Opinion ID: 1574197
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Appellate Policy of Striking Pro Se Pleadings

Text: The appellate courts have uniformly refused to permit a defendant represented by counsel to file additional pro se briefs and papers. The considerations on appeal are somewhat different because at that point in the process the focus is on the legal issues. Thus, the articulated purpose behind the refusal of the appellate courts to allow litigants to file separate pro se briefs or pleadings in pending appeals is that allowing such pro se pleadings would frustrate and confuse rather than advance the appellate process and the administration of justice. See Burke v. State, 732 So.2d 1194, 1195 (Fla. 4th DCA 1999) (citing Powell v. State, 206 So.2d 47, 47 (Fla. 4th DCA 1968)). In this Court we have likewise announced a policy that, even in appeals of death penalty cases, we will strike pro se pleadings or briefs where the party is represented by counsel, even where the defendant is alleging ineffective assistance of appellate counsel. See Davis v. State, 789 So.2d 978, 979-80 (Fla.2001). [4] The concerns that the interests of justice would not be served by allowing pro se pleadings on appeal when a defendant is represented by counsel also led to this Court's opinion in Logan v. State, 846 So.2d 472 (Fla.2003), which involved defendants filing pro se petitions for relief in the Florida Supreme Court when the defendants were represented by counsel in the trial court. Over the years, this Court had seen an ever-increasing number of these pro se petitions and therefore in Logan, we announced a policy of striking pro se extraordinary writ petitions filed in this Court where the petitioners were represented by counsel in the trial court. Id. at 479. We explained the policy as one affecting the administration of justice: The subject cases are representative of a similar problem this Court is having with regard to defendants in pending noncapital criminal cases. This Court has recently seen an increase in the number of these noncapital criminal defendants filing pro se petitions for extraordinary relief in this Court, asking this Court to grant them relief, either in the form of immediate release pending trial or absolute discharge from prosecution, while their cases are still pending in the trial court. What is clear in both the subject cases and other similar cases that have been filed with increasing regularity in this Court, is that the petitioners are represented by counsel in their pending criminal cases, and nothing in their petitions indicates that they have sought, or will be seeking, to discharge counsel in those proceedings. Id. at 474. We noted that in similar contexts the appellate courts had uniformly held that pro se petitions for relief filed in the appellate courts were stricken where the defendant was represented by counsel in the trial court. Id. at 475 (citing Martin v. Bieluch, 786 So.2d 1229, 1230 (Fla. 4th DCA 2001); Carlisle v. State, 773 So.2d 647, 648 (Fla. 5th DCA 2000)). We thus announced a rule that absent an unequivocal request to discharge counsel, pro se petitions filed in this Court would be dismissed. Subsequent to Logan, we decided Johnson v. State, 974 So.2d 363 (Fla.2008), in which a criminal defendant filed a pro se petition in this Court seeking relief from an allegedly illegal sentence while he was represented by court-appointed counsel in a pending appeal involving the same conviction and sentence. Id. at 363. In other words, Johnson involved the same type of situation as Logan except the defendant in Johnson filed a pro se petition in this Court while the defendant was represented by counsel in ongoing appellate proceedings. In Johnson, we clarified that the rule in Logan was not limited to cases where the defendant was represented by trial counsel but applied to any pro se filings submitted by litigants seeking affirmative relief in the context of any criminal proceeding where a death sentence has not been imposed, whether direct or collateral, either in the trial court or a district court of appeal, and who are represented by counsel in those proceedings. Johnson, 974 So.2d at 364-65. We reaffirm our holding in Logan and Johnson to dismiss pro se extraordinary writ petitions filed in this Court while a defendant is simultaneously being represented by counsel in ongoing criminal proceedings in either the trial or appellate court. However, our language in those opinions has been interpreted as a blanket rule against ever allowing the trial court to entertain a pro se pleading, unless there is an unequivocal request to discharge counsel. To the extent that our statements in Logan and Johnson have been so broadly interpreted, we clarify that those cases were not intended to enunciate an unbending rule to require the striking of pleadings in the trial court even where the defendant makes specific allegations that would give rise to a clear adversarial relationship with his counsel, such as misadvice, affirmative misrepresentations, or coercion that led to the entry of the plea. [5] We now specifically address the narrow circumstance of a pro se motion to withdraw a plea under rule 3.170( l ).