Case Title: Roughton v. State

Citation: 

Docket Number: SC12-1719

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 2016-02-25T00:00:00Z

Document:
Supreme Court of Florida 
 
 
____________ 
 
No. SC12-1719 
____________ 
 
JAMES HOUSTON ROUGHTON, 
Petitioner, 
 
vs. 
 
STATE OF FLORIDA, 
Respondent. 
 
[February 25, 2016] 
 
CANADY, J. 
In this case we consider whether dual convictions for capital sexual battery 
and lewd or lascivious molestation based on a single act violate the constitutional 
prohibition against double jeopardy.  Our analysis turns on the rule of construction 
in section 775.021(4), Florida Statutes (2008), regarding “separate criminal 
offenses” “committed in the course of one criminal episode or transaction.”  We 
have for review Roughton v. State, 92 So. 3d 284 (Fla. 5th DCA 2012), in which 
the Fifth District Court of Appeal held that dual convictions for both capital sexual 
battery and lewd or lascivious molestation based on a single act do not result in a 
double jeopardy violation.  The Fifth District certified conflict with Berlin v. State, 
 
- 2 - 
72 So. 3d 284 (Fla. 1st DCA 2011), Smith v. State, 41 So. 3d 1041 (Fla. 1st DCA 
2010), Robinson v. State, 919 So. 2d 623 (Fla. 2d DCA 2006), and Johnson v. 
State, 913 So. 2d 1291 (Fla. 2d DCA 2005), in which the First and Second District 
Courts of Appeal held that dual convictions for sexual battery and lewd or 
lascivious molestation do violate the prohibition against double jeopardy when 
they are based on a single act.  We have jurisdiction.  See art. V, § 3(b)(4), Fla. 
Const.  For the reasons we explain, we approve the Fifth District’s decision in 
Roughton and disapprove the decisions of the First and Second Districts in Berlin, 
Smith, Robinson, and Johnson.  We also recede from our prior decision in Gibbs v. 
State, 698 So. 2d 1206 (Fla. 1997). 
I.  BACKGROUND 
James Roughton was convicted of both sexual battery on a person under 
twelve years of age1—commonly known as capital sexual battery—and lewd or 
lascivious molestation on a person under twelve years of age2 for the single act of 
placing his mouth on the seven-year-old victim’s penis.  On appeal, Roughton 
argued that his dual convictions for sexual battery and lewd or lascivious 
molestation violated his constitutional protection against double jeopardy because 
                                                 
 
1.  § 794.011(2)(a), Fla. Stat. (2008). 
 
2.  § 800.04(5)(b), Fla. Stat. (2008). 
 
- 3 - 
the two convictions were based on a single act.  Roughton, 92 So. 3d at 285.  The 
State agreed that the convictions were based on a single act but argued that there 
was no double jeopardy violation.  Id.   
Finding no specific statement by the Legislature that it intended to punish 
sexual battery and lewd or lascivious molestation separately, the Fifth District 
applied the “same elements” test set forth in Blockburger v. United States, 284 
U.S. 299, 304 (1932), and codified in section 775.021(4)(a).  Under the basic rule 
of Blockburger and section 775.021(4)(a), if “each offense requires proof of an 
element that the other does not,” separate punishments for each offense do not 
violate the prohibition against double jeopardy.   
 
The Fifth District held that the two offenses each have elements that the 
other does not, in that “[l]ewd or lascivious molestation requires a specific lewd or 
lascivious intent, which sexual battery does not,” and “sexual battery requires 
either penetration or oral, anal or vaginal union with the sexual organ of another, 
neither of which are elements of lewd or lascivious molestation.”  Roughton, 92 
So. 3d at 286-87.  Thus, “the anatomy protected by the statutes is, or may be, 
different.  For example, touching the buttocks of a child in a lewd manner would 
constitute a lewd or lascivious molestation, but would not constitute a sexual 
battery.”  Id. at 287.  The court determined that none of the exceptions to the 
Blockburger “same elements” test—set out in section 775.021(4)(b)—were 
 
