Third District Court of Appeal

State of Florida 

Opinion filed December 1, 2021.

Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.

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No. 3D18-2430

Lower Tribunal No. F05-11764B

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Samuel Wright,

Appellant,

vs.

The State of Florida,

Appellee.

An Appeal from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Marisa 

Tinkler Mendez, Judge.

Carlos J. Martinez, Public Defender, and Andrew Stanton, Assistant 

Public Defender, for appellant.

Ashley Moody, Attorney General, and Brian H. Zack, Assistant 

Attorney General, for appellee.

Before LOGUE, SCALES and LINDSEY, JJ.

LOGUE, J.
2

Samuel Wright appeals from his convictions and sentences after a jury 

found him guilty of first-degree murder, armed robbery, and burglary. He 

asserts that the trial court reversibly erred by refusing to excuse a 

prospective juror for cause. We agree and reverse.

During voir dire, the following exchange occurred between defense 

counsel and the juror at issue:

[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: So can a completely innocent 

person be wrongfully accused of a crime?

JUROR: No.

[DEFENSE COUNSEL]: No?

(The juror shakes her head in the negative.)

Defense counsel later asked the panel to raise their hand “if you think if I am 

innocent and I am wrongfully accused of a crime, I will absolutely take the 

stand and testify on my own behalf?” The juror at issue was one of a handful 

of prospective jurors who raised their hands. After these exchanges, no 

attempt was made to rehabilitate the juror at issue.

Wright moved to excuse the juror for cause based on her statements

regarding the presumption of innocence. The State argued that the juror’s

responses reflected only confusion as to the question as presented. The trial 

court agreed that the juror appeared “somewhat confused” and denied 

Wright’s motion. Wright exercised a peremptory challenge to remove the 
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juror from the panel. Later, the trial court also denied Wright’s request for an 

additional peremptory challenge to excuse another juror who ultimately sat 

on the jury.1 The jury convicted Wright of the crimes as charged, and the trial 

court sentenced him to life imprisonment on the first-degree murder charge 

and forty years on the armed robbery and burglary charges. Wright timely 

appealed. 

“We review a trial court’s decision to deny a challenge for cause to a 

potential juror for an abuse of discretion.” Rivas v. Sandoval, 319 So. 3d 744, 

746 (Fla. 3d DCA 2021). “The test for determining juror competency is 

whether the juror can lay aside any bias or prejudice and render a verdict 

solely on the evidence presented and the instructions on the law given by 

1 There was no showing that the juror who Wright would have excused but 

who ultimately served because Wright was denied additional preemptory 

challenges was legally objectionable. Nevertheless, the State conceded that 

the issue was properly preserved for appellate review in accordance with 

Matarranz v. State, 133 So. 3d 473, 482 (Fla. 2013) (“[T]o preserve 

challenges for cause to prospective jurors, the defendant must object to the 

jurors, show that he or she has exhausted all peremptory challenges and 

requested more that were denied, and identify a specific juror that he or she 

would have excused if possible.”) (internal quotations and citation omitted).

But see Deviney v. State, 322 So. 3d 563, 578–88 (Lawson, J., concurring 

in part and concurring in result) (proposing that Florida courts should adopt 

the harmless error standard in reviewing trial court rulings on cause 

challenges, by which a defendant would have to show that a “legally 

objectionable” juror (i.e., a biased or partial juror) ultimately sat on the jury, 

thus infringing upon the defendant’s constitutional right to a fair and impartial 

jury).
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the court.” Busby v. State, 894 So. 2d 88, 95 (Fla. 2004). “An evaluation of a 

juror’s ability to render a verdict based solely on the evidence and law must 

take in account ‘all of the questions and answers posed to or received from 

the juror.’” Rivas, 319 So. 3d at 747 (quoting Matarranz, 133 So. 3d at 484).

When a juror makes a statement that calls into question the juror’s 

ability to serve, our Supreme Court allows for liberal rehabilitation to show 

the statement reflected only a momentary and passing confusion of the law, 

rather than a firm belief or inborn bias:

[C]ourts and counsel also find themselves addressing jurors who 

misunderstand aspects of the law and the judicial process. These 

misunderstandings are based not on personal experience and 

beliefs, but on a lack of familiarity with or misinformation 

concerning the law. We clarify today that courts and counsel are 

correct to engage prospective jurors in a dialogue addressing 

their partialities, biases, prejudices, and misconceptions when 

they are rooted in a lack of familiarity with the judicial system as 

part of an effort to rehabilitate in contrast to those immutable 

opinions and attitudes that arise from personal life experiences 

and firmly held beliefs. Florida law allows the rehabilitation of 

jurors whose responses in voir dire raise concerns about their 

impartiality. Concerns that stem from misinformation and 

confusion concerning the law or process are ripe for discussion 

and redress through rehabilitation.

Matarranz, 133 So. 3d at 485–86 (citations omitted). At the same time, 

however, such rehabilitation is not just liberally available, it is also required if 

the juror is to serve: “When a juror’s last response indicates that the juror is 

potentially prejudiced, and the response is not retracted or modified, the juror 
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must be stricken for cause.” Marquez v. State, 721 So. 2d 1206, 1207 (Fla. 

3d DCA 1998). 

We find that the responses of the juror at issue, when taken at face

value, raise concerns about her ability to serve as an impartial juror. When 

asked whether an innocent person could be wrongfully accused of a crime, 

she said “No.” Other jurors readily understood the question. When asked 

again, she reaffirmed her answer by shaking her head in the negative. She 

also raised her hand when asked whether she thought that an innocent 

person would absolutely take the stand and testify on his own behalf.

While the juror’s responses in this regard may have reflected only a 

temporary confusion and misunderstanding of the law, there was no attempt 

to rehabilitate her. The juror’s responses were not retracted or modified. For 

these reasons, we are compelled to reverse and remand for a new trial.2

Reversed and remanded.

2 Wright also challenges the trial court’s use of the “and/or” conjunction in the 

jury instructions. Because we are reversing on the jury selection issue, we 

do not reach this argument. We note, however, the Supreme Court has 

repeatedly condemned its use. Garzon v. State, 980 So. 2d 1038, 1045 (Fla. 

2008) (listing ways to avoid the “potential problems” presented by the use of 

“and/or” in jury instructions); see also Gilley v. State, 996 So. 2d 936, 939

(Fla. 2d DCA 2008) (holding that the trial court erred in using jury instructions 

that included the “and/or” conjunction and referred to codefendants who 

were being tried separately). We similarly do not reach the other arguments 

raised by Wright.