Case Title: Anderson v. State

Citation: 

Docket Number: SC18-1059

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 2020-03-05T00:00:00Z

Document:
Supreme Court of Florida 
 
 
____________ 
 
No. SC18-1059 
____________ 
 
TIMOTHY ANDERSON, 
Petitioner, 
 
vs. 
 
STATE OF FLORIDA, 
Respondent. 
 
March 5, 2020 
 
LAWSON, J. 
 
This case is before the Court for review of the First District Court of 
Appeal’s decision in Anderson v. State, 247 So. 3d 680 (Fla. 1st DCA 2018), 
which affirmed Timothy Anderson’s felony conviction for aggravated assault with 
a deadly weapon, an automobile, and rejected Anderson’s argument that his jury 
should have been instructed on reckless driving as a lesser-included offense.  The 
First District certified that its decision directly conflicts with Piggott v. State, 140 
So. 3d 666 (Fla. 4th DCA 2014), in which the Fourth District held on similar facts1 
                                          
 
 
1.  The Fourth District’s decision in Piggott references the defendant’s 
charge as aggravated assault with a deadly weapon within its harmless error 
analysis but as aggravated battery with a deadly weapon in the remainder of its 
 
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that a defendant is entitled to have his jury instructed on reckless driving as a lesser 
offense.  Anderson, 247 So. 3d at 684.  We have jurisdiction.  See art. V, § 3(b)(4), 
Fla. Const.  For the reasons explained below, we approve the First District’s 
decision in Anderson and disapprove the Fourth District’s decision in Piggott. 
BACKGROUND 
 
Timothy Anderson was charged with and convicted of aggravated assault 
with a deadly weapon after he drove his truck erratically and struck his girlfriend’s 
car.  Anderson, 247 So. 3d at 681.  The criminal information alleged that Anderson 
“did unlawfully and intentionally make an assault upon [Anderson’s girlfriend] 
with a motor vehicle, a deadly weapon[,] without intent to kill, contrary to 
[s]ection 784.021(1)(a), Florida Statutes [(2014)2].”  Id. at 682.  At trial, Anderson 
requested a jury instruction on the offense of reckless driving as a permissive 
lesser-included offense.  Id. at 681.  The trial court denied his request.  Id.  On 
appeal, Anderson argued entitlement to a new trial at which the judge instructs the 
                                          
 
opinion.  See Piggott, 140 So. 3d at 670.  But see id. at 668-71 (referencing the 
defendant’s charge and conviction as “aggravated battery with a deadly weapon”).  
Although aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and aggravated battery with a 
deadly weapon are different levels of offenses under chapter 784, Florida Statutes 
(2014), it is the nature of the deadly weapon, an automobile, and not whether the 
offense is an assault or battery, that is relevant to the conflict issue. 
 
2.  Although Anderson was charged under the 2014 version of this statute, 
there is no substantive difference between the 2014 version and the current version 
of section 784.021(1)(a). 
 
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jury on reckless driving as a lesser-included offense of aggravated assault with a 
deadly weapon.  Id. 
The First District affirmed Anderson’s conviction and sentence, reasoning 
that reckless driving is not a permissive lesser-included offense of aggravated 
assault with a deadly weapon, an automobile, unless the charging instrument 
alleges that the defendant was driving at the time of the offense—which the First 
District found not to have been alleged.  Id. at 683-84.  The First District also 
certified conflict with the Fourth District’s decision in Piggott, which came to the 
opposite conclusion, namely that reckless driving is a permissive lesser-included 
offense of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon so long as the weapon alleged 
is a motor vehicle and it is undisputed at trial that the defendant was driving.  Id. at 
684; Piggott, 140 So. 3d at 669, 671 n.1. 
ANALYSIS 
 
Anderson argues that because (1) the information alleged use of an 
automobile to commit the offense and (2) it was undisputed that he was driving at 
the time of the offense, he was entitled to a jury instruction on the charge of 
reckless driving as a permissive lesser-included offense.  We review this legal 
issue de novo.  See Khianthalat v. State, 974 So. 2d 359, 360 (Fla. 2008).  We 
reject this argument and will (1) explain the relevant law regarding permissive 
lesser-included offenses, (2) explain why reckless driving is not an applicable 
 
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lesser-included offense of the aggravated assault charge in this case, and (3) 
address Anderson’s specific arguments, which are based upon the analysis in 
Piggott and the dissent in Anderson.   
A. Permissive Lesser-Included Offenses. 
 
