Case ID: so2d_676/html/0063-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "ALLEN, Judge. LAWRENCE, Judge,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Jamie HARGROVE, Appellant, v. FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS, Appellee.
    No. 95-4040.
    District Court of Appeal of Florida, First District.
    July 9, 1996.
    
      Jamie Hargrove, Starke, pro se.
    Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, and Britt Thomas, Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, for Appellee.
   ALLEN, Judge.

The appellant challenges an order by which his petition for a writ of mandamus was summarily denied. In this petition the appellant, who is an inmate in the state prison system, alleged that he received inadequate notice of a disciplinary charge. The factual recitations in the petition are consistent with the copy of the disciplinary report attached thereto, which indicates that a correctional officer witnessed an assault and observed the appellant in the immediate area. But the circumstances and manner of the charged assault (including the type of weapon used and the identity of the victim), and the appellant’s involvement therein, are not otherwise clearly delineated in this report. The petition thus suggests that the appellant did not receive sufficient notice to satisfy the due process requirements of Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974), and the petition therefore should not have been summarily denied. The appealed order is accordingly reversed, and the case is remanded.

WEBSTER, J., concurs.

LAWRENCE, J., concurs with written opinion.

LAWRENCE, Judge,

specially concurring.

I agree that the notice of disciplinary charges which Hargrove alleges that he received is inadequate under due process requirements. However, in response to an order to show cause, the Department of Corrections contended that Hargrove in fact received more extensive notice than he alleges in his petition. Thus, on remand, in my view, the trial court may address this factual dispute in an evidentiary hearing or at trial in determining whether Hargrove received adequate notice.

Hargrove’s allegation that the evidence presented to the disciplinary committee was insufficient to support a finding of guilty is, in my view, without merit. The trial court was fully justified in not granting relief on this basis.