FIRST DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL

STATE OF FLORIDA

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No. 1D2023-0434 

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JACOB L. HUDSON,

Appellant,

v.

STATE OF FLORIDA,

Appellee.

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On appeal from the Circuit Court for Bay County.

Shonna Young Gay, Judge.

May 1, 2024

PER CURIAM.

AFFIRMED.

ROBERTS and ROWE, JJ., concur; B.L. THOMAS, J., concurs with 

opinion.

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Not final until disposition of any timely and 

authorized motion under Fla. R. App. P. 9.330 or 

9.331.

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B.L. Thomas, J., concurring. 
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I concur in the Court’s decision affirming Hudson’s judgment 

and sentence for four counts of capital sexual battery on a child 

under the age of twelve, and eleven counts of lewd and lascivious 

molestation and lewd battery on the same victim. 

I write to reiterate my view that Hudson and other offenders 

like him should be subject to the death penalty. 

Offenders like Hudson who commit capital sexual battery 

murder their young victims’ innocence. And contrary to the 

reasoning of the United States Supreme Court in Kennedy v. 

Louisiana, 554 U.S. 407 (2008), and the Florida Supreme Court in 

Buford v. State, 403 So. 2d 943 (Fla. 1981), no decent society should 

allow such offenders to avoid the just punishment of death for 

these utterly depraved and horrific capital crimes. Based on recent 

legislation discussed further below, such offenders may now be 

sentenced to death in Florida, should these two decisions be 

overruled. 

Sexual crimes of this nature committed against children merit 

the death penalty in a moral and civilized society. 

This was not Hudson’s first minor victim of sexual crimes. At 

sentencing, the State noted he had been sentenced to prison for 

that offense. In this case, Hudson began victimizing his stepdaughter when she was ten years old. He was the only father the 

victim had ever known. She called Hudson “Dad.” The victim 

testified that before Hudson began sexually assaulting her, she 

loved Hudson. Her mother described the victim as a “daddy’s girl,” 

referring to Hudson, before the crimes occurred. 

Hudson forced the victim to perform oral sex on him, forced 

her to allow him to perform oral sex on her, and committed the 

other sexual crimes, all while the victim’s mother was away from 

home. The victim was sleeping during one of the assaults, awoke 

to find her clothes removed, and Hudson committing sexual 

battery on her. Hudson told the victim he wanted to have sexual 

intercourse with her, by repeating an obscene slang term. The 

victim testified she “was only” ten years old and did not know what 

that meant. 
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Hudson repeatedly told his victim not to tell anyone or he 

would go to jail. He gave the victim cosmetics after he committed 

the sexual crimes against her. 

When the victim was eleven years old, she showed her mother 

some cosmetics Hudson had given her. The victim’s mother asked 

her where she obtained the make-up, and the victim said Hudson

gave it to her. Her mother then asked the victim how often Hudson 

gave her cosmetics, to which the victim stated “every Friday.” The 

victim showed her mother the extensive and unused cosmetics 

Hudson had given her. After thinking about this unusual 

arrangement, the victim’s mother testified she then thought the 

excessive gifts seemed like a “bribe.” 

The mother asked her daughter if Hudson had touched her 

inappropriately.

At first the victim said “no.” But then she started crying and 

told her mother that “Dad,” Hudson, had touched her. The victim 

then recounted all the sexual crimes Hudson had committed. She 

told her mother she was afraid to tell because she thought Hudson 

would hurt her or her mother if she reported his extensive crimes 

against her. The victim’s mother did not go to sleep that night and 

pretended to be asleep when Hudson returned, because the 

victim’s mother was afraid Hudson would go into the victim’s room

and commit more sexual assaults. 

The victim’s mother then informed Hudson’s mother and 

asked her to confront Hudson together, because she was afraid to 

do so alone. The two of them confronted Hudson.

The victim’s mother was screaming, crying, “on the floor,” and 

could not breathe when she confronted Hudson. But Hudson just 

kept talking about getting dinner. He then calmly told the victim’s 

mother that “If I’m going to spend the rest of my life in prison, I’m 

going to go outside and smoke a cigarette.” Hudson told the 

victim’s mother he was sorry for hurting the victim, and would 

accept any punishment that might be administered. At first, he 

told the victim’s mother that he would call the police and report 

the crimes, but he then made her call law enforcement. 
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The victim participated in two interviews with a Child 

Protection Team. The State provided notice to Hudson’s counsel 

that the State would introduce both hearsay statements in 

evidence against Hudson. 

The victim testified at trial when she was fifteen years old.

When asked at trial how she felt about the crimes, the victim 

testified that recounting the events “disgust[ed] her”. She tried to 

“forget” what had occurred. 

At sentencing, the victim provided a statement, in which she 

stated in part:

“I am here today for the ten-year-old me who had no voice. The 

eleven-year-old me who never thought she would be okay and my 

world would never be the same. The twelve-year old me who no 

longer wanted to live. The fourteen-year-old me who thought I 

would never heal from this pain. Now at fifteen, I stare at this man 

who brought me all this pain and shame. From this day forward I 

will not carry this burden. I will not live with this shame, so I give 

this burden to [Hudson.] You will now carry this pain. You will 

know the shame you created because I now know it was never mine 

to have.”

Legislation Now Provides for Imposition of Death Penalty for 

Certain Child-Sexual Battery Crimes.

At the time Hudson committed these horrific offenses, and 

told the victim’s mother he was ready “to accept” punishment for 

his crimes, state law did not provide for the death penalty for such 

crimes. But it does now. See §§ 794.011 (2)(a), & 921.1425, Fla. 

