Case Name: William R. RIGABAR, Petitioner, v. Hon. Virginia Gay BROOME, Judge of the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, Respondent
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1995-04-05
Citations: 658 So. 2d 1038
Docket Number: No. 95-0333
Parties: William R. RIGABAR, Petitioner, v. Hon. Virginia Gay BROOME, Judge of the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, Respondent.
Judges: GUNTHER and STEVENSON, JJ., concur.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 658
Pages: 1038–1042

Head Matter:
William R. RIGABAR, Petitioner, v. Hon. Virginia Gay BROOME, Judge of the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, Respondent.
No. 95-0333.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District.
April 5, 1995.
Opinion Denying Rehearing July 5, 1995.
Philip G. Butler, Jr., of Butler & Brown, P.A., West Palm Beach, for petitioner.
Robert A. Butterworth, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Joseph A. Tringali, Asst. Atty. Gen., West Palm Beach, for respondent.

Opinion:
FARMER, Judge.
The defendant in a criminal case petitions for an order directing the trial judge to accept his plea of guilty in spite of the judge's announced policy of categorically refusing to accept guilty pleas when they are made without an express admission of actual guilt. Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.172 provides in relevant part:
"(a) Voluntariness; Factual Basis. Before accepting a plea of guilty or nolo contendere, the trial judge shall be satisfied that the plea is voluntarily entered and that there is a factual basis for it. Counsel for the prosecution and the defense shall assist the trial judge in this function."
"(d) Acknowledgement by Defendant. Before the trial judge accepts a guilty or nolo contendere plea, the judge must determine that the defendant either (1) acknowledges his guilt or (2) acknowledges that he feels the plea to be in his best interest, while maintaining his innocence."
Within this rule, he claims, lies a right to plead guilty in one's "best interest," while maintaining one's innocence.
Petitioner is charged with lewd assault and attempting to commit a lewd act. Respondent is the presiding judge in his case. After entering into a plea agreement with the prosecuting attorney, a plea hearing was held before respondent at which the following occurred:
"COURT: ⅜ Would you outline the plea agreement.
"PROSECUTOR: Before I do that, I would like to tell the Court the defendant in this case, with the State's consent, is entering a guilty best interest plea.
"COURT: I don't take best interest pleas.
"PROSECUTOR: I know that.
"[DEFENSE]: Judge, may I address the Court?
"COURT: Yes.
"[DEFENSE]: There is an HRS proceeding. This is not in the best interest of the — the victim in this case is the step granddaughter; she's in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
"COURT: I don't let anybody plead guilty to anything when they feel they're not guilty. So we need to set this for trial."
The plea being thus refused, defendant promptly filed this petition.
He begins by acknowledging that mandamus is not appropriate to compel the performance of a discretionary duty and that the trial court does have some discretion in accepting guilty pleas. He argues rather that a blanket refusal to accept a plea of guilty based not on an admission of guilt but on the best interest of the defendant is, effectually, the exercise of no discretion. It is instead the refusal to exercise discretion — which is, of course, one of the traditional occasions for the use of this writ. See, e.g., Moore v. Florida Parole and Probation Commission, 289 So.2d 719 (Fla.1974), cert. denied, 417 U.S. 935, 94 S.Ct. 2649, 41 L.Ed.2d 239 (1974); Yepes v. Tobin, 531 So.2d 1067 (Fla.3d DCA 1988); Glosson v. Solomon, 490 So.2d 94 (Fla.3d DCA 1986); and Hamilton v. Davis, 427 So.2d 1137 (Fla. 5th DCA 1983), approved, 448 So.2d 1007 (Fla.1984).
He also recognizes that there is no federal constitutional right to have the court accept a guilty plea merely because it is in the "best interests" of the defendant to do so. Santobello v. New York, 404 U.S. 257, 92 S.Ct. 495, 30 L.Ed.2d 427 (1971); and Lynch v. Overholser, 369 U.S. 705, 82 S.Ct. 1063, 8 L.Ed.2d 211 (1962). As the Court explained in North Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 91 S.Ct. 160, 27 L.Ed.2d 162 (1970), however:
"Our holding does not mean that a trial judge must accept every constitutionally valid guilty plea merely because a defendant wishes so to plead. A criminal defendant does not have an absolute right under the Constitution to have his guilty plea accepted by the court, see Lynch v. Overholser, 369 U.S. [705], at 719, 82 S.Ct. [1063], at 1072, 8 L.Ed.2d 211 (by implication), although the States may by statute or otherwise confer such a right Likewise, the States may bar their courts from accepting guilty pleas from any defendants who assert their innocence. Cf. Fed. Rule Crim.Proe. 11, which gives a trial judge discretion to 'refuse to accept a plea of guilty .' We need not now delineate the scope of that discretion." [e.s.]
