FIRST DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL

STATE OF FLORIDA

_____________________________

No. 1D17-448

_____________________________

AARON BEAL WANLESS,

Appellant,

v.

STATE OF FLORIDA,

Appellee.

_____________________________

On appeal from the Circuit Court for Okaloosa County.

William F. Stone, Judge.

May 6, 2019

WINSOR, J.

Aaron Wanless appeals his convictions and sentences for five 

counts of aggravated assault. The convictions followed a disturbing 

episode during which Wanless threatened his father and law 

enforcement officers. On appeal, Wanless argues the trial court 

erred in allowing certain testimony about his sanity and, 

separately, in imposing consecutive 10-20-Life mandatoryminimum sentences. We affirm the convictions but reverse the 

consecutive 10-20-Life mandatory-minimum sentences.

I.

After fighting with his wife, Wanless got drunk and went to 

his father’s house. Once there, Wanless accused his father of 

stealing a gun and demanded to know where it was. Wanless then 
2

grabbed a knife from the kitchen and threatened to slit his father’s 

throat unless the father produced the gun. 

Fearing for his life, Wanless’s father left the house and called 

911. After three sheriff’s deputies responded, Wanless walked 

outside with a gun and fired a single shot into the air. The sheriff’s 

deputies ordered Wanless to drop the gun, but Wanless refused, 

yelling that they would have to shoot him. After a tense standoff, 

Wanless retreated into the house and fled out a back door. He was 

arrested the next day. 

Wanless asserted an insanity defense. A licensed psychologist 

testified that Wanless’s medication was not working and that a 

manic episode was to blame for his conduct. The State called its

own expert, who testified that Wanless was not insane. Wanless 

objected to the State’s expert testimony, arguing the expert was 

not qualified to opine about sanity because he was not a 

“psychiatrist, licensed psychologist, or physician,” but was instead 

a mental health counselor with a Ph.D. in Education. The court 

overruled Wanless’s objection, finding the State’s expert qualified 

based on his “education, training, and experience.”

The jury convicted Wanless on all five counts of aggravated 

assault. The first count was for Wanless’s assaulting his father 

with the knife. The next four were for Wanless’s assaulting the 

three deputies and his father with the gun. (The jury found that 

Wanless discharged a firearm as to the latter four counts.) The 

court sentenced Wanless to just over eight years for the knife 

assault; three concurrent twenty-year terms (pursuant to 10-20-

Life)1 for the assaults against the deputies; and a consecutive 

twenty-year term (also pursuant to 10-20-Life) for the remaining 

count.

II.

Wanless’s first argument is that the trial court should have 

excluded the State’s expert testimony about his sanity. Wanless 

argues that section 916.115(1)(a), Florida Statutes—which 

provides that court-appointed experts who evaluate defendants for 

 1 § 775.087, Fla. Stat. (2015).
3

sanity “each shall be a psychiatrist, licensed psychologist, or 

physician”—precludes expert testimony from anyone who is not a 

psychiatrist, licensed psychologist, or physician. But this 

argument confuses the qualifications of experts the court appoints 

to evaluate sanity with the qualifications of experts parties present 

at trial. Although experts appointed pursuant to section 916.115 

sometimes testify at trial, see Fla. R. Crim. P. 3.216(i) (“Any 

experts appointed by the court may be summoned to testify at the 

trial . . . .” (emphasis added)), the parties may also introduce 

“[o]ther evidence regarding the defendant’s insanity or mental 

condition,” so long as it is otherwise admissible, see id.

Accordingly, the fact that the State’s expert was not a 

“licensed psychologist, psychiatrist, or physician” did not preclude 

his testimony at trial. Whether the witness was qualified to testify 

as an expert was therefore left to the trial court’s discretion, see, 

e.g., Penalver v. State, 926 So. 2d 1118, 1134 (Fla. 2006) (“The 

qualification of a person as an expert is within the sound discretion 

of the trial judge.”), and we find no abuse of that discretion. 

III.