In In re Standard Jury Instructions in Criminal Cases, 431 So. 2d 594 (Fla. 
1981), we recognized two categories of lesser-included offenses: those 
“necessarily included in the offense charged,” id. at 596, which are not at issue 
here, and those “which may or may not be included in the offense charged, 
depending on the accusatory pleading and the evidence.”  Id.  This latter category 
is often referenced as “permissive” lesser-included offenses.  Stevens v. State, 226 
So. 3d 787, 790 (Fla. 2017).  “A permissive lesser included offense exists when 
‘the two offenses appear to be separate [on the face of the statutes], but the facts 
alleged in the accusatory pleadings are such that the lesser [included] offense 
cannot help but be perpetrated once the greater offense has been.’ ”  Sanders v. 
State, 944 So. 2d 203, 206 (Fla. 2006) (alterations in original) (quoting State v. 
Weller, 590 So. 2d 923, 925 n.2 (Fla. 1991)). 
This Court in Brown v. State, 206 So. 2d 377, 383 (Fla. 1968), overruled in 
part on other grounds by Standard Jury Instructions in Criminal Cases, 431 So. 2d 
at 597, described the process by which trial judges determine whether a permissive 
lesser-included offense is included in the offense charged, stating that “the trial 
 
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judge must examine the information to determine whether it alleges all of the 
elements of a lesser offense . . . [and] [i]f the accusation is present, then the judge 
must determine from the evidence whether it supports the allegation of the lesser 
included offense.”  A jury instruction on a permissive lesser-included offense “is 
appropriate only if the allegations of the greater offense contain all the elements of 
the lesser offense and the evidence at trial would support a verdict on the lesser 
offense.”  Williams v. State, 957 So. 2d 595, 599 (Fla. 2007).  A trial judge is 
therefore required to give a jury instruction on a permissive lesser-included offense 
(upon request) “if the following two conditions are met: ‘(1) the indictment or 
information must allege all the statutory elements of the permissive lesser included 
offense; and (2) there must be some evidence adduced at trial establishing all of 
these elements.’ ”  Khianthalat, 974 So. 2d at 361 (quoting Jones v. State, 666 So. 
2d 960, 964 (Fla. 3d DCA 1996)).  With respect to the first condition, “Florida law 
is well settled that the elements of an offense cannot be established by mere 
inference.”  State v. Von Deck, 607 So. 2d 1388, 1389 (Fla. 1992) (citing State v. 
Dye, 346 So. 2d 538, 541 (Fla. 1977)). 
Von Deck is instructive.  In that case, we accepted review to settle a conflict 
of decisions over whether a jury could be instructed on the charge of aggravated 
assault as a permissive lesser-included offense of the charge of attempted murder 
by shooting.  Id. at 1389.  We explained that aggravated assault includes an 
 
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element of “putting [the victim] in fear,” which is not an element of attempted 
murder and was not alleged in the information.  Id.  We expressly rejected the 
argument “that the element of ‘putting in fear’ can be established by inference, 
because a shooting is likely to create such fear,” id., explaining that while it would 
be true in some cases that being shot at will put the victim in fear, “it will not be 
true in all [cases because] . . . . [i]t is possible to commit an attempted murder 
without also committing aggravated assault, such as where the victim remains 
unaware of the attempted murder until some time has elapsed after the 
commission.”  Id.  We reiterated the well-settled rules “that the elements of an 
offense cannot be established by mere inference,” and that “an instruction cannot 
be given on a permissive lesser included offense unless both the accusatory 
pleading and the evidence support the commission of that offense.”  Id. (citing 
Brown, 206 So. 2d at 383). 
The requirement that an offense not be submitted to the jury as a permissive 
lesser-included offense unless all elements are alleged in the charging document 
for the greater offense is an application of the more general principle that juries are 
not to be instructed on uncharged crimes.  See generally, 15A Fla. Jur. 2d Criminal 
Law—Procedure § 2040 (2019).  We view this rule as justified on two bases.  The 
most obvious, and most often cited, is that the due process clause requires that a 
defendant be put on clear notice of all crimes for which he or she is in jeopardy of 
 
