Supreme Court of Florida

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No. SC17-68

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SONNY BOY OATS, JR.,

Petitioner,

vs.

JULIE L. JONES, etc.,

Respondent.

[May 25, 2017]

PER CURIAM.

Sonny Boy Oats, Jr., was tried and convicted for the December 1979 robbery 

of a convenience store and first-degree murder of the store clerk. Oats v. State, 

181 So. 3d 457, 460 (Fla. 2015). This Court affirmed Oats’ conviction on direct 

appeal but held that the trial court erroneously found three aggravating factors and 

remanded to the trial court for entry of a new sentencing order. Oats v. State, 446 

So. 2d 90, 95-96 (Fla. 1984). On remand, the trial court reweighed the valid 

aggravating factors and again imposed the death penalty, which this Court then 

affirmed. Oats v. State, 472 So. 2d 1143, 1145 (Fla.), cert. denied, 474 U.S. 865 

(1985). This Court later affirmed the trial court’s denial of Oats’ initial motion for 
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postconviction relief and denied his petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Oats v. 

Dugger, 638 So. 2d 20, 20 (Fla. 1994).

In late 2015, pursuant to the United States Supreme Court’s decision in Hall 

v. Florida, 134 S. Ct. 1986 (2014), this Court remanded Oats’ case back to the 

circuit court for a new intellectual disability evidentiary hearing. Oats, 181 So. 3d 

at 471.1 Following this Court’s opinion in Hurst v. State (Hurst), 202 So. 3d 40 

(Fla. 2016), cert. denied, No. 16-998 (U.S. May 22, 2017), on October 28, 2016, 

Oats filed a postconviction motion in the circuit court seeking relief under Hurst, 

which the circuit court held in abeyance pending the evidentiary hearing on Oats’ 

Hall claim. 

On January 17, 2017, Oats filed the current petition for a writ of habeas 

corpus and additionally filed a motion to stay the circuit court proceedings (on 

remand from this Court’s 2015 decision).2 In his petition, Oats contends that (1) he 

is entitled to have his death sentence vacated pursuant to Hurst, and (2) regardless,

Hurst applies to cases involving Hall claims, like his, because the determination of 

whether a defendant is intellectually disabled is a fact that must be found by the 

 

1. That hearing has now been scheduled for September 7, 2017.

2. We have jurisdiction. See art. V, § 3(b)(9), Fla. Const.
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jury. For reasons more fully explained below, we conclude that Oats is not entitled 

to relief. Accordingly, we deny Oats’ petition.

ANALYSIS

As to Oats’ first claim, we conclude that Oats is not entitled to Hurst relief

because Hurst does not apply retroactively to Oats’ sentence, which became final 

in 1985. See Asay v. State, 210 So. 3d 1 (Fla. 2016), petition for cert. filed, No. 

16-9033 (U.S. Apr. 29, 2017); see also Oats, 472 So. 2d 1143. 

Next, we address Oats’ claim that the United States Supreme Court’s 

decision in Hurst v. Florida and this Court’s decision in Hurst require that the jury, 

rather than the trial judge, determine intellectual disability. In granting Oats a new 

hearing on his claim of intellectual disability, we concluded:

[T]he circuit court erred in determining that Oats failed to establish 

onset of his intellectual disability prior to the age of 18. The evidence 

presented to the circuit court in fact strongly leads to the conclusion 

that Oats established both his low IQ and onset of an intellectual 

disability prior to the age of 18. However, because the circuit court 

did not analyze the remaining prongs, and because neither the circuit 

court nor the parties and their experts had the benefit of Hall, we 

remand for further proceedings consistent with this opinion, including 

providing the parties with an opportunity to present additional 

evidence at an evidentiary hearing to enable a full reevaluation of 

whether Oats is intellectually disabled.

Oats, 181 So. 3d at 471. Our instruction was clear that the new intellectual 

disability hearing should be held before the trial court. 
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Pursuant to section 921.141, Florida Statutes (2016), once a defendant is 

convicted of first-degree murder, the minimum sentence is life imprisonment 

without parole. See § 921.141(3), Fla. Stat. (2016); Hurst, 202 So. 3d at 51. The 

trial then proceeds to the penalty phase where the jury ultimately determines 

whether the defendant should be sentenced to life imprisonment without parole or 

death. See Hurst, 202 So. 3d at 44.

In 2002, the United States Supreme Court decided Atkins v. Virginia, 536 

U.S. 304 (2002), which held that the Eighth Amendment to the United States 

Constitution bars the execution of criminal defendants who are intellectually 

disabled. Id. at 321. Although Atkins held that the imposition of the death penalty

against intellectually disabled individuals is unconstitutional, the United States 

Supreme Court left for the states “the task of developing appropriate ways to 

enforce the constitutional restriction” established in Atkins. Id. at 317. 

In 2001, before Atkins, the Legislature enacted section 921.137, Florida 

Statutes, barring the execution of intellectually disabled defendants. See

§ 921.137(2), Fla. Stat. (2001). In 2004, after Atkins, this Court adopted Florida 

Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.203, which became effective on October 1, 2004, to 

provide a procedure for implementing Atkins and section 921.137. Amends. to 

Fla. Rules of Crim. P. & Fla. Rules of App. P., 875 So. 2d 563, 565 (Fla. 2004). 