- 4 - 
applicable and therefore concluded that convictions for both lewd or lascivious 
molestation and sexual battery arising from the same act do not violate the 
prohibition against double jeopardy.  Id.   
II.  ANALYSIS 
The double jeopardy clauses, contained in the Fifth Amendment to the 
United States Constitution and article I, section 9 of the Florida Constitution, 
prohibit the imposition of multiple punishments for the same criminal offense.  But 
the double jeopardy clauses do not prohibit multiple punishments for different 
offenses arising out of the same criminal transaction or episode if the Legislature 
intended to authorize separate punishments.  Valdes v. State, 3 So. 3d 1067, 1069 
(Fla. 2009).  “The Double Jeopardy Clause presents no substantive limitation on 
the legislature’s power to prescribe multiple punishments, but rather, seeks only to 
prevent courts either from allowing multiple prosecutions or from imposing 
multiple punishments for a single, legislatively defined offense.”  Borges v. State, 
415 So. 2d 1265, 1267 (Fla. 1982) (citation omitted).  
Section 775.021(4)(a) requires that an offender who “commits an act or acts 
which constitute one or more separate criminal offenses . . . be sentenced 
separately for each criminal offense” even if those offenses are committed “in the 
course of one criminal transaction or episode.”  “[O]ffenses are separate if each 
offense requires proof of an element that the other does not, without regard to the 
 
- 5 - 
accusatory pleading or the proof adduced at trial.”  § 775.021(4)(a), Fla. Stat. 
(2008).  Section 775.021(4)(b), Florida Statutes (2008), provides: 
The intent of the Legislature is to convict and sentence for each 
criminal offense committed in the course of one criminal episode or 
transaction and not to allow the principle of lenity as set forth in 
subsection (1) to determine legislative intent.  Exceptions to this rule 
of construction are: 
1.  Offenses which require identical elements of proof. 
2.  Offenses which are degrees of the same offense as provided 
by statute. 
3.  Offenses which are lesser offenses the statutory elements of 
which are subsumed by the greater offense. 
The application of the statutory rule of construction based on undisputed facts is a 
legal issue, subject to de novo review.  State v. Drawdy, 136 So. 3d 1209, 1213 
(Fla. 2014). 
As the Fifth District recognized, whether Roughton’s dual convictions for 
sexual battery and lewd or lascivious molestation based on a single act violate the 
prohibition against double jeopardy depends on whether each offense requires 
proof of an element the other does not.  Sexual battery is defined as “oral, anal, or 
vaginal penetration by, or union[3] with, the sexual organ of another or the anal or 
vaginal penetration of another by any other object; however, sexual battery does 
not include an act done for a bona fide medical purpose.”  § 794.011(h), Fla. Stat. 
                                                 
 
3.  “ ‘Union’ means contact.”  Fla. Std. Jury Instr. (Crim.) 11.1. 
 
- 6 - 
(2008).  In contrast, lewd or lascivious molestation occurs when a person 
“intentionally touches in a lewd or lascivious manner[4] the breasts, genitals, genital 
area, or buttocks, or the clothing covering them, of a person less than 16 years of 
age, or forces or entices a person under 16 years of age to so touch the 
perpetrator[.]”  § 800.04(5)(a), Fla. Stat. (2008).   
Although the conduct constituting capital sexual battery will as a practical 
matter ordinarily—if not always—also constitute lewd or lascivious molestation, 
the formal elements of these two crimes are quite distinct.  And section 775.021(4) 
requires analysis based on the formal elements of the crimes.  Establishing capital 
sexual battery—like any other sexual battery—requires proof of either penetration 
or oral, anal, or vaginal union with the sexual organ of another, while establishing 
lewd or lascivious molestation requires proof of intentional touching of the breasts, 
genitals, genital area, or buttocks, or the clothing covering those areas.  Lewd or 
lascivious molestation requires proof that the touching was done with a lewd or 
lascivious intent, while sexual battery may be committed without any proof of a 
specific sensual intent.  Each offense requires proof of an element that the other 
does not; therefore, they are “separate offenses” under section 775.021(4)(a). 
                                                 
 
4.  “The words ‘lewd’ and ‘lascivious’ mean the same thing: a wicked, 
lustful, unchaste, licentious, or sensual intent on the part of the person doing an 
act.”  Fla. Std. Jury Instr. (Crim.) 11.10(c). 
 