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being convicted and punished.  U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1; art. I, § 9, Fla. 
Const.; art. I, § 16(a), Fla. Const.; Weatherspoon v. State, 214 So. 3d 578, 583-84 
(Fla. 2017) (quoting Price v. State, 995 So. 2d 401, 404 (Fla. 2008)).  The second 
justification is found in Florida’s constitutional directive for separation of powers, 
art. II, § 3, Fla. Const., and the executive branch’s exclusive discretion under 
Florida law to prosecute or not prosecute an individual for crimes committed.  See 
ch. 27, Fla. Stat. (2019); see also Ayala v. Scott, 224 So. 3d 755, 759 n.2 (Fla. 
2017) (“[T]he power to prosecute . . . is a purely executive function . . . .”); State v. 
Bloom, 497 So. 2d 2, 3 (Fla. 1986) (“Under Florida’s constitution, the decision to 
charge and prosecute is an executive responsibility, and the state attorney has 
complete discretion in deciding whether and how to prosecute.”); Fulk v. State, 417 
So. 2d 1121, 1126 (Fla. 5th DCA 1982) (Cowart, J., concurring specially) 
(“Although state attorneys, like all attorneys, are officers of the court, the 
execution of criminal statutes by enforcement, including prosecution, is an 
executive function of government.  The state attorney, when acting as a 
prosecuting officer under article V, section 17, of the Florida Constitution and 
under chapter 27 of the Florida Statutes, is performing an executive function and 
not a judicial function.” (footnote omitted)).  Any judicial rule authorizing a 
defendant to present an uncharged offense for a jury’s consideration, over the 
objection of the prosecution, would interfere with the executive branch’s exclusive 
 
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authority to prosecute cases and would constitute a substantive change in Florida 
law.   
B. Application in This Case. 
We now turn to whether the information charging Anderson with aggravated 
assault with a deadly weapon alleged all statutory elements of reckless driving.  
“Reckless driving” is defined in section 316.192(1)(a), Florida Statutes (2014), 
which states that “[a]ny person who drives any vehicle in willful or wanton 
disregard for the safety of persons or property is guilty of reckless driving.”  
Florida’s standard jury instructions provide the following instruction for a violation 
of section 316.192(1)(a):    
To prove the crime of Reckless Driving, the State must prove 
the following beyond a reasonable doubt:  
 
(Defendant) drove a vehicle in Florida with a willful or wanton 
disregard for the safety of persons or property. 
 
See Fla. Std. Jury Instr. (Crim.) 28.5.  Obviously, driving is an essential element of 
the crime of reckless driving. 
The information in this case alleged that Anderson “did unlawfully and 
intentionally make an assault upon [Anderson’s girlfriend] with a motor vehicle, a 
deadly weapon[,] without intent to kill, contrary to [s]ection 784.021(1)(a), Florida 
Statutes.”  Anderson, 247 So. 3d at 682.  Although a reader might infer from this 
language that Anderson was driving the vehicle, the information does not actually 
 
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make that allegation.  Instead, consistent with the elements of the aggravated 
assault charge,3 the information simply alleges that Anderson made “an assault 
upon” the victim “with a motor vehicle.”  Id.  Because the information charging 
aggravated assault did not allege driving, an essential element of reckless driving, 
we readily conclude that the trial court correctly denied Anderson’s request for an 
instruction on reckless driving as a permissive lesser-included offense, and that the 
First District correctly affirmed as to this issue.    
C. Anderson’s Contrary Arguments. 
First, Anderson argues that Piggott contains a correct analysis and 
application of the first condition that must be met before a separate offense 
qualifies as a permissive lesser-included offense: that “the indictment or 
information must allege all the statutory elements of the permissive lesser included 
offense.”  Piggott, 140 So. 3d at 669 (quoting Khianthalat, 974 So. 2d at 361).  
However, instead of analyzing the language of the charging instrument in Piggott’s 
case, the Fourth District seems to have concluded that alleging an automobile as a 
deadly weapon constitutes an allegation of driving as a matter of law.   See id. 
                                          
 
 
3.  “Aggravated assault” is an “assault . . . [w]ith a deadly weapon without 
intent to kill.”  § 784.021(1)(a).  “Assault” is defined in section 784.011(1), Florida 
Statutes (2014), as “an intentional, unlawful threat by word or act to do violence to 
the person of another, coupled with an apparent ability to do so, and doing some 
act which creates a well-founded fear in such other person that such violence is 
imminent.” 
 