Stat; Ch. 2023-25, Laws of Fla.

In 2023, the legislature authorized this punishment and 

stated its intent:

Such crimes destroy the innocence of a young child and 

violate all standards of decency held by civilized society. 

The Legislature further finds that Buford v. State of 
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Florida, 403 So. 2d 943 (Fla. 1981), was wrongly decided, 

and that Kennedy v. Louisiana, 554 U.S. 407, (2008), was 

wrongly decided and an egregious infringement of the 

states’ power to punish the most heinous of crimes.

§ 921.1425, Fla. Stat.; Ch. 2023-25, Laws of Fla. 

In Lainhart v. State, I stated in my concurring opinion that 

crimes such as Hudson committed merit the possibility of the 

imposition of capital punishment: 

As I have noted previously, see Bicking v. State, 348 

So. 3d 35, 36 (Fla. 1st DCA 2022), historically the states 

were permitted to execute such offenders as Appellant, 

but the United States Supreme Court held in Kennedy v. 

Louisiana, in a 5-4 decision in 2008, that the death 

penalty was no longer a valid punishment for such 

horrific crimes as occurred here. 554 U.S. 407, 128 S.Ct. 

2641, 171 L.Ed.2d 525 (2008). The Court in Kennedy, 

which relied in part on its plurality decision in Coker v. 

Georgia, 433 U.S. 584, 97 S.Ct. 2861, 53 L.Ed.2d 982 

(1977), held that no matter how brutal and dehumanizing 

a rapist victimizes a person, even a child, the states are 

not authorized to impose capital punishment for such 

heinous crimes. I reiterate my view that both of these 

decisions are wrong as they are not based on the text or 

the historical underpinnings of the Eighth Amendment. 

This case is just another sad example of why those 

decisions are also wrong based on any moral theory of 

punishment and justice, especially where a perpetrator 

destroys the innocence of a young child and violates all 

standards of decency held by any civilized society. 

Bicking, 348 So. 3d at 43.

351 So. 3d 1282, 1283 (Fla. 1st DCA 2022).

In the dissenting opinion in Kennedy v. Louisiana, Justice 

Alito noted:

The rape of any victim inflicts great injury, and 

“[s]ome victims are so grievously injured physically or 
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psychologically that life is beyond repair.” Coker, 433 U.S. 

at 603, 97 S.Ct. 2861 (opinion of Powell, J.). “The 

immaturity and vulnerability of a child, both physically 

and psychologically, adds a devastating dimension to 

rape that is not present when an adult is raped.” Meister, 

Murdering Innocence: The Constitutionality of Capital 

Child Rape Statutes, 45 Ariz. L.Rev. 197, 208–209 (2003). 

See also State v. Wilson, 96–1392, p. 6 (La. 12/13/96), 685 

So.2d 1063, 1067; Broughton, “On Horror's Head Horrors 

Accumulate”: A Reflective Comment on Capital Child 

Rape Legislation, 39 Duquesne L.Rev. 1, 38 (2000). Longterm studies show that sexual abuse is “grossly intrusive 

in the lives of children and is harmful to their normal 

psychological, emotional, and sexual development in 

ways which no just or humane society can tolerate.” C. 

Bagley & K. King, Child Sexual Abuse: The Search for 

Healing 2 (1990).

It has been estimated that as many as 40% of 7– to 

13–year–old sexual assault victims are considered 

“seriously disturbed.” A. Lurigio, M. Jones, & B. Smith, 

Child Sexual Abuse: Its Causes, Consequences, and 

Implications for Probation Practice, 59 Fed. Probation 69, 

70 (Sept. 1995). Psychological problems include sudden 

school failure, unprovoked crying, dissociation, 

depression, insomnia, sleep disturbances, nightmares, 

feelings of guilt and inferiority, and self-destructive 

behavior, including an increased incidence of suicide. 

Meister, supra, at 209; Broughton, supra, at 38; Glazer, 

Child Rapists Beware! The Death Penalty and 

Louisiana’s Amended Aggravated Rape Statute, 25 Am. 

J.Crim. L. 79, 88 (1997).

The deep problems that afflict child-rape victims 

often become society’s problems as well. Commentators 

have noted correlations between childhood sexual abuse 

and later problems such as substance abuse, dangerous 

sexual behaviors or dysfunction, inability to relate to 

others on an interpersonal level, and psychiatric illness. 

Broughton, supra, at 38; Glazer, supra, at 89; Handbook 

on Sexual Abuse of Children 7 (L. Walker ed.1988). 
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Victims of child rape are nearly 5 times more likely than 

nonvictims to be arrested for sex crimes and nearly 30 

times more likely to be arrested for prostitution. Ibid.

The harm that is caused to the victims and to society 

at large by the worst child rapists is grave. It is the 

judgment of the Louisiana lawmakers and those in an 

increasing number of other States that these harms 

justify the death penalty. The Court provides no cogent 

explanation why this legislative judgment should be 

overridden. Conclusory references to “decency,” 

“moderation,” “restraint,” “full progress,” and “moral 

judgment” are not enough.

554 U.S. at 468–69.

Hudson murdered the innocence of the victim. In the future, 

should the decisions in Kennedy and Buford be overruled, 

perpetrators who commit such crimes may and should be subject 

to the imposition of the death penalty as provided in law. 

_____________________________

Jessica J. Yeary, Public Defender, and Ross Haine, Assistant 

Public Defender, Tallahassee.

Ashley Moody, Attorney General, and Robert Charles “Charlie”

Lee, Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, for Appellee.