Both the statute and the court rule provide for an evidentiary hearing to determine 
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intellectual disability to take place before the trial court. See Fla. R. Crim. P. 

3.203(e).

It is clear that the Florida Legislature designated the trial judge, not the jury, 

as the factfinder for intellectual disability determinations. Intellectual disability is 

not a “necessary finding[] to impose a death sentence” but is, rather, the opposite—

a fact that bars death. Hurst, 202 So. 3d at 67. Therefore, nothing from the United 

States Supreme Court’s decisions in Ring, Atkins, Hall, or Hurst v. Florida, compel 

a conclusion either way on the issue of whether a judge or jury must determine that 

a criminal defendant is intellectually disabled. Rather, the United States Supreme 

Court explicitly left the implementation of Atkins to the states. Thus, Oats has not 

demonstrated that Florida’s Atkins procedure, as set forth in section 921.137, is 

unconstitutional. Accordingly, Oats is not entitled to relief on this claim.

CONCLUSION

For the above reasons, Oats’ petition for writ of habeas corpus is hereby 

denied.

It is so ordered.

LABARGA, C.J., and PARIENTE, LEWIS, QUINCE, and POLSTON, JJ., 

concur.

PARIENTE, J., concurs with an opinion.

LAWSON, J., concurs with an opinion, in which CANADY, J., concurs.

NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION, AND 

IF FILED, DETERMINED.
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PARIENTE, J., concurring.

I concur in the majority’s holding that Oats is not entitled to a jury 

determination on his claim that he is intellectually disabled and therefore ineligible 

for execution. As to Oats’ claim for relief under Hurst v. State (Hurst), 202 So. 3d 

40 (Fla. 2016), cert. denied, No. 16-998 (U.S. May 22, 2017), based upon the trial 

court’s failure to impanel a jury on resentencing, I concur in the majority opinion 

because I am bound by this Court’s precedent in Asay v. State, 210 So. 3d 1 (Fla. 

2016), petition for cert. filed, No. 16-9033 (U.S. Apr. 29, 2017). However, for the 

reasons fully expressed in my concurring in part and dissenting in part opinion in 

Asay, I would apply Hurst retroactively to Oats’ sentence and, finding that the 

error is not harmless beyond a reasonable doubt, reverse for a new penalty phase. 

Id. at 32-38 (Pariente, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). There are good 

reasons in Oats’ case for doing so.

In 1981, Oats’ original jury “rendered an advisory sentence of death.” Oats 

v. State, 446 So. 2d 90, 92 (Fla. 1984). The jury’s precise vote for life or death is 

unknown because the verdict form only indicated that at least a majority of the jury 

voted to recommend a sentence of death. On appeal, this Court struck three of the 

aggravating factors upon which the trial judge’s sentencing determination relied: 

(1) that Oats had been previously convicted of a violent felony, (2) that the murder 

was especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel (HAC), and (3) that the murder was 
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committed for pecuniary gain. Id. at 94-95. “On remand, the trial court reweighed 

the valid aggravators and reimposed the death penalty.” Oats v. State, 181 So. 3d 

457, 460 (Fla. 2015).

Oats appealed, claiming in pertinent part “that the trial court erred in failing 

to impanel a jury to rehear evidence and to make a recommendation as to the 

proper sentence.” Oats v. State, 472 So. 2d 1143, 1144-45 (Fla. 1985). This Court 

denied relief on this claim, stating that “[b]ecause a new jury would be considering 

essentially the same evidence as was presented to the original jury,” there was “no 

reason to resubmit the evidence to a jury.” Id. at 1145 (quoting Oats, 446 So. 2d at 

96). 

However, it was error for this Court not to have allowed jury resentencing in 

Oats’ case after striking three of the aggravators, even under our pre-Hurst

harmless error jurisprudence for errors in sentencing orders. See Kaczmar v. State, 

104 So. 3d 990, 1008 (Fla. 2012); see also Wood v. State, 209 So. 3d 1217, 1234 

(Fla. 2017). “Post-Hurst, this conclusion is even more compelling.” Wood, 209 

So. 3d at 1234.

Regardless of the error on resentencing, because this Court struck three of 

the six aggravating factors upon which the jury originally relied in recommending 

death, I cannot conclude that the error of submitting invalid aggravators to the jury 

is harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. See id. Nonetheless, because I am bound 
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by our precedent in Asay, I concur in denying Oats Hurst relief. Oats will not 

receive a new penalty phase. And because Oats is not entitled to a jury 

determination of intellectual disability, this case should be returned to the trial 

court to conduct the new hearing on intellectual disability, as previously ordered by 

this Court in Oats, 181 So. 3d at 471.

LAWSON, J., concurring.

I concur in the majority’s holding that Oats is not entitled to a jury 

determination on his intellectual disability claim and concur in the result of the 

majority’s holding that Oats is not entitled to relief under Hurst. See Mosley v. 

State, 209 So. 3d 1248, 1285 (Fla. 2016) (Canady, J., concurring in part and 

dissenting in part).

CANADY, J., concurs.

Original Proceeding – Habeas Corpus

Martin J. McClain, Special Assistant Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, and 

Nicole M. Noël, Assistant Capital Collateral Regional Counsel, Southern Region, 

Fort Lauderdale, Florida,

for Petitioner

Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, Tallahassee, Florida; and Vivian Singleton, 

Assistant Attorney General, Daytona Beach, Florida,

for Respondent