Wanless’s second argument is that his consecutive sentences 

under 10-20-Life were illegal because his convictions stemmed 

from a single criminal act. He argues that under the facts of his 

case—one gunshot, multiple assault victims, no physical injuries—

the court lacked authority to impose consecutive sentences. 

The issue of whether and when consecutive sentences are 

permissible under 10-20-Life has long been a subject of confusion. 

Although the Florida Supreme Court has continued to establish 

new rules in this area, the facts of this case do not fit neatly into 

any of them. Nonetheless, we conclude that Florida Supreme Court 

precedent precluded Wanless’s consecutive sentences.

In Williams v. State, the supreme court walked through some 

of its earlier cases and concluded that the “controlling precedent 

establishes [these] points of law for purposes of sentencing under 

the current 10–20–Life statute.” 186 So. 3d 989, 993 (Fla. 2016).

First, as a general matter, “consecutive sentencing of mandatory 

minimum imprisonment terms for multiple firearm offenses is 

impermissible if the offenses arose from the same criminal episode 
4

and a firearm was merely possessed but not discharged.” Id.

Second, if “multiple firearm offenses are committed 

contemporaneously, during which time multiple victims are shot 

at, then consecutive sentencing is permissible but not mandatory.” 

Id. But these points do not help here: Wanless did discharge his 

firearm (he did not “merely possess[]” it), but he did not shoot “at” 

multiple people; he shot once—and in the air. 

Williams therefore does not explicitly answer the question 

presented here: whether consecutive mandatory-minimum 

sentences can stand when there are multiple victims but only a 

single gunshot. Nor is the answer in the 10-20-Life statute’s text. 

As Justice Canady explained, “[t]he distinction . . . made based on 

whether a firearm was fired is totally untethered from anything in 

the text of the relevant statutes.” Walton v. State, 208 So. 3d 60, 

69 (Fla. 2016) (Canady, J., dissenting). Indeed, “[u]nder the 

statutory provisions, the firing of a firearm is relevant only to the 

length of the mandatory minimum sentence.” Id. (Canady, J., 

dissenting); accord Lifred v. State, 643 So. 2d 94, 96 (Fla. 4th DCA 

1994) (Pariente, J.) (noting that “[a]lthough section 775.087(2) 

does not contain any explicit language restricting trial courts from 

imposing consecutive mandatory minimums for separate criminal 

offenses involving the use of a firearm,” the Florida Supreme Court 

has limited authority of trial courts to impose consecutive 

sentences (citing Palmer v. State, 438 So. 2d 1 (Fla. 1983))).

With no help from the statutory text and no explicit answer 

from the Florida Supreme Court, this court has done its best to 

discern the answer from Williams (and the cases that preceded it). 

And our cases, interpreting Williams, have held that one gunshot 

is enough. In Thornes v. State, for example, we noted that 

“Williams did not directly address whether or not consecutive 

mandatory minimum sentences were permissible [when] the 

defendant only shot at one victim but was convicted of multiple 

firearm offenses arising out of the same criminal episode.” 223 So. 

3d 411, 411-12 (Fla. 1st DCA 2017). This court went on to hold 

that—“based on Williams,”—consecutive sentences are

permissible in that circumstance. Id. at 412. Similarly, in Burns v. 

State, this court applied Williams and held that consecutive 

mandatory-minimum sentences were allowed after attempted 

second-degree murder and felon-in-possession convictions when 
5

the defendant “discharged a firearm striking a single victim” in a 

single episode. 212 So. 3d 546, 546 (Fla. 1st DCA 2017); see also

Plummer v. State, 246 So. 3d 506, 509 (Fla. 1st DCA 2018) (“Under 

Williams, consecutive mandatory minimum sentences are 

permissible, but not required if there is a discharge of a firearm.”); 

Bradley v. State, 223 So. 3d 421, 422 (Fla. 1st DCA 2017) (quoting 

Thornes without attribution and finding consecutive sentences 

permissible when defendant shot at single victim); Fleming v. 

State, 219 So. 3d 1038, 1038 (Fla. 2017) (consecutive mandatoryminimum sentences permissible for attempted-murder and felonin-possession convictions in one criminal episode with single 

victim; no mention of multiple gunshots); Tate v. State, 194 So. 3d 

564, 565 (Fla. 1st DCA 2016) (consecutive mandatory-minimum 

sentences permissible for second-degree murder and felon-inpossession convictions in one criminal episode; no mention of 

multiple gunshots); Howard v. State, 100 So. 3d 136 (Fla. 1st DCA 

2012) (explaining, pre-Williams, that “[t]he imposition of 

consecutive minimum mandatory sentences under section 

775.087(2) is improper where the offenses occurred during a single

criminal episode, unless the defendant discharged the firearm and 

injured multiple victims or caused multiple injuries to one 

victim.”).

We are of course bound to follow our own decisions unless and 

until an intervening decision from the Florida Supreme Court, the 

United States Supreme Court, or this court sitting en banc compels 

otherwise. See Schlesinger v. Jacob, 240 So. 3d 75, 78 (Fla. 3d DCA 

2018) (Luck, J., concurring). We therefore must consider whether 

the Florida Supreme Court’s newest decision in this area—Miller

v. State, 265 So. 3d 457 (Fla. 2018)—conflicts with our postWilliams decisions. 

The defendant in Miller was convicted of kidnapping with a 

firearm, aggravated battery, and possession of a firearm by a 

convicted felon. Id. at 458. His offenses were part of one criminal 

episode that involved one victim and no gunshot. Id. at 459. 

Applying Williams, the court concluded that under those facts, 

“consecutive sentences are impermissible.” Id. This outcome is 

consistent with the pronouncement in Williams (and earlier cases) 

that multiple offenses in a single criminal episode generally cannot 

support consecutive mandatory-minimum sentences absent a gun 
6

discharge. Williams, 186 So. 3d at 933. And if Miller did nothing 

but reiterate that rule, it would not conflict with our decisions in 

Bradley, Burns, Thornes, Flemming, or Tate—each of which 

featured a firearm discharge.

But Miller also expressly approved Torres-Rios v. State, 205 

So. 3d 883 (Fla. 5th DCA 2016), in which there was a discharge but 

in which the court nonetheless found consecutive mandatoryminimum sentences impermissible. Id. at 883. Citing Williams, 

the court in Torres-Rios concluded consecutive sentences were 

illegal “where there was only a single discharge of the firearm and 

only one person was shot during a single criminal episode.” Id. 

Several of our own decisions had cited conflict with Torres-Rios, 

see Bradley, 223 So. 3d at 422; Thornes, 223 So. 3d at 412; Tate, 

219 So. 3d at 1038; Burns, 212 So. 3d at 546, and to the extent 

there was a conflict, the Florida Supreme Court has now sided with 

Torres-Rios.

Wanless shot only once, so had there been just one victim, this 

would be like Torres-Rios. And because it approved Torres-Rios, 

the supreme court’s decision in Miller would therefore compel us 

to reverse, notwithstanding our earlier precedent. But unlike the 

defendant in Torres-Rios, Wanless had multiple victims. There is 

some language in Miller suggesting that this fact changes the 

result. In fact, Miller explained that in Williams, “consecutive 

sentences were permissible because there were multiple victims 

and the gun was fired.” 265 So. 3d at 459. If the rule is that simple, 

we must affirm because here, too, there were multiple victims and 

the gun was fired.

Other language in Miller also supports Wanless’s consecutive 

sentences. The court said, for example, that “[w]here, during a 

single criminal episode, there are multiple victims or multiple 

injuries to a single victim, consecutive sentences are permitted at 

the discretion of the trial judge.” Id. at 458. And it said that the 

10-20-Life statute “permits consecutive sentences at judicial 

discretion for specified crimes committed in a single criminal 

episode with either multiple victims or injuries.” Id. at 459 

(emphasis added). But the court also reminded us that it “does not 

reverse itself sub silentio and the cases upon which Williams relied 

are still good law.” Id. at 459 n.1. And those cases, unlike Miller
7

itself, suggest that Wanless’s consecutive sentences were 

unlawful.

