Case Name: Leon THOMAS and Randolph Wilbur Scott, Appellants, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee
Court: Florida District Court of Appeal
Jurisdiction: Florida
Decision Date: 1976-02-05
Citations: 327 So. 2d 63
Docket Number: No. Z-194
Parties: Leon THOMAS and Randolph Wilbur Scott, Appellants, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
Judges: MILLS, J., concurs.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 327
Pages: 63–65

Head Matter:
Leon THOMAS and Randolph Wilbur Scott, Appellants, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.
No. Z-194.
District Court of Appeal of Florida, First District.
Feb. 5, 1976.
Rehearing Denied March 11, 1976.
Richard W. Ervin, III, Public Defender, and Louis G. Carres, Asst. Public Defender, for appellants.
Robert L. Shevin, Atty. Gen., and Raymond L. Marky, Asst. Atty. Gen., for ap-pellee.

Opinion:
SMITH, Judge.
The trial court sentenced appellants to imprisonment for one year and three years respectively on charges that they had in their possession a boat motor and gas tank which they knew or had reason to believe had been stolen. Sec. 814.03(2), F.S.1973. The trial judge imposed the sentences without first advising appellants that he intended not to grant them probation, as the State had recommended on their pleas of guilty pursuant to plea bargaining. The State takes the position that the plea bargain required only that the State recommend probation and that, the prosecutor having done so, the trial court was licensed to imprison appellants without notice and without explicitly affording appellants an opportunity to withdraw their pleas of guilty.
The trial court notified appellants at the time of their pleas, as he was obliged to do by Rule 3.171(c), R.Cr.P., that he was not bound by the plea bargain and that the court "will rescind its approval of such agreement" if the court found that "the ends of justice require a disposition other than that agreed on." The trial judge promised that, in that event, "the defendants will have the opportunity to withdraw their plea of guilty, without prejudice."
To say in these circumstances that all which was bargained for and agreed to was fulfilled by the prosecutor's mere act of recommending probation would reduce the bargain to a trap or, at best, a formality. There could be no purpose in the court intending to agree only that the prosecutor might recommend probation. When the trial judge reached the conclusion that confinement terms were appropriate, appellants should have been affirmatively offered an opportunity to withdraw their pleas prior to imposition of sentence. Taylor v. State, 275 So.2d 307 (Fla.App. 4th, 1973); Bloom v. State, 290 So.2d 128 (Fla.App.3d, 1974); Barker v. State, 259 So.2d 200, 205 (Fla.App.2d, 1972). We note that the trial court entertained and expressed some question concerning his duty in these circumstances and, unfortunately, that the response of appellants' trial counsel tended to reassure the judge concerning his power to imprison without further notice. It is regrettable that the trial judge was thus permitted to err, but appointed counsel's misreading of Rule 3.-171(c) does not alter or waive its terms.
Reversed.
MILLS, J., concurs.
BOYER, C. J., dissents.