Case Name: Hawthorne Konrad MATTHEWS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee
Court: Florida Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1978-07-27
Citations: 363 So. 2d 1066
Docket Number: No. 50350
Parties: Hawthorne Konrad MATTHEWS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
Judges: ENGLAND, C. J., and ADKINS and OVERTON, JJ., concur.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 363
Pages: 1066–1075

Head Matter:
Hawthorne Konrad MATTHEWS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
No. 50350.
Supreme Court of Florida.
July 27, 1978.
Rehearing Denied Nov. 28, 1978.
Paul Shimek, Jr., of Shimek & Sutherland, Pensacola, for appellant.
Robert L. Shevin, Atty. Gen., and Raymond L. Marky, Asst. Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, for appellee.

Opinion:
SUNDBERG, Justice.
This cause comes to us by appeal from the decision of the District Court of Appeal, First District, in Matthews v. State, reported at 336 So.2d 643, because the district court initially and directly passed on the validity of Section 836.05 Florida Statutes (1973), thereby vesting jurisdiction in this Court under Article V, Section 3(b)(1), Florida Constitution. It is unusual that the case would reach this Court in this posture. Ordinarily, the initial ruling upon the constitutionality of the statute would take place in the trial court in which event direct review in this Court would follow. Article V, Section 3(b)(1), Florida Constitution. If a ruling on the validity of the statute was not made in the trial court, it is difficult to understand how it was preserved for review in the District Court of Appeal. Nonetheless, the assignments of error filed by the appellant in the court below clearly raise the constitutional issue:
Florida Statute § 836.05, the section under which the Defendant has been convicted, is unconstitutional as applied to your Defendant based upon the facts in this cause and is in contravention as ap plied in this cause to Defendant's rights under the First Amendment, Fifth Amendment, and Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America. The conviction is an unconstitutional application of the extortion statute, i. e., § 836.05.
Appellee State does not cross-appeal in this Court asserting that the matter was not preserved at the trial court level. Consequently, when the district court affirmed appellant's conviction in the face of this constitutional challenge, it inherently ruled on the validity of the statute. Harrell's Candy Kitchen, Inc. v. Sarasota-Manatee Air Authority, 111 So.2d 439 (Fla.1959). The fact that appellant does not challenge the facial validity of the statute but instead contests the constitutionality of the statute as applied to his conduct does not preclude review by this Court. Snedeker v. Vernmar, Ltd., 151 So.2d 439 (Fla.1963).
The facts of the case sub judice are as follows: On December 20, 1974, a young black man was shot and killed by a deputy sheriff in Escambia County. The shooting became the subject matter of a grand jury investigation which resulted in a finding that the deputy fired in self-defense. Appellant and other members of the black community staged several demonstrations in protest. Among other things, the demonstrators demanded the removal of the deputy from office. At one of these demonstrations, appellant led the crowd in the following chant:
Two, four, six, eight, who shall we assassinate? Doug Raines, Doug Raines, Sheriff Untreiner, Askew, and the whole bunch of you pigs.
Appellant was arrested and charged with extortion, a violation of Section 836.05, Florida Statutes (1973), in that he verbally and maliciously threatened injury to Sheriff Untreiner in order to compel the dismissal of Deputy Raines. Appellant was found guilty by a jury and sentenced to five years in prison. On appeal, the District Court of Appeal, First District, affirmed the judgment and the sentence, interpreting the decision of the Supreme Court in Watts v. United States, 394 U.S. 705, 89 S.Ct. 1399, 22 L.Ed.2d 664 (1969), to suggest such result. We affirm.
In Watts v. United States, supra, the United States Supreme Court had the opportunity to construe the federal statute proscribing threats of bodily harm to the President. Defendant, while participating in a political debate at a small public gathering which followed a demonstration held at the Washington Monument, expressed an intention to resist induction into the armed forces and allegedly stated that, "if they ever make me carry a rifle the first person I want in my sights is L.B.J." On the basis of those facts, defendant was convicted in a jury trial of knowingly and willfully threatening the life of the President. After the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit affirmed the conviction, the Supreme Court granted cer-tiorari and reversed. The Court stated that a "true threat" must be distinguished from conduct protected by the First Amendment.