400 U.S. at 38 n. 11, 91 S.Ct. at 168.
Petitioner argues that Florida has conferred on him the right to plead guilty in his best interest, without admitting his guilt. The discretion reposed in the trial judge under rule 3.172 is to determine the elements of an acceptable guilty plea. The first element, as we have seen, is that the plea be knowing and voluntary. The second element is that there be a factual basis for it. Once the state agrees to the plea, and voluntariness and a factual basis have been made to appear, the defendant cannot be forced to go to trial anyway; the state cannot be forced to prove its charges in the way that would be necessary to sustain a verdict of guilty and incur the time and expenses attendant to that enterprise; and the witnesses need not undergo the rigors of live courtroom testimony. Everyone benefits from this disposition.
The state opposes mandamus by contending that the acceptance of a guilty plea involves the exercise of discretion by the trial judge. And it is certainly true that acceptance of a plea does indeed begin as a discretionary act. As we have seen from the rule, however, that discretion is hinged on express elements. Once those elements have been made to appear, however, and the state agrees to the plea, there is no residual discretion.
Discretion unrestrained by principle, by methodology and by standards is contrary to our rule of law. It would substitute rule by the whim of judges. Discretion exercised without guiding principles or standards is without rudder or anchor and is subject to prevailing tides and winds and little else. Judicial discretion exists not for its own sake but merely because it is impossible to set down a single rule to govern all procedural questions that arise in judicial proceedings.
No one suggests, for example, that all guilty pleas be automatically accepted, no matter the circumstances under which they arise. The reason against such a requirement is that sometimes pleas are involuntary, or arise from misapprehension or ignorance. No rule could be manageably drafted to describe those guilty pleas that should be accepted and those to be rejected. Discretion is given to enable the trial judge to exclude those pleas not founded on knowing, voluntary decisions by a defendant or those not accompanied by the requisite factual basis. Thus the purpose of this particular discretion is not to allow the judge to accept those pleas personally unobnoxious but rather to accept those that fit within rule 3.172's specifications.
For these reasons, a judge cannot refuse a concession to a judgment of guilt merely because the trial judge does not like "best interest" pleas. There is no residuum of discretion to insist that a defendant make a public acknowledgement of actual guilt before a plea of guilty is legally acceptable. When the plea is knowing and voluntary, when there is a factual foundation to support it, when the state has agreed to it, then the discretion has ended and the plea must be accepted.
We return the case to the trial court for a determination of the necessary elements of an acceptable plea of guilt.
GUNTHER and STEVENSON, JJ., concur.
.Subdivision (c) of rule 3.172 provides what amounts to a checklist of inquiries to guide the judge in assessing the voluntariness of the plea. These inquiries require the court to determine whether the defendant understands the nature of the charges against him and the penalties that must or could be imposed, his right to counsel, that he can plead not guilty and have a trial by jury with all that entails, that a plea of guilty or nolo contendere waives the right to trial as well as certain appellate rights and may subject him to deportation by the United States government, that if questioned by the court under oath at the plea hearing the answers given may be used in any later perjury prosecution, and finally that he understands the terms of the plea agreement.
. See § 800.04(1), Fla.Stat. (1993).
. See § 777.04(1) and 800.04(2), Fla.Stat. (1993).
. We note that, in this case, the plea agreement would avoid the necessity of requiring a young victim of sexual abuse to travel from far away Oklahoma and suffer through a testimonial experience.
. We cannot help noting the irony in the fact that the state's lawyer in the trial court agreed to the plea, but that its lawyer in this court opposes mandating the trial judge to consider accepting the plea after making the inquiries compelled by rule 3.172.
. We distinguish this case from State ex rel. Schieres v. Nimmons, 364 So.2d 1262 (Fla. 1st DCA 1978), where the plea was not agreeable to the prosecutor, who opposed it.