Case ID: so2d_488/html/0668-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "PER CURIAM. GLICKSTEIN, Judge,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

STATE of Florida, Appellant, v. Richard Thomas CASTELLAN, Appellee.
    No. 85-1195.
    District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.
    May 21, 1986.
    Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Lee Rosenthal, Asst. Atty. Gen., West Palm Beach, for appellant.
    Fred Haddad of Sandstrom & Haddad, Fort Lauderdale, for appellee.
   PER CURIAM.

After being charged by information with second degree murder, appellee Castellan filed a sworn motion to dismiss. The gist of the motion was that the victim’s death was an accident, resulting from a struggle involving appellee, the victim, and the woman over whom the two men were fighting. As all three had possession of a pocketknife at some point in the altercation, it was unclear how or when the victim was stabbed. The state responded by filing a traverse which set forth, “The State neither admits nor denies the facts as alleged by the Defendant .... ” Although the state did deny a minor fact alleged by appellee, the traverse essentially contained a recitation of additional facts most of which were circumstantial. After a hearing the trial court determined that the state had failed to traverse material allegations, and granted the motion to dismiss.

We affirm. Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.190(d) provides:

(d) Traverse or Demurrer. The State may traverse or demur to a motion to dismiss which alleges factual matters. Factual matters alleged in a motion to dismiss shall be deemed admitted unless specifically denied by the State in such traverse. The court may receive evidence on any issue of fact necessary to the decision on the motion. A motion to dismiss under paragraph (c)(4) of this rule shall be denied if the State filed a traverse which with specificity denied under oath the material fact or facts alleged in the motion to dismiss. Such demurrer or traverse shall be filed a reasonable time before the hearing on the motion to dismiss.

If the state filed a traverse as required by the rule, a trial court has no choice but to deny a motion to dismiss. As we held in State v. Oberholtzer, 411 So.2d 376 (Fla. 4th DCA 1982), it is not necessary for the state to present additional facts consistent with guilt. The state need only deny with specificity the material facts alleged in the motion. Here, the state simply did not meet this minimum requirement as evidenced by the state’s refusal to deny the facts alleged by appellee. The additional facts alleged by the state only highlighted the weakness of the state’s case, and were actually consistent with appellee’s version. Even resolving all inferences against appel-lee, the state did not establish a prima facie case of guilt. See State v. Hunwick, 446 So.2d 214 (Fla. 4th DCA 1984).

AFFIRMED.

HERSEY, C.J., and DELL, J., concur.

GLICKSTEIN, J., concurs specially with opinion.

GLICKSTEIN, Judge,

concurring specialty-

I agree with all of the majority opinion and add that this case, to me, factually parallels McGriff v. State, 341 So.2d 1036 (Fla. 4th DCA 1977), which is amply described in the reporter. In that case we held where a charge was manslaughter, not murder, the trial court erred in not granting appellant’s motion for acquittal. Here, the state has not denied any of the following recitations in the sworn motion to dismiss.

THIRD: That on 23 May 1984, the Defendant and Merenda Haynes, a girl the Defendant was dating (as had been Ull-rich previously) returned to her apartment complex at 520 NE 20 St. in Wilton Manors, after having been out to dinner and a lounge.
FOURTH: That upon their return the decedent “pulled up” as Haynes and the Defendant were out of their car. As Ullrich came out. [sic] Haynes had words with Ullrich and then a fight ensuend [sic] between Ullrich and the Defendant where “they both ended up on the ground with Dennis (Ullrich) on top” and the Defendant eventually saying, “I give”. According to Haynes, Dennis Ull-rich won the fight.
FIFTH: That everything seemed to calm down, when Ullrich again started with Ms. Haynes, trying to get her in his car. The Defendant said she was not going with him. This enraged Ullrich.
EIGHTH: That after the Defendant told the decedent that Ms. Haynes was not going with him, the decedent became enraged and again attacked the Defendant CASTELLAN; the two began struggling on the ground. That after the first struggle, the Defendant’s pocket knife had fallen on the ground when the Defendant pulled his keys out of his pocket. The Decedent Ullrich apparently found and opened the same, and the Defendant CASTELLAN attempted to both protect himself from the same and wrestle the same away. A struggle ensued over the knife.
NINTH: That Ms. Haynes also grabbed the knife and was grappling with the two men. Somehow during this struggle the decedent became stabbed. Ms. Haynes, the sole eye-witness, does not know how or when, although she is sure she heard no words to evidence anyone was stabbed or any threatening words regarding a knife. Too, no others who heard the struggle heard any words regarding any knife. In fact, she doesn’t know whether Ullrich may have rolled over on the same during the struggle.

In McGriff the state conceded the gun discharged by accident. Here, the decedent opened the defendant’s closed pocket knife while it was on the ground, during the brawl.