Among the cases Williams relied on are Palmer v. State, 438 

So. 2d 1 (Fla. 1983); State v. Thomas, 487 So. 2d 1043 (Fla. 1986); 

and State v. Christian, 692 So. 2d 889, 891 (Fla. 1997). The 

defendant in Palmer interrupted a funeral service, brandished a 

gun, and demanded money from the mourners. 438 So. 2d at 2. He 

took money and wallets and left without firing a shot. Id. His 

sentence included thirteen consecutive three-year mandatory 

minimums based on thirteen robbery convictions. Id. The Florida 

Supreme Court found that unlawful, noting that it did “not believe 

the legislature intended such a result.” Id. at 3. The court did not 

explicitly hinge its decision on the fact that no shot was fired, but 

it did say that it would not prohibit consecutive mandatoryminimum sentences if multiple offenses arose “from separate 

incidents occurring at separate times and places.” Id. at 4. 

Then, in State v. Thomas, the court concluded a defendant 

who shot multiple times was eligible for mandatory minimums. 

487 So. 2d at 1045. The multiple shots constituted the “separate 

and distinct offenses” missing from Palmer. Id.; cf. also State v. 

Enmund, 476 So. 2d 165, 168 (Fla. 1985) (finding Palmer

distinguishable where there were “two separate and distinct 

homicides”). Finally, in Christian, which also involved a defendant 

who shot multiple people, the court explained that the separate 

acts “bifurcate[d] the crimes for stacking purposes.” 692 So. 2d at 

890-91.2 In simpler terms, the court explained that “Christian shot 

two people. Stacking is permissible.” Id. at 891.

 2 The separate acts in Christian were separate shots, and 

although the court found multiple injuries—and that the multiple 

injuries bifurcated the crimes—it clarified that there need not be 

“injuries” in the traditional sense. 692 So. 2d at 891 n.1. Instead, 

“[t]he injury may consist of the heightened danger caused by a 

fired weapon.” Id. So multiple shots count as multiple injuries 

when deciding whether there were “bifurcate[d] crimes for 

stacking purposes”—regardless of whether there were injuries. Id.; 

see also Williams, 186 So. 3d at 993 (noting consecutive sentences 

permissible when multiple people “are shot at”); Thomas, 487 So.
8

In several cases, including Williams and Miller, the Florida 

Supreme Court has returned to the concept that separate acts 

“bifurcate the crimes for stacking purposes.” Miller, 265 So. 3d at 

459 (quoting Christian); accord Williams, 186 So. 3d at 993 

(quoting Christian); State v. Sousa, 903 So. 2d 923, 926 (Fla. 2005).

Multiple gunshots could constitute the separate acts necessary for 

this bifurcation, which is why the court consistently explains that 

“shooting at” multiple people is enough. But in Wanless’s case, 

with just one shot, there are no distinct acts to effect the 

bifurcation. There were multiple victims, but each was victimized 

by the same act, the same assault, the same single gunshot. See

State v. Sousa, 903 So. 2d 923, 926 (Fla. 2005) (explaining that 

“[t]he holding of Christian [turned on] the fact that the defendant 

fired his gun multiple times, injuring multiple victims”); see also 

Cooper v. State, 739 So. 2d 82, 86 (Fla. 1999) (holding that “each 

violation of the mandatory minimum statute must cause a 

separate injury” to allow stacking based on multiple injuries or 

multiple victims (quoting Christian; marks omitted)); Lifred v. 

State, 643 So. 2d 94, 98 (Fla. 4th DCA 1994) (Pariente, J.) (“In the 

case of armed robberies of multiple victims, as in Palmer, the 

firearm is used simultaneously and in the same manner to rob 

more than one person. However, discharge of a firearm in the 

course of an armed robbery changes the nature of the crime and 

manner of commission. With each successive discharge of the 

firearm at each additional victim, the firearm is being used 

separately and distinctly, and in a different manner.”).

