Case Name: STATE of Florida, Appellant, v. Boyce E. GLOSSON, Matthew A. Bronza, Robert C. Brooke, James P. Sheridan, Howard T. Smith, and Frances Lorraine Gonzalez, Appellees
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1983-12-13
Citations: 441 So. 2d 1178
Docket Number: No. AO-431
Parties: STATE of Florida, Appellant, v. Boyce E. GLOSSON, Matthew A. Bronza, Robert C. Brooke, James P. Sheridan, Howard T. Smith, and Frances Lorraine Gonzalez, Appellees.
Judges: LARRY G. SMITH, J., concurs.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 441
Pages: 1178–1181

Head Matter:
STATE of Florida, Appellant, v. Boyce E. GLOSSON, Matthew A. Bronza, Robert C. Brooke, James P. Sheridan, Howard T. Smith, and Frances Lorraine Gonzalez, Appellees.
No. AO-431.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, First District.
Dec. 13, 1983.
Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., and John W. Tied-emann, Asst. Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, for appellant.
Robert G. Duval of Bergstresser & Duval, Miami, for appellee Boyce E. Glosson.
Harvey Robbins, North Miami, for appel-lees Matthew A. Bronza, Robert Brooke and James Sheridan.
Harvie S. Duval of Greenfield & Duval, North Miami, for appellees Harold T. Smith and Frances Lorraine Gonzalez.

Opinion:
JOANOS, Judge.
The State of Florida appeals the trial court's dismissal of the two-count information charging appellees with possessing between 100 and 2,000 pounds of cannabis and conspiring to traffic more than 100 pounds of cannabis because of prosecutorial misconduct. We agree that there was prosecutorial misconduct requiring dismissal and affirm.
Appellees were arrested after their alleged involvement in a marijuana transaction in which Norwood Lee Wilson (Wilson), acting as an agent for the Levy County Sheriff's Department, was involved. In this case, Wilson ¡ set up the alleged transaction through Janet Moore, an acquaintance of appellees Gonzalez and Smith. Wilson was the seller, Gonzalez and Smith allegedly found buyers. Motions to dismiss based upon entrapment and prosecutorial misconduct were filed and denied. Further motions to dismiss prompted a hearing at which the state stipulated that entrapment had been asserted by each defendant; that Wilson had an oral agreement with the Levy County Sheriff, which was known and carried out under the State's Attorney's supervision; that Wilson was to receive 10% of all civil forfeitures as a result of the criminal investigations; that the contingent fee would be paid out of civil forfeitures going to the Levy County Sheriff's Department; that Wilson must testify and cooperate in the prosecution to collect the contingent fee; that this was such a case; and that successful prosecution was unattainable without Wilson's testimony. The trial court found as a matter of law that the state was guilty of prosecutorial misconduct inherently violative of constitutional due process.
The state argues, among other things, that appellee's due process defense is bot tomed on the notion that the governmental involvement in the case has rendered its witnesses inherently incredible and that the evaluation of the credibility of a witness is for the jury, not the judge.
While a witness's credibility is normally evaluated by the jury, we do not see this as merely a question of credibility to be left to the jury. The state has admitted its involvement in a scheme whereby an individual is promised payment contingent upon his successfully making criminal' cases against others to whom he is to sell cannabis provided by the Levy County Sheriffs Department. The state admits also that it has no case without Wilson's testimony. This "payment to make cases against criminal defendants" arrangement deprives the defendants of due process. See Williamson v. United States, 311 F.2d 441 (5th Cir.1962). The circumstances of this case are not a situation where the state merely seeks evidence of criminal activity but is more akin to the manufacturing of criminal activity by the state. We cannot tolerate such behavior under our system of constitutional protections.
Inherent in the state's citation to State v. Eshuk, 347 So.2d 704 (Fla. 3rd DCA 1977), is the argument that United States v. Joseph, 533 F.2d 282 (5th Cir.1976), removes this case from the Williamson ambit by there being no particularly named defendants as the targets of the agent's attempts to produce evidence. The Joseph opinion focused on the targeting of defendants before the crime was committed as the factor requiring reversal in Williamson. While Joseph narrowed the Williamson holding to cover only operations directed at named defendants, there are greater similarities between Williamson and this case than were present in Joseph. In Williamson, as here, a paid informant was used to set up the illegal transaction. The Williamson opinion points out that the agent made the purchases himself, produced the evidence against the defendants and was paid for his catch — a wrongdoing precluding the use of its fruits. Williamson at 444-445. In Joseph, the paid informant merely introduced undercover police to sellers of controlled substances, with the court pointing out that the case did not hinge on the informants' testimonies. Here, the state stipulated that it had no case without Wilson. The similarities of the agent's direct involvement in the illegal transaction, payment only upon successful prosecution based upon the agent's testimony and cooperation in the investigation, and the importance of the paid agent's testimony in producing evidence against the defendants bring this case within the ambit of Williamson and distinguish it from Joseph.
Accordingly, the trial court is AFFIRMED.
LARRY G. SMITH, J., concurs.
NIMMONS, J., dissents with written opinion.