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(“conclud[ing] that reckless driving is a permissive lesser included offense of 
aggravated battery with a deadly weapon when the alleged deadly weapon is an 
automobile” and reiterating that “the charge of aggravated battery with a deadly 
weapon alleges all of the statutory elements of reckless driving when the alleged 
deadly weapon is an automobile”).4  Although Piggott cites two cases in support of 
its conclusion, see id. (citing Wallace v. State, 688 So. 2d 429, 429-30 (Fla. 3d 
DCA 1997), and LaValley v. State, 633 So. 2d 1126, 1127 (Fla. 5th DCA 1994)), 
both of the cited opinions state that the information at issue in those cases alleged 
driving.  Wallace, 688 So. 2d at 430 (“The allegation within the information that 
Wallace intentionally drove his car in such a way as to threaten the officers was 
‘sufficient to include the willful and wanton disregard for the safety of others’ 
                                          
 
 
4.  In fairness to the Fourth District, we find it appropriate to point out that 
the briefing before that court did not illuminate a clear path to the correct legal 
analysis.  In its answer brief, for example, the State seemed to accept that alleging 
use of an automobile constituted an allegation of driving, and focused instead on 
the intent elements associated with each crime and on whether any error in refusing 
to give the instruction constituted harmless error.  Answer Brief of Appellee at 4-7, 
Piggott v. State, 140 So. 3d 666 (Fla. 4th DCA 2014) (No. 4D12-2704).  Even on 
rehearing, when the State first argued that “in order to be entitled to an instruction 
on the crime of reckless driving, there needed to be an allegation in the charging 
document that the defendant committed the battery by driving the automobile,” the 
State neither expounded on its argument nor cited Von Deck, 607 So. 2d 1388, or 
any other case setting forth the well-settled law that an element cannot be inferred 
in this context.  Appellee’s Motion for Rehearing and/or Motion for Rehearing En 
Banc and Motion for Certified Question of Great Public Importance at 1-5, Piggott 
v. State, 140 So. 3d 666 (Fla. 4th DCA 2014) (No. 4D12-2704). 
 
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necessary to establish reckless driving.” (quoting LaValley, 663 So. 2d at 1127)) 
(emphasis added); LaValley, 633 So. 2d at 1127 (“We believe that a charge that 
one committed an aggravated assault by intentionally driving her vehicle in a 
threatening manner subsumes the elements of reckless driving.”) (emphasis 
added).5   
By contrast, according to the Fourth District’s opinion, the State merely 
alleged that Piggott “did unlawfully and intentionally touch or strike [the victim] 
against his will with a deadly weapon, to wit: a Kia Sephia four-door automobile,” 
Piggott, 140 So. 3d at 669 (alteration in original), which only implies driving and 
does not allege driving.  Accepting Anderson’s argument on this issue would 
require that we ignore or recede from Florida’s “well[-]settled [law] that the 
elements of an offense cannot be established by mere inference,” Von Deck, 607 
So. 2d at 1389, which we are unwilling to do.  
As a factual matter, alleging use of an automobile in this context is not the 
same as alleging driving because an automobile could be used to commit the 
greater offense without driving, as the State pointed out to the Fourth District on 
rehearing, see Piggott, 140 So. 3d at 671 n.1 (“According to the state, ‘one can 
                                          
 
 
5.  However, it is unclear how the Fifth District reached the conclusion that 
the charging document alleged that the defendant drove the vehicle when such was 
not included in its earlier recitation of the charging document’s language.  See 
LaValley, 633 So. 2d at 1127. 
 
