Case Title: State v. Wilson

Citation: 686 So. 2d 569

Docket Number: 87575

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 1996-12-26T00:00:00Z

Document:
686 So. 2d 569 (1996)
STATE of Florida, Petitioner,
v.
Milo WILSON, Respondent.
No. 87575.

Supreme Court of Florida.
December 26, 1996.
Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General; Carolyn M. Snurkowski, Assistant Deputy Attorney General, Tallahassee, and Georgina Jimenez-Orosa, Senior Assistant Attorney General, West Palm Beach, for Petitioner.
Richard L. Jorandby, Public Defender and Louis G. Carres, Assistant Public Defender, Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, West Palm Beach, for Respondent.
SHAW, Justice.
We have for review Wilson v. State, 668 So. 2d 998 (Fla. 4th DCA 1995), wherein the court certified:
See id. at 999-1000. We have jurisdiction. Art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. Const. We answer both questions in the negative and quash Wilson.
Milo Wilson and an accomplice accosted and robbed Mr. Ramsaroop and his companion, Ms. Wells, in a Wal-Mart parking lot, September 23, 1993. Wilson was arrested a few minutes later, charged with armed robbery, and convicted of grand theft. The district court reversed for two reasons: 1) The "reasonable doubt" comments made by the judge to the venire constituted fundamental error, and 2) the State could not seek a conviction on grand theft as a permissive lesser included offense of armed robbery because the information did not allege the value of the property taken. The court remanded for a new trial on petit theft and certified the above questions.
The State contends that the "reasonable doubt" comments were not improper, or alternatively, that if they were improper the error was not fundamental and required a contemporaneous objection.
Prior to selecting the jury, the judge spoke to the entire venire about "cardinal rules," which he said apply "in every criminal trial all over the United States of America."
The trial judge's preliminary instruction on reasonable doubt was not incorrect, as such. However, it was at least ambiguous to the extent that it might have been construed as either minimizing the importance of reasonable doubt or shifting the burden to the defendant to prove that a reasonable doubt existed. Notwithstanding, in view of the fact that the trial judge gave the standard jury instruction on reasonable doubt at the close of the evidence and told the jury that it must follow the standard instructions, we cannot say that error was committed. While we can understand why trial judges might wish to acquaint the jury with the concept of reasonable doubt at an early stage in the proceeding, we strongly suggest that this be done only by reading in advance the approved standard jury instruction on the subject. Any extemporaneous explanation of sensitive legal issues that are already embraced within the standard jury instructions runs the risk of creating error.
In any event, even if it could be said that the judge committed error in making the preliminary comments on reasonable doubt, the error would not be fundamental. Any perceived ambiguity could have been clarified by the simple expedient of calling it to the judge's attention through a proper objection. We addressed a comparable situation in Archer v. State, 673 So. 2d 17 (Fla.), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 117 S. Ct. 197, 136 L. Ed. 2d 134 (1996):
Id. at 20 (citations omitted) (quoting Brown v. State, 124 So. 2d 481, 484 (Fla.1960)).
We answer both certified questions in the negative and quash Wilson.[1] We remand for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
KOGAN, C.J., and OVERTON, GRIMES, HARDING, WELLS and ANSTEAD, JJ., concur.
[1]  We decline to address the State's second claim since it is unrelated to the certified questions.