Without distinct acts, our case is more like Palmer, in which 

multiple mourners became multiple robbery victims leading to 

multiple convictions, but in which the court found no distinct acts 

to support consecutive mandatory-minimum sentences. Palmer, 

438 So. 2d at 3; see also State v. Parker, 812 So. 2d 495, 498 (Fla. 

4th DCA 2002) (concluding consecutive mandatory-minimum 

 

2d at 1044 (approving consecutive mandatory-minimum sentences 

when the defendant shot twice but missed once); Valentin v. State, 

963 So. 2d 317, 320 (Fla. 5th DCA 2007) (“Firing the weapon at an 

individual without striking him or her may be enough to cause the 

type of injury that will allow imposition of consecutive minimum 

mandatory sentences under the statute.” (citing Christian)).
9

sentences impermissible because “[a]lthough [defendant] pointed 

the guns at four victims, Parker fired the gun only once”). We 

therefore conclude that, based on Florida Supreme Court 

precedent, Wanless was entitled to concurrent sentences.

As the Florida Supreme Court continues to develop rules in 

this area, it may well conclude that any gunshot is enough. Or it 

may decide that a single act can be “bifurcated” if it simultaneously 

harms multiple people. Or it may abandon its current rules 

altogether and decide to untether the legality of consecutive

mandatory-minimum sentences from the number of victims or 

gunshots. But based on the Florida Supreme Court precedent as 

we now understand it, Wanless’s consecutive mandatoryminimum sentences cannot stand. 

AFFIRMED in part; REVERSED in part. 

WINOKUR, J., concurs; MAKAR, J., concurs in part and dissents in 

part with opinion.

_____________________________

Not final until disposition of any timely and 

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

9.331.

_____________________________

MAKAR, J., concurring in part, dissenting in part.

When confronted by three sheriff’s deputies, Aaron Beal 

Wanless fired a single shot skyward, had a tense standoff with the 

officers while wielding his gun, and fled. Because his father was 

present during the entire confrontation, Wanless was charged with 

four separate counts of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, 

three on the officers and one on his father. If only one deputy (or 

just the father) were present, the single gunshot and standoff 

would likely be insufficient to impose consecutive sentences under 

Florida’s 10-20-Life statute, § 775.087(2)(d), Fla. Stat. (2018), 

because the incident involved a single criminal episode with a 

single shot and only one victim. Torres-Rios v. State, 205 So. 3d 
10

883 (Fla. 5th DCA 2016), approved, Miller v. State, 43 Fla. L. 

Weekly S426 (Fla. Oct. 4, 2018).

But what happens when more than one person was victimized 

by Wanless’s conduct? Did the presence of three officers and the 

father when Wanless fired his weapon and brandished it 

thereafter give the trial court discretion to impose consecutive 

mandatory-minimum sentences? Here, the trial court did not 

impose four consecutive mandatory-minimum sentences; instead, 

it imposed three concurrent mandatory-minimum sentences of 

twenty years for the aggravated assault on the three officers but 

imposed a consecutive mandatory-minimum sentence of twenty 

years for the aggravated assault on the father. In other words, 

Wanless must serve twenty years for the aggravated assault with 

a gun on the officers followed by twenty years for the aggravated 

assault with a gun on his father, a total of forty years.

On this point, our supreme court in Williams v. State, 186 So. 

3d 989, 993 (Fla. 2016), addressed whether the imposition of 

consecutive mandatory-minimum sentences was permissible, but 

not required, where a defendant fired multiple shots in the air 

during a squabble with four men during a single criminal episode. 

It concluded that if “multiple firearm offenses are committed 

contemporaneously, during which time multiple victims are shot 

at, then consecutive sentencing is permissible but not mandatory.” 

Id.