- 7 - 
Where even a single act constitutes multiple separate criminal offenses, as 
defined in section 775.021(4)(a), the offender must be sentenced separately for 
each offense unless one of the three exceptions in section 775.021(4)(b) applies.  
Capital sexual battery (like any other sexual battery) and lewd or lascivious 
molestation do not require identical elements of proof and are not degrees of the 
same offense as provided by statute.  Nor is one a lesser included offense of the 
other.  We therefore conclude that Roughton’s separate sentences for capital sexual 
battery and lewd or lascivious molestation arising from a single act do not violate 
the prohibition against double jeopardy. 
We recognize that in Gibbs this Court held that for purposes of determining 
whether a double jeopardy violation has occurred, courts must analyze an 
alternative conduct statute—i.e., a statute that proscribes conduct in the alternative, 
such as a touching of the breasts, buttocks, genitals, or genital area—by breaking 
out and comparing only the specific alternative conduct that is the same as the 
conduct prohibited by the other statute being compared, and cannot consider the 
entire range of conduct proscribed by the statute.  698 So. 2d at 1209-10.  But our 
holding in Gibbs is irreconcilable with the plain language of section 775.021(4)(a), 
which requires that the elements of the offenses be compared “without regard to 
the accusatory pleading or the proof adduced at trial.”  (Emphasis added.)  It runs 
afoul of the Legislature’s intent “to convict and sentence for each criminal offense 
 
- 8 - 
committed in the course of one criminal episode or transaction and not to allow the 
principle of lenity as set forth in subsection [775.021](1) to determine legislative 
intent.”  § 775.021(4)(b), Fla. Stat. (2008). 
In Florida, the presumption in favor of stare decisis is strong, but not 
unwavering.  Brown v. Nagelhout, 84 So. 3d 304, 309 (Fla. 2012).  The doctrine of 
stare decisis may bend “where there has been an error in legal analysis.”  Id. 
(quoting Puryear v. State, 810 So. 2d 901, 905 (Fla. 2002)).  We have recognized 
that “[s]tare decisis does not yield based on a conclusion that a precedent is merely 
erroneous” but that an error is of sufficient gravity to justify departing from 
precedent where the prior decision is “unsound in principle” or “unworkable in 
practice.”  Id. (quoting Allied-Signal, Inc. v. Dir., Div. of Taxation, 504 U.S. 768, 
783 (1992)).  
We conclude that a serious legal error was committed in Gibbs, which flies 
in the face of the manifest intent of the Legislature.  Gibbs “is based on a serious 
interpretative error, which resulted in imposing a meaning on the statute that is 
‘unsound in principle.’ ”  Id. at 310 (quoting Allied-Signal, 504 U.S. at 783).  
Thus, we find it necessary to recede from Gibbs. 
III.  CONCLUSION 
For the reasons explained above, we approve the decision of the Fifth 
District in Roughton and disapprove the decisions of the First and Second Districts 
 
- 9 - 
in Berlin, Smith, Robinson, and Johnson.  We recede from our prior decision in 
Gibbs and hold that a double jeopardy analysis must—in accordance with section 
775.021(4)—be conducted without regard to the accusatory pleading or the proof 
adduced at trial, even where an alternative conduct statute is implicated. 
It is so ordered. 
LABARGA, C.J., and PARIENTE, LEWIS, POLSTON, and PERRY, JJ., concur. 
QUINCE, J., dissents with an opinion. 
 
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION, AND 
IF FILED, DETERMINED. 
 
QUINCE, J., dissenting. 
A defendant’s right not to be placed in jeopardy more than once for the same 
offense is personal to that defendant.  In order to determine if a particular 
defendant’s right has been violated, we must start with an analysis of the charges 
against that defendant—not what is potentially chargeable under a particular 
statute.  Thus, section 775.021(4)(a), Florida Statutes—which requires a double 
jeopardy analysis to be conducted without regard to the specific charges against a 
defendant or which charges have been proven—is antithetical to the purpose and 
meaning of the double jeopardy clauses of both the United States and Florida 
Constitutions.  We must consider the allegations against the defendant and what 
the State proved.  Therefore, I begin this analysis by relying on our precedent of 
 
- 10 - 
Gibbs v. State, 698 So. 2d 1206 (Fla. 1997), which stays true to this overarching 
principle. 
Where a statute prohibits alternative types of conduct, a double jeopardy 
determination “requires an analysis that breaks the conduct elements into the 
specific alternative conduct which is in the other statute being compared.”  Id. at 
1209; see also State v. Connelly, 748 So. 2d 248, 251 (Fla. 1999); Graves v. State, 
95 So. 3d 1033, 1035-36 (Fla. 5th DCA 2012).  For example, in comparing the 
cocaine trafficking statute—an alternative conduct statute—with the simple 
possession statute, this Court stated, “The conduct element of the trafficking statute 
is not compared by considering the entire range of conduct including possession, 
sale, purchase, and delivery, but rather by comparing only trafficking possession 
with simple possession.”  Gibbs, 698 So. 2d at 1209.  This Court found that such 
situation differed from a case where the defendant is charged with trafficking sale 
and simple possession “because the sale element of the trafficking statute differs 
from the elements in the simple possession statute.”  Id. at 1210.  “[T]he court 
must focus on the particular component of the statute that is in issue.”  Johnson v. 
State, 712 So. 2d 380, 381 (Fla. 1998).  “[I]f the prosecution is for the same 
conduct under both statutes, a conviction under more than one of the statutes is a 
violation of double jeopardy principles.”  Gibbs, 698 So. 2d at 1210; Connelly, 748 
So. 2d at 251. 
 
