by an order of the court on demurrers to them the number was reduced to eighteen, i. e., nine of 'not guilty'; three on the part of the association denying any authority of the co-defendants to act in its behalf; six, to the first and third counts, asserting that the pleader did no more than fairly present facts to the solicitor who was then '* * * left * * * to act upon his own judgment * * *'.
At the conclusion of the plaintiff's testimony the court granted the defendants' motion for a directed verdict, observing that elements indispensable to a recovery had not been proven, namely, want of probable cause and wrongful arrest.
A general account was given by the plaintiff of the various positions he had held over a long period of time and of his employment with the defendant association. In his story he told of a feeling of animosity which had developed between himself and one of the individual defendants and of the sympathy which was shown him by the manager of the company who subsequently gave him a letter of recommendation for his use in securing other employment.
He was first arrested by city police and detained for nearly two days. The second day after his release on bond he was apprehended on a capias issued by the Criminal Court of Record based on an information charging embezzlement. The information bore the affidavit of the acting solicitor that it was founded on sworn facts which if true constituted the offense alleged. Names of the witnesses appearing on the information did not include those of the defendants.
Clearly a necessary ingredient of the charge of malicious prosecution is malice, a fact to be proven by the plaintiff and although it may be inferred from want of probable cause these elements are not synonymous.
We think that there was failure of the plaintiff in his undertaking to establish malice on the part of the defendants as he had alleged. There was some testimony of ill feeling on the part of one of the individual defendants but the evidence of this condition could hardly be dignified as proof that all of them acted maliciously. As we have pointed out, the names of the...
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Colonial Stores, Inc. v. Scarbrough
...Co. v. Smith, supra. However, malice is not legally synonymous with the absence of probable cause. White v. Miami Home Milk Producers Association, 143 Fla. 518, 197 So. 125 (1940). The inference of malice from the absence of probable cause is not one of law but merely a presumption of fact ......
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Manners v. Cannella, Case No. 15-cv-62071-BLOOM/Valle
...for false arrest and false imprisonment, summary judgment was properly entered in the County's favor." (citing White v. Miami Home Milk Prods. Ass'n, 143 Fla. 518 (1940); Metropolitan Dade County v. Norton, 543 So. 2d 1301 (Fla. 3d DCA), rev. denied, 551 So. 2d 462 (Fla. 1989); and Rothstei......
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Miami-Dade Cnty. v. Asad
...ingredient of the charge of malicious prosecution” and it is not synonymous with want of probable cause. White v. Miami Home Milk Producers Ass'n, 143 Fla. 518, 197 So. 125, 126 (1940) (emphasis added). “Malice is not only an essential element of malicious prosecution but it is the gist of ......
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