Here, the father and each of the officers were victimized by 

the gun’s discharge and brandishment, i.e., an aggravated assault 

with the gun. The deputies at the scene said they were scared and 

fearful throughout the encounter due to the gunshot and Wanless’s 

brandishing his weapon openly during the tense standoff that 

followed. One deputy testified that he was “extremely close” to 

shooting Wanless; the other said he was “as close as any human 

has ever come” to doing so. The father, who had been threatened 

by Wanless just before the officers arrived, was scared and became 

distraught after the gunshot, pleading with the officers not to shoot 

his only son. Under these circumstances, where there are multiple 

victims arising from a single gunshot and an ongoing encounter 

with an armed and unstable suspect, consecutive sentencing is 

permissible. Wanless’s actions amounted to an aggravated assault 
11

upon each of the three officers and his father, thereby giving the 

trial judge the authority to impose consecutive sentences as to one 

or all of the charges. The trial judge was not required to do so, but 

had the discretion to do so, see Williams, choosing to make 

consecutive only the sentence for the aggravated assault against 

the father (oddly, the trial judge initially imposed only concurrent

probation, but changed that to a consecutive sentence of mandatory 

twenty years when the prosecutor pointed out that probation was 

impermissible).

Palmer v. State, 438 So. 2d 1, 2 (Fla. 1983), has similarities to 

this case but is distinguishable because it did not involve the 

actual discharge of a firearm, it pre-dates the 1999 revisions to the 

10-20-Life statute, and its holding was premised on the thenexisting parole system (that statutorily required parole 

considerations that consecutive sentencing would thwart). In 

Palmer, an intruder, Ronald Gene Palmer, walked into a funeral 

parlor during a wake with a pistol and ordered mourners to give 

up their money and valuables. Palmer brandished the pistol in 

front of the group, resulting in aggravated assault charges; no shot 

was fired, however. Palmer was found guilty and sentenced to 

“seventy-five years' imprisonment on each of thirteen robbery 

counts, the sentences to run consecutively for a total of 975 years.” 

Id. As to the “counts of aggravated assault and carrying a 

concealed firearm Palmer received sentences of five years for each, 

consecutive to each other and to the robbery counts.” Id. The trial 

court in Palmer “also imposed the mandatory minimum of three 

years on each robbery count for a total of thirty-nine years.” Id. 

On appeal, the Florida Supreme Court was “primarily 

concerned with the issue of whether the trial court erred in 

imposing three-year mandatory minimums on each of thirteen 

consecutive sentences, for a total of thirty-nine years without 

eligibility for parole.” Id. at 3 (emphasis added). As to that issue 

alone, the Court reversed, holding that consecutive sentencing of 

the thirteen mandatory-minimums was impermissible due to the 

then-existing statutory necessity that Palmer be eligible for parole 

in three years. Conflicting statutory provisions and the absence of 

clear authority for stacking required that thirteen mandatoryminimum sentences on the robbery counts could not be imposed 

consecutively. Id. at 3-4. The Court, however, left in place the 
12

consecutive sentences for the robbery and aggravated 

assault/carrying firearm counts against Palmer totaling almost a 

millennium. See State v. Boatwright, 559 So. 2d 210, 213 (Fla. 

1990) (noting that the Court in Palmer “found no reversible error 

in the trial court's imposition of sentences of seventy-five years' 

imprisonment on each of the thirteen robbery counts . . . with the 

sentences to run consecutively for a total of 975 years. Nor did the 

trial court err in imposing five-year sentences on the counts of 

aggravated assault and carrying a concealed weapon, such 

sentences to run consecutively to each other and to the robbery 

counts.”).

Unlike Palmer, where no clear statutory directive existed to 

overcome the statutory requirement of parole consideration, the 

legislature in 1999 enacted section 775.087(2) as a part of the 10-

20-Life revisions, which marked a major shift in sentencing laws, 

moving away from a parole-oriented system toward a more certain 

and punitive sentencing regime. From that point forward, no 

statutory conundrum with the parole system stood in the way of 

longer sentences that might be imposed consecutively; indeed, the 

legislature made its intent clear:

(d) It is the intent of the Legislature that offenders who 

actually possess, carry, display, use, threaten to use, or 

attempt to use firearms or destructive devices be 

punished to the fullest extent of the law, and the minimum 

terms of imprisonment imposed pursuant to this 

subsection shall be imposed for each qualifying felony 

count for which the person is convicted. The court shall 

impose any term of imprisonment provided for in this 

subsection consecutively to any other term of 

imprisonment imposed for any other felony offense.

