NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPI RES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION AND, IF FILED, DETERMINED

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL OF FLORIDA SECOND DISTRICT CAROL RACHELLE ROACH, ) ) Appellant, ) ) v. ) Case No. 2D15-493 ) CARMEN BROWER, ) ) Appellee. ) ) Opinion filed December 9, 2015. Appeal from the Circuit Court for Pinellas County; Thomas M. Ramsberger, Judge. J. Andrew Crawford of J. Andrew Crawford, P.A., St. Petersburg, for Appellant. Carmen Brower, pro se.

LUCAS, Judge.

Carol Rachelle Roach appeals the entry of an injunction for pr otection against stalking that prohibits h er from contacting Carmen Brow er, the petitioner below. Ms. Brower, who neither appeared in this appeal nor testified i n the underlying proceedings, failed to prove that s he suffered any kind of emot ional distress as a result of Ms. Roach's activities. Accor dingly, we reverse the circuit court's order.- 2 - From the record presented in this appeal, it appears that Ms. Roach became convinced that a relative of Ms. Brower had burglarized Ms. Roach's home. Ms. Roach pursued that belief to some degree. She filed a crim inal complaint and then began "investigating," through vari ous means, Ms. Brower's rela tive by contacting Ms. Brower, her friends, and her family. On November 6, 2014, Ms. Brower filed a petition for injunction against Ms. Roach, a lleging that Ms. Roach was h arassing, stalking, and threatening her. On January 9, 2015, the court convened an evidentiary hearing on Ms. Brower's petition. At that hearing, several witnesses testifie d on behalf of Ms. Brower and Ms. Roach. Collectively, their testimony was fairly vague, revolving around anonymous telephone calls made to Ms. Brower's daughter, Ms. Ro ach's repeated inquiries about Ms. Brower's relative, and a magnetic car sign Ms. Roach placed on her vehicle that sought information about Ms. Brower's relative. N either Ms. Roach nor Ms. Brower testified. 1 The circuit court announced its ruling at the conclusion of t he hearing, stating it was concerned about the level of contact that Ms. Ro ach had had with Ms. Brower's friends and family. The court's injunction order proh ibited Ms. Roach from committing, or causing any other person to commit, any acts of stalking against Ms. Brower and from contacting Ms. Brower for a period of one year. Ms. Roach then timely appealed.

1 Ms. Brower represented hersel f throughout the proceedings below and appears to have conducted herself properly. She examined and c ross-examined the witnesses who testified and comp lied with the court's evidentia ry rulings. However, she never provided her own testimony during the hearing. It may be that she was simply unsure at what point in the proc ess she could "tell her side of the story," so to speak, as a pro se litigant.- 3 - A petitioner may obtain an injunction to prevent stalking unde r section 784.0485, Florida Statutes (2014). Section 784.048(2), in turn , provides: "A person who willfully, maliciously, and repeatedly follows, harasses, or cy berstalks another person commits the offense of stalking . . . ." Pertinent here, secti on 784.048(1)(a) defines the term "harass" as "to engage in a course of conduct directed at a specific person which causes substantial emotional dis tress to that person and serves no legitimate purpose." Thus, to be entitled to injunctive relief under her petition, M s. Brower had to establish that Ms. Roach willfully, maliciously, and repeatedly engaged i n a course of conduct toward her that caused her subst antial emotional distress and s erved no legitimate
purpose. "Each incident of stalking must be proven by competent, substa ntial evidence to support an injuncti on against stalking." Touhey v. Seda, 133 So. 3d 1203, 1204 (Fla. 2d DCA 2014). In the case at bar, while we might de fer to the court's determinations that Ms. Roach's c ourse of conduct was willful, malicious, and unjustified, we cannot ignore the complete absence of evidence as to whether that conduct caused Ms. Brower substantial emotional distress under section 784.048(1)(a). Ms. Brower never testified. And not one of the witnesses who d id testify ever implied that Ms. Brower was affected by Ms. Roach's actions in any way. In truth, it seems that the distress, if there were any here, was harbored solely by th e witnesses themselves. Regardless, without competent, subs tantial evidence that Ms. Br ower, the petitioner, suffered substantial emotional distress, the circuit court coul d not enter an injunction against Ms. Roach based upon the stalking statute. See Leach v . Kersey, 162 So. 3d 1104, 1106-07 (Fla. 2d DCA 2015) (holding that because petition er failed to- 4 - demonstrate that she suffered substantial emotional distress th rough competent, substantial evidence, the trial court erred in granting the inj unction against stalking); Jones v. Jackson, 67 So. 3d 120 3, 1204 (Fla. 2d DCA 2011) (hold ing that the trial court erred in granting an injunction against stalking where the evid ence did not demonstrate that a reasonable person in the petitioner's position would hav e suffered substantial emotional distress). The order below is, therefore, reversed, and we remand with in structions to the circuit court to dissolve the injunction against Ms. Roa ch. Reversed and remanded with instructions.

ALTENBERND and WALLACE, JJ., Concur.