We do not believe that the kind of political hyperbole indulged in by petitioner fits within that statutory term. For we must interpret the language Congress chose "against the background of a pro found national commitment to the principle that debate on public issues should be uninhibited, robust, and wide-open, and that it may well include vehement, caustic, and sometimes unpleasantly sharp attacks on government and public officials." The language of the political arena, like the language used in labor disputes, is often vituperative, abusive, and inexact. We agree with petitioner that his only offense here was "a kind of very crude offensive method of stating a political opposition to the President." Taken in context, and regarding the expressly conditional nature of the statement and the reaction of the listeners, we do not see how it could be interpreted otherwise. (Citations omitted)
Id. at 708, 89 S.Ct. at 1401.
In the instant case, the District Court of Appeal, First District, speaking through Judge Smith, carefully analyzed the evidence presented by the record and concluded that the appellant's conduct constituted a real and substantial criminal "threat" as opposed to "political hyperbole." While conceding that Watts requires the context of the chant and the mood and reaction of the crowd to be taken into account in coloring the words spoken, the district court looked not only to the exculpatory circumstances surrounding the event urged by appellant but also considered evidence in the record "of graver significance." This evidence included testimony that on the night appellant's offense was allegedly committed, (i) the mood of the crowd (which theretofore had been good-natured) became "more hostile, frightening;" (ii) the demonstrators possessed sticks and clubs which they held "in one hand and slapped in the palm of the other under the noses of deputies on the scene;" (iii) the crowd passed a steak knife from one demonstrator to another, and at the same time, exhibited umbrellas with pointed tips and a golf club shaft with the head removed; (iv) the appellant at the end of the "assassination" chant stated directly to Sergeant Edison "that goes for you too;" and (v) the demonstrators spat upon two police officers. The district court concluded that the totality of the evidence "could properly have convinced the jury that Matthews consciously embraced fear of bodily injury as an instrument of enforcing otherwise lawful demands." Such a result is not proscribed by Watts, supra, and is consistent with State v. McInnes, 153 So.2d 854 (Fla. 1st DCA 1963), which concluded that in order for a demand and threat to be actionable under our extortion statute, it must be calculated to coerce the victim's acquiescence "in order to prevent the threat from being carried out."
If there is competent evidence in the record before the District Court of Appeal, First District, to support its conclusion, and if that court does not misapply the correct rule of law, its decision must be affirmed. Shaw v. Shaw, 334 So.2d 13 (Fla. 1976). In the case sub judice, there exists evidence in the record to support the conclusion of the District Court of Appeal, First District, that the statute was not unconstitutionally applied to appellant. Furthermore, it is apparent that the District Court neither failed to consider nor misapplied the Waits decision. Under such circumstances it transcends the scope of our review to substitute our judgment for that of the jury, the trial judge and the District Court of Appeal, First District, and to determine upon our view of the same evidence in the record that the statute was unconstitutional as applied to appellant.
Accordingly, the decision of the District Court of Appeal, First District, is affirmed.
It is so ordered.
ENGLAND, C. J., and ADKINS and OVERTON, JJ., concur.
BOYD, J., dissents with an opinion.
HATCHETT, J., dissents with an opinion.
. As pointed out in the opinion of the district court there was conflicting evidence as to whether the precise word "assassinate" was used by the demonstrators, but the jury's verdict binds a reviewing court to the "assassination" version of the chant urged by the State.
. § 836.05, Fla.Stat. (1973), states:
"Threats; extortion. — Whoever, either verbally or by a written or printed communication, maliciously threatens to accuse another of any crime or offense, or by such communication maliciously threatens an injury to the person, property or reputation of another, or maliciously threatens to expose another to disgrace, or to expose any secret affecting another, or to impute any deformity or lack of chastity to another, with intent thereby to extort money or any pecuniary advantage whatsoever, or with intent to compel the person so threatened, or any other person, to do any act or refrain from doing any act against his will, shall be guilty of a felony of the second degree, punishable as provided in § 775.082, § 775.083, or § 775.084."
. 18 U.S.C. § 871(a) (1964).