§ 775.087(2)(d), Fla. Stat. (1999) (emphasis added) (subsection (d) 

remains unaltered today); see also § 775.021(4)(a) & (b), Fla. Stat. 

(2019) (both subsections remain the same since their enactment in 

1988) (subsection (b) states that 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 . . . to determine legislative intent” with 
13

exceptions); cf. State v. Suarez, 485 So. 2d 1283, 1283 (Fla. 1986)

(noting that “Palmer is still operative under the guidelines”).

Our supreme court doesn’t overrule itself sub silentio, but it 

seems that Palmer—a 4-3 precedent with a limited holding—has 

been elbowed aside, though not put on a shelf to die, in light of both 

Williams and the court’s most recent pronouncement, Miller v.

State, No. SC17-1598, 2018 WL 4784069, (Fla. Oct. 4, 2018), whose 

language supports affirming the consecutive mandatory-minimum

sentence imposed against Wanless. Unlike this case, Miller was a 

single shot, single victim, single criminal episode case, i.e., the 

prototype for a prohibition on consecutive minimum-mandatory 

sentences. In the course of overturning the consecutive sentences 

in Miller, the court said two things. First, it said that “[w]here, 

during a single criminal episode, there are multiple victims or 

multiple injuries to a single victim, consecutive sentences are 

permitted at the discretion of the trial judge.” Id. at *1 (emphasis 

added). Second, it said—in describing the holding in Williams—

that “consecutive sentences were permissible because there were 

multiple victims and the gun was fired.” Id. at *2 (emphasis added).

The takeaway from the highlighted language, albeit 

persuasive dicta, is that the existence of multiple victims matters 

greatly in deciding whether consecutive sentences are permissible, 

a factor present in this case. In addition, the firing of a gun 

matters—multiple shots into the air in Williams, for example. 

Though our supreme court has not had an aggravated-assaultsingle-shot-in-the-air-with-multiple-victims case (yet), it is more 

consistent with its existing jurisprudence to apply Williams and 

affirm the trial court’s discretionary imposition of a consecutive 

sentence in this case. Though no officer or the father was 

physically injured by the skyward gunshot, each was a “victim” of 

Wanless’s aggravated assault with the gun; each felt fear from the 

assault, which included not just the gunshot but the ongoing 

standoff with Wanless brandishing the weapon. Because “multiple 

victims” were assaulted in this manner, the imposition of a 

consecutive sentence as to the aggravated assault of the father was 

permissible, even if Wanless’s conduct is considered a single 

criminal episode.
14

For twenty years, the complexity and conundrums of Florida’s 

sentencing law have created a degree of confusion as to when 

consecutive or concurrent sentences are permissible. See William 

A. Haddad, “Appellate Sentencing” in Florida: A Plea for Less 

Complexity at the Trial Level, 70 FLA. BAR. J. 28 (1996) (discussing 

the need for the reform of sentencing laws, including concurrent 

and consecutive sentencing, prior to the added complexities of the 

10-20-Life law, which passed in 1999). This case showcases the 

muddle, as Judge Winsor’s opinion cogently explains. Though I 

disagree with the result in this case as to the consecutive 

mandatory-minimum sentencing issue, I agree that our supreme 

court ought to bring greater clarity to this area of the law and, if 

possible, return to a textually-based jurisprudence; likewise, the 

legislature ought to consider clarifying the statutory framework to 

bring it into alignment with current criminal justice priorities. I 

concur as to the expert testimony issue.

_____________________________

Andy Thomas, Public Defender, and Terry P. Roberts, Special 

Assistant Public Defender, Tallahassee, for Appellant.

Ashley Moody, Attorney General, and Amanda D. Stokes,

Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, for Appellee.