- 11 - 
Here, Roughton was convicted of sexual battery and lewd or lascivious 
molestation.  Sexual battery prohibits “penetration” or, in the alternative, “union 
with” certain body parts,5 and lewd or lascivious molestation prohibits touching or, 
in the alternative, forcing or enticing the victim to do the touching.6  Under Gibbs, 
the relevant comparison here is between the “union with” element of sexual battery 
and the “touching” element of lewd or lascivious molestation, as the convictions 
involve Roughton placing his mouth on the victim’s penis.  Thus, the elements of 
the two crimes are as follows: sexual battery concerns (1) oral, anal, or vaginal 
union with (2) the sexual organ (3) of another;7 whereas, lewd or lascivious 
molestation involves (1) touching—using any part of the perpetrator’s body—(2) 
the breasts, genitals, genital area, or buttocks (3) of another (4) intentionally and 
(5) in a lewd or lascivious manner.8 
                                                 
 
5.  § 794.011(1)(h), (2)(a), Fla. Stat. (2008). 
 
6.  § 800.04(5)(a), (b), Fla. Stat. (2008). 
 
7.  Section 794.011(1)(h) defines “sexual battery” as “oral, anal, or vaginal 
penetration by, or union with, the sexual organ of another or the anal or vaginal 
penetration of another by any other object,” not including “an act done for a bona 
fide medical purpose.” 
 
8.  Section 800.04(5)(a) defines “lewd or lascivious molestation” as 
“intentionally touch[ing] in a lewd or lascivious manner the breasts, genitals, 
genital area, or buttocks, or the clothing covering them, of a person less than 16 
years of age, or forc[ing] or entic[ing] a person under 16 years of age to so touch 
the perpetrator.” 
 
- 12 - 
Reviewing the statutory provisions in this manner reveals that lewd or 
lascivious molestation contains two elements that sexual battery does not—that the 
touching be done “intentionally” and “in a lewd or lascivious manner.”  However, 
in this case, sexual battery does not contain any elements that lewd or lascivious 
molestation does not because, under Gibbs, the remaining elements of both crimes 
punish the same conduct. 
The third element of both is identical in that the offense involves another 
person.  As to the first element, “union” means “contact,”9 and “contact” includes 
“a touching or meeting,” as this Court previously recognized in Seagrave v. State, 
802 So. 2d 281, 286 (Fla. 2001).  Although the first element of sexual battery 
requires proof of specifically oral, anal, or vaginal touching, whereas the touching 
under lewd or lascivious molestation can be with any part of the perpetrator’s 
body, that fact does not constitute an element within one that the other does not 
have because (1) the broader type of touching possible under molestation includes 
that specified under sexual battery, and (2) in this case, the same type of touching 
is at issue under both statutes—with oral touching being the factual basis for both 
convictions.  See, e.g., Gibbs, 698 So. 2d at 1209 (not finding “quantity” element 
of trafficking possession to constitute an element that simple possession does not 
                                                 
 
9.  Fla. Std. Jury Instr. (Crim.) 11.1. 
 
- 13 - 
have, where simple possession punishes any quantity of drugs possessed).  The 
same can be said for the second element of both crimes.  Although sexual battery 
requires touching of a sexual organ whereas the touching under molestation can be 
of the breasts, genitals, genital area, buttocks, or the clothing covering them, (1) 
the broader list of body parts under molestation includes those body parts specified 
under sexual battery, and (2) in this case, the same body part (the victim’s penis) is 
being touched under both statutes.  See, e.g., id. 
Thus, it cannot be said, under Blockburger v. United States, 284 U.S. 299 
(1932), that each offense has an element that the other does not.  Furthermore, in 
the instant case, the prosecution is for the same single act under both statutes.  Id. 
at 1210 (“[I]f prosecution is for the same conduct under both statutes, a conviction 
under more than one of the statutes is a violation of double jeopardy principles.”); 
Connelly, 748 So. 2d at 251 (“Moreover, we have held that a double jeopardy 
violation does occur in such a situation if the prosecution is for the same conduct 
under both statutes.”).  Accordingly, I would find that double jeopardy precludes 
convictions for both sexual battery and lewd or lascivious molestation for the 
single criminal act of touching the victim’s penis with Roughton’s mouth. 
The Fifth District used a similar rationale in Graves, decided about a month 
after the instant case, to find that a defendant’s convictions for both lewd or 
 