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batter another person with an automobile with[out] the act of driving the 
automobile (e.g., by slamming the hood or door of a car on the head of a victim of 
dropping a car from a crane onto a victim).’ ”), and as the State argues here.  With 
respect to the aggravated assault charge in this case, and analogous to the analysis 
in Von Deck, one could commit aggravated assault with a motor vehicle without 
driving it, by, for example, pushing an unmanned vehicle down a hill toward the 
victim, threatening to crush part of the victim’s body with a vehicle door or trunk 
lid, or threatening to lock the victim in a trunk and roll the vehicle into a body of 
water.  Cf. Von Deck, 607 So. 2d at 1389 (explaining that, as a factual matter, “[i]t 
is possible to commit an attempted murder without also committing aggravated 
assault, such as where the victim remains unaware of the attempted murder until 
some time has elapsed after the commission”). 
Anderson attempts to bolster his reliance on Piggott by pointing out the far 
greater likelihood that a person committing an aggravated assault using an 
automobile would do so by driving than by any other method.  This argument 
misses the point.  The existence of a foreseeable way that an automobile could be 
used to commit an aggravated assault or battery without driving, irrespective of the 
probable frequency of occurrence, means that alleging use of a vehicle as a deadly 
weapon cannot be treated, factually, as an allegation of driving.   
 
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Finally, Anderson relies heavily on the dissent in Anderson, which posits 
that:   
Limiting review solely to the information as originally 
drafted—and forcing trial judges to ignore subsequent indisputable 
factual developments—is a recipe for gamesmanship when defendants 
request instructions on lesser-included offenses.  Because an 
information’s content is exclusively controlled by the State, a game of 
“heads I win, tails you lose” can result if a Spartan information is 
drafted, alleging aggravated assault but leaving out whether the car 
was driven, thereby precluding a defendant from claiming a legitimate 
lesser-included offense based on the facts developed prior to trial; no 
suggestion is made that was the intent here, but that is the result.  Had 
the State alleged in its information against Anderson that the assault 
upon the victim was by “driving with a motor vehicle,” it could not 
now argue that the lesser-included offense of reckless driving was 
precluded.  What an odd result: Anderson loses his right to the lesser-
included offense instruction of reckless driving simply because the 
original information left out the word “driving”—even though 
everyone knew pre-trial that was the means of assault. 
 
Anderson, 247 So. 3d at 685 (Makar, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part).6  
 
These points do not give us pause.  First, the law is clear that the facts as 
they are known to the State at the time of charging, or “subsequent[ly] . . . 
develop[ed],” id., including at trial, are legally irrelevant to a trial court’s 
determination of whether “the allegations of the greater offense contain all the 
                                          
 
 
6.  Judge Makar concurred only in the decision to certify conflict with 
Piggott, which he viewed as “set[ting] forth the better approach in deciding 
whether a jury instruction on a lesser-included offense requested by a defendant 
should be given.”  Anderson, 247 So. 3d at 684 (Makar, J., concurring in part and 
dissenting in part).   
 
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elements of the lesser offense,” Williams, 957 So. 2d at 599, which is what this 
Court’s precedent clearly requires a trial judge to first examine when determining 
whether a separate offense constitutes a permissible lesser-included offense.  See 
Khianthalat, 974 So. 2d at 361 (explaining that for a separate charge to constitute a 
permissive lesser-included offense “the indictment or information must allege all 
the statutory elements of the permissive lesser included offense” (quoting Jones, 
666 So. 2d at 964)).  The charging document does not change based upon 
“subsequent indisputable factual developments,” Anderson, 247 So. 3d at 685 
(Makar, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part), unless the State chooses to 
amend the information and is permitted to do so.  Here, the information was never 
amended. 
Second, the notion that the charging information should be viewed in light of 
the evidence presented at trial inappropriately conflates the two independent 
considerations set forth by this Court for decades as the test for determining what 
constitutes a permissive lesser-included offense, see, e.g., Brown, 206 So. 2d at 
383, essentially eliminating the first requirement that all elements of a lesser 
offense “must” be factually alleged in the charging document in order for the 
offense to qualify as a permissive lesser-included offense.  Khianthalat, 974 So. 2d 
at 361.   
 
