Case Name: Hector RIVAS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1996-09-11
Citations: 679 So. 2d 358
Docket Number: No. 95-3620
Parties: Hector RIVAS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
Judges: DELL, KLEIN and PARIENTE, JJ., concur.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 679
Pages: 358–359

Head Matter:
Hector RIVAS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
No. 95-3620.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.
Sept. 11, 1996.
Robert Friedman, West Palm Beach, for appellant.
Robert A. Butterworth, Attorney General, Tallahassee; and Don M. Rogers, Assistant Attorney General, West Palm Beach, for ap-pellee.

Opinion:
PER CURIAM.
We reverse appellant's conviction and remand for a new trial because the trial court allowed defendant to represent himself at trial, but did not conduct either a Nelson hearing or a Faretta hearing prior to allowing the trial to proceed as it did. If defendant had been represented by his court-appointed counsel throughout the trial, we might well have been able to find that the defendant's ambiguous statements did not require a Faretta hearing; however, the court's permitting him to represent himself without a Faretta hearing leaves us no alternative but to reverse.
DELL, KLEIN and PARIENTE, JJ., concur.
. Nelson v. State, 274 So.2d 256 (Fla. 4th DCA 1973), in which this court established the procedure for determining if a defendant is entitled to discharge his court-appointed counsel for ineffec tive assistance, approved in Hardwick v. State, 521 So.2d 1071 (Fla.1988).
. Faretta v. California, 422 U.S. 806, 95 S.Ct. 2525, 45 L.Ed.2d 562 (1975), holding that a defendant has the constitutional right to represent himself after the court makes a sufficient inquiry and is satisfied with defendant's responses. See Fla. R.Crim. P. 3.111(d).