- 14 - 
lascivious battery10 and lewd or lascivious molestation violated double jeopardy 
principles.  95 So. 3d at 1033.  In that case, the defendant penetrated the victim’s 
vagina with his penis.  Id.  As to the molestation charge, the information did not 
allege the specific manner of the “touching”; however, the district court found that 
the record evidence demonstrated that the only touching of the victim’s vagina 
“coincided with the penetration or union alleged in the lewd or lascivious battery 
count.”  Id. at 1034.  The Fifth District recognized that because both crimes could 
be committed in a variety of ways, each statute contains an element the other does 
not.  Id. at 1035.  However, the district court then cited Gibbs for the principle that 
courts “do not look at the entire theoretical range of conduct encompassed by the 
statute but rather compare only the conduct alleged in the information.”  Id. at 
1036.  Doing so, the Fifth District found a violation of double jeopardy because the 
conduct alleged under each count involved a touching of the victim’s vagina.  Id.  
The court concluded that “[t]he only element contained in the lewd or lascivious 
molestation count, not subsumed within the lewd or lascivious battery count, is a 
requirement of a lascivious intent” and found that since each offense must contain 
                                                 
 
10.  The sexual activity forming the basis of the crime in that case is defined 
in the same manner as the conduct at issue here under the sexual battery statute.  
Compare § 800.04(1)(a), (4)(a), Fla. Stat. (2003) (lewd or lascivious battery) with 
§ 794.011(1)(h), (2)(a), Fla. Stat. (2008) (sexual battery). 
 
- 15 - 
an element not within the other, the defendant “should have been convicted of only 
one offense.”  Id. 
Because a true double jeopardy analysis cannot be conducted based on 
crimes for which the defendant was neither charged nor convicted, I would find 
that Roughton’s convictions for sexual battery and lewd or lascivious molestation 
for a single act violate double jeopardy.  As such, I would remand to the trial court 
to vacate Roughton’s molestation conviction on Count II.  As to the certified 
conflict cases,11 I would approve Berlin and Smith, but would approve only the 
result, not the rationale, of Johnson and Robinson because those two cases cited to 
State v. Hightower, 509 So. 2d 1078 (Fla. 1987)12—or cases which themselves 
cited Hightower—and that case involved the pre-1999 version of the lewd or 
lascivious molestation statute containing different language from that at issue here.  
Therefore, reliance on such case law is misplaced.  I would quash the decision 
                                                 
 
11.  Berlin v. State, 72 So. 3d 284 (Fla. 1st DCA 2011); Smith v. State, 41 
So. 3d 1041 (Fla. 1st DCA 2010); Robinson v. State, 919 So. 2d 623 (Fla. 2d DCA 
2006); Johnson v. State, 913 So. 2d 1291 (Fla. 2d DCA 2005). 
 
12.  In Hightower, this Court found that under the 1984 amendment to 
section 800.04, which included the phrase “without committing the crime of sexual 
battery,” the crimes of sexual battery and lewd or lascivious conduct were 
“mutually exclusive.”  509 So. 2d at 1079.  Section 800.04 was amended in 1999, 
however, resulting in the removal of that phrase.  Ch. 99-201, § 6, Laws of Fla. 
 
- 16 - 
below, approve Smith and Berlin, and approve the result but not the reasoning of 
Johnson and Robinson. 
Application for Review of the Decision of the District Court of Appeal - Certified 
Direct Conflict of Decisions 
 
 
Fifth District - Case No. 5D11-652 
 
 
(Orange County) 
 
James S. Purdy, Public Defender, Doris R. Ball, Assistant Public Defender, and 
Edward J. Weiss, Assistant Public Defender, Seventh Judicial Circuit, Daytona 
Beach, Florida, 
 
 
for Petitioner 
 
Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, Tallahassee, Florida; Dawn A. Tiffin, 
Assistant Attorney General, Tampa, Florida; Wesley Harold Heidt, Bureau Chief, 
and Kellie Anne Nielan, Assistant Attorney General, Daytona Beach, Florida, 
 
 
for Respondent