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Third, this result would implicate separation of powers concerns by 
interfering with the charging discretion granted to the executive by substantive 
law.  See art. V, § 17, Fla. Const.; ch. 27, Fla. Stat. (2019); Bloom, 497 So. 2d at 3.  
There is nothing sinister about a prosecuting authority exercising its charging 
discretion strategically in this context.  Had the State elected to charge reckless 
driving, it invariably would have done so in a second count.  Reckless driving 
would have then been presented to the jury as an additional charge—not as a lesser 
alternative to the aggravated battery charge, as the defendant would have preferred.   
Fourth, the purpose of a charging instrument is to put the defendant on 
notice, Miller v. State, 42 So. 3d 204, 215 (Fla. 2010) (citing art. I, § 16, Fla. 
Const.), not to allege all of the facts that will ultimately support the essential 
elements of the charge.  Indeed, the state attorney is directed by Florida Rule of 
Criminal Procedure 3.140(b) to draft an information that is “a plain, concise, and 
definite written statement of the essential facts constituting the offense charged.”  
Requiring the State to allege “driving” in this case would be contrary to the 
direction of our rules and go beyond putting the defendant on notice of the nature 
and cause of the charged offense.  Moreover, the responsibility for detail and 
particularity in the charging document rests on the defendant and not the State.  See 
Fla. R. Crim. P. 3.140(n) (“The court, on motion, shall order the prosecuting 
attorney to furnish a statement of particulars when the indictment or information 
 
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on which the defendant is to be tried fails to inform the defendant of the particulars 
of the offense sufficiently to enable the defendant to prepare a defense.”).   
Finally, neither Anderson nor Judge Makar’s dissent cites any authority 
supporting the assertion made by both that Anderson had a “right” to have his jury 
consider a separate crime as a lesser alternative to the crime charged when the 
lesser, separate offense does not qualify as a permissive lesser-included offense 
under well-settled Florida law.   
CONCLUSION 
 
Because an element of an offense cannot be established in a charging 
document by inference, we hold that a defendant is not entitled to a defendant-
requested jury instruction on the permissive lesser-included offense of reckless 
driving where the charging instrument fails to expressly allege the element of 
driving.  Accordingly, we approve the First District’s decision in Anderson and 
disapprove the Fourth District’s decision in Piggott. 
 
It is so ordered. 
CANADY, C.J., and POLSTON and MUÑIZ, JJ., concur. 
LABARGA, J., dissents with an opinion. 
 
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION AND, 
IF FILED, DETERMINED. 
 
 
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LABARGA, J., dissenting. 
 
I dissent from the majority’s conclusion that because the information did not 
expressly allege that Anderson was driving at the time of the offense, he was not 
entitled to an instruction on the permissive lesser included offense of reckless 
driving.  In doing so, I agree with the well-reasoned concurring in part and 
dissenting in part opinion written by Judge Makar in the decision below, and the 
majority opinion in the certified conflict case, Piggott v. State, 140 So. 3d 666 (Fla. 
4th DCA 2016) (holding that “reckless driving is a permissive lesser included 
offense of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon when the alleged deadly 
weapon is an automobile”). 
 
Under rule 3.510(b), Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, a jury may 
convict a defendant of: “any offense that as a matter of law is a necessarily 
included offense or a lesser included offense of the offense charged in the 
indictment or information and is supported by the evidence.”  (Emphasis added.)  
As noted by Judge Makar, “[a]lthough a charging document is very important in 
providing notice of the charge alleged, as the Sixth Amendment requires, Piggott 
persuasively points out that what is even more important from the defense’s 
perspective is the actual basis of a charge at the time of the charge conference, 
when predicate facts are conclusively framed and jury instructions approved.  At 
that point, a lesser-included offense may have become obvious that was not at the 
 
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outset.”  Anderson v. State, 247 So. 3d 680, 684 (Fla. 1st DCA 2018) (Makar, J., 
concurring in part and dissenting in part). 
 
In this case, in the sole count of the information, the State charged that 
Anderson “did unlawfully and intentionally make an assault upon [the victim] with 
a motor vehicle, a deadly weapon without intent to kill.”  The evidence in this case 
establishes an indisputable conclusion that Anderson was driving that vehicle at the 
time of the offense.  In fact, not only does the State not dispute that Anderson was 
driving, it repeatedly relies on this point.  During opening statements, the 
prosecutor summarized the State’s version of the underlying events as follows: 
 
Earlier that night, [Anderson’s] girlfriend . . . went out with 
friends to a club.  The defendant shows up.  He sees her talking to a 
guy in the parking lot.  Presumably, he gets angry. 
 
When she and her friends get in the car to leave . . . the 
defendant gets in his car to follow her.  He begins to try and block her 
into the parking lot at first to keep her from leaving.  They’re both 
driving.  She is able to get out of the parking lot, but when she does, 
the defendant follows her down the road and begins to get into a chase 
with her. 
 
She’s going to testify that they’re going high speeds.  She’s 
having to run red lights, that he rammed his car into the back of her 
car—his truck into the back of her truck.  That he does this multiple 
times.  
 
(Emphasis added.)  During its case in chief, the State called two witnesses, 
including the victim, who provided eyewitness testimony that Anderson was 
driving a vehicle and chasing them.  The State also called an officer who testified 
 
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that the victim identified Anderson as the person who chased her vehicle and 
caused her to have an accident.   
 
Moreover, during its cross-examination of Anderson, the State emphasized 
that Anderson was driving (and recklessly so): 
Prosecutor: So you were driving to follow her is what you were 
doing that night?  You thought she was driving, and you were trying 
to follow her, right? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: So you all start speeding.  She starts speeding.  You start 
following her speeding? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: Okay.  You said you get about, I think your testimony 
was a car length away from her car? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: Okay.  But somehow you run into it? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: And you’re saying it’s an accident? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: You’re chasing her at high speeds? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: And you hit her by accident? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
 
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Prosecutor: And you heard everybody here testify today that you hit 
her car more than once, right? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: And are you trying to say you only hit her one time? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: And all that screaming from that 911 call came from one 
accidental hit of her car? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: Okay.  You know she crashed her car that night? 
 
Anderson: Yeah, after the fact. 
 
Prosecutor: Right.  Was that after the first time you hit her? 
 
Anderson: I only hit her once. 
 
Prosecutor: And you heard the officer here today testify that he saw 
you . . . moving along the road, running red lights, running stop signs? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: Do you remember running multiple red lights? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: And your testimony is that you did not think this would 
scare anyone?  Following somebody, making them run through red 
lights? 
 
Anderson: No, ma’am. 
 
Prosecutor: You weren’t trying to scare her? 
 
Anderson: No, ma’am. 
 
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Prosecutor: You weren’t mad at her; that’s what you want this jury to 
believe? 
 
Anderson: Yes, ma’am. 
 
 
Considering this evidence, there is no question that Anderson was driving 
the vehicle involved in the offense.  The fact that Anderson was driving a vehicle 
at the time of the offense was not established by “mere inference.”  Majority op. at 
6.  There was direct evidence, in the form of eyewitness testimony, that Anderson 
was driving.  Indeed, Anderson himself admitted to driving. 
 
The State, having drafted the information charging Anderson with 
aggravated assault with a deadly weapon (a motor vehicle), and having relied on 
the fact that Anderson was driving the vehicle, benefitted from drafting the 
information in a way that limited Anderson’s ability to have the jury instructed on 
a permissible lesser included offense supported by the evidence.  As Judge Makar 
pointed out, there is no indication that the State intentionally drafted the 
information in the manner that it did, but the result nonetheless is that Anderson 
was deprived of the reckless driving permissible lesser included offense even 
though there was never a dispute that Anderson was driving.  “Simply put, trial 
judges should not be told to put on blinders at a charge conference, looking only at 
an information filed months or years earlier, when it has become obvious that a 
lesser-included instruction requested by the defendant is appropriate in light of a 
fact not then in dispute (here, that the car was driven, not dropped from the sky, 
 
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used as a bludgeon, and so on).”  Anderson, 247 So. 3d at 685 (Makar, J., 
concurring in part and dissenting in part). 
 
While there is also no question that the evidence supported the charge of 
aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, the point is that the evidence proved that 
Anderson was driving a vehicle, and the evidence supported an instruction on the 
permissible lesser included offense of reckless driving.  The jury was entitled to 
receive that instruction and to then be entrusted to, upon determining that the State 
met its burden, convict the defendant for the highest offense proven. 
 
For these reasons, I dissent. 
Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal – Certified 
Direct Conflict of Decisions  
 
 
First District - Case No. 1D15-5433  
 
 
(Leon County) 
 
Andy Thomas, Public Defender, and Pamela D. Presnell, Assistant Public 
Defender, Second Judicial Circuit, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
 
for Petitioner 
 
Ashley Moody, Attorney General, Trisha M. Pate, Bureau Chief, and Amanda 
Stokes, Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
 
for Respondent