Opinion ID: 1746692
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Causal Connection to Impose Victim-Injury Points

Text: Sims contends that the imposition of victim-injury points by the trial court should be reversed. In Florida, the decision of a trial court to impose victim-injury points is subject to an abuse-of-discretion standard. See Key v. State, 837 So.2d 535, 536 (Fla. 2d DCA 2003). However, here, Sims contends that the trial court did not follow the law and instead misinterpreted sections 316.027(1)(b) and 921.0021(7)(a), Florida Statutes (2001). This is a pure question of law, which is subject to de novo review. See Borden v. East-European Ins. Co., 921 So.2d 587, 591 (Fla.2006) (holding that the issue under review was a question of statutory interpretation and thus is subject to de novo review); Jupiter v. State, 833 So.2d 169, 170 (Fla. 1st DCA 2002) (holding that the decision of the trial court to assess victim-injury points for the third-degree murder conviction, but not for the false-imprisonment conviction, was a pure issue of law subject to de novo review). Therefore, we review de novo the decision of the trial court to impose victim-injury points. Here, Sims asserts that victim-injury points should not have been imposed because the death of the victim was not a direct result of his underlying offense, which was leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death. According to Sims, to impose victim-injury points, the statute requires a causal connection between the death or injury of the victim and the underlying offense. As a preliminary matter, we conclude that this causation claim has been properly preserved for appellate review. In Florida, a specific, contemporaneous objection is necessary to preserve a sentencing error. See State v. Montague, 682 So.2d 1085, 1087 (Fla.1996) (holding that the failure of the defendant to raise the sentencing-error issue in the trial court was fatal to his appellate claim). The rationale behind this requirement is that such an objection places the trial court on notice of the alleged error and permits immediate correction at an early stage. See F.B. v. State, 852 So.2d 226, 229 (Fla.2003). Although not in the form of an objection, Sims placed the trial court on notice of his position with regard to the imposition of victim-injury points at the outset of the sentencing proceeding. Sims alerted the trial court that the definition of victim injury arguably included the direct result language of section 921.0021, Florida Statutes (2001). The trial court also recognized that to permit the imposition of victim-injury points, case law required the crime to be a cause of death. Therefore, the causation claim was properly presented to the trial court and preserved for appellate review. Based upon the plain language of section 921.0021(7)(a), which defines victim injury for the purpose of scoring victim-injury points, we conclude that under these facts, the imposition of such points for leaving the scene in violation of section 316.027(1)(b) was incorrect. See Koile v. State, 934 So.2d 1226, 1233 (Fla.2006) ([T]his Court must first look to the plain language of the statute, and if the statute is ambiguous on its face, the Court can only then rely upon the rules of statutory construction in order to discern legislative intent.). Section 921.0021(7)(a) applies here because it concerns felony offenses committed on or after October 1, 1998, and Sims committed the alleged offense on May 12, 2001. Section 921.0021(7)(a) provides: Victim injury means the physical injury or death suffered by a person as a direct result of the primary offense, or any additional offense, for which an offender is convicted and which is pending before the court for sentencing at the time of the primary offense. (Emphasis supplied.) This direct result language clearly imparts and includes a causation requirement, which must exist between the death of the victim and the charged offense of leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death. In Geary and Rodriguez, the Second District correctly recognized and applied the causation requirement. Conversely, the decision of the Fourth District in May is factually distinguishable from both Geary and Rodriguez; nevertheless, May also correctly recognized and applied the statutory causation requirement. Additionally, in Schuette v. State, 822 So.2d 1275 (Fla.2002), this Court held that for the imposition of a restitution award, there must be a causal connection [9] between the accident that produced damages and the underlying crime. See id. at 1284. We reasoned that section 775.089(1)(a), Florida Statutes (2001), which states that restitution shall be ordered for any [d]amage or loss caused directly or indirectly by the defendant's offense, imposes a causation requirement. Schuette, 822 So.2d at 1280 (emphasis supplied). This statutory language is similar to the direct result language of section 921.0021(7)(a). Accordingly, here, a similar interpretation of section 921.0021(7)(a), requiring the existence of a causal connection to impose victim-injury points, is warranted. Moreover, if the imposition of a restitution award, which results in monetary loss, entails a causation requirement, a causal connection is also required for the imposition of victim-injury points, which can lead to the much more significant loss of personal liberty through the imposition of a longer sentence. Finally, in interpreting Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.701(d)(7), which provides when victim injury shall be scored under the sentencing guidelines, this Court concluded that the Sentencing Guidelines Commission had recommended that victim injury be scored when the injury occurred during the offense which led to the conviction. Fla. R.Crim. Pro. re Sentencing Guidelines (Rules 3.701 & 3.988), 509 So.2d 1088, 1089 (Fla.1987) (emphasis supplied). For these reasons, we conclude that a causal connection must clearly exist between the charged offense and the death of the victim to impose victim-injury points. Crucial to the determination of whether a causal connection exists between the death of the victim and the alleged offense of leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death is a determination of when this particular criminal offense began. Sims was not charged with vehicular homicide or any other offense in which the crime actually involved the impact that caused the death. A conviction under that different circumstance would have satisfied the causation requirement for the imposition of victim-injury points. Instead, Sims was only charged with the offense of leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death. It is reasonable to conclude that the decision to charge Sims with this lesser offense was due to the circumstances surrounding the accident, which made the collision nearly unavoidable. [10] Section 316.027(1)(b), which governs this offense, provides: The driver of any vehicle involved in a crash resulting in the death of any person must immediately stop the vehicle at the scene of the crash, or as close thereto as possible, and must remain at the scene of the crash until he or she has fulfilled the requirements of s. 316.062. Any person who willfully violates this paragraph commits a felony of the second degree, punishable as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084. Under this statute, the offense begins when the defendant leaves the scene with knowledge (actual or constructive) of having been involved in an accident resulting in death. See Triplett v. State, 709 So.2d 107, 108 (Fla. 5th DCA 1998) (holding that the similar offense of leaving the scene of an accident involving personal injury did not begin until the defendant elected an affirmative course of action ... after he became aware that personal injury had occurred in the collision (citing State v. Dumas, 700 So.2d 1223 (Fla.1997))); Fla. Std. Jury Instr. (Crim.) 28.4 (To prove the crime of Leaving the Scene of an Accident... [the State] must prove the following... (Defendant) knew or should have known that [he] [she] was involved in an accident ... (Defendant) knew or should have known of the [injury to] [death of] the person....). Logically, the requisite knowledge can only exist after the impact of the accident resulting in death. In the instant case, the record clearly establishes that the cause of the victim's death occurred prior to the underlying offense. Dr. Terrence Steiner was the only medical expert to testify as to the cause of death. Steiner testified that death was instantaneous, meaning ... a second or two. He based this testimony on the severity of the victim's injuries, which in his view supported the conclusion that the victim suffered an instant death upon impact. Unlike May, and contrary to the Fifth District's interpretation of this case, there was no medical or other evidence here to even suggest that any subsequent dragging of the victim's body was or could have been a cause of the victim's death. [11] Even if the victim died a second or two after impact, the offense of leaving the scene with the requisite knowledge still occurred after the initial impact, which Steiner testified was the sole cause of the victim's death. Additionally, the statement of passenger Sheila Asbury that Sims stated he saw the victim waving his arms just prior to impact, and the argument that this fact suggests Sims could have formed the requisite knowledge fairly quickly after impact, does not change the result. The death of the victim was the direct result of the initial impact, rather than the underlying offense which occurred only after the death. So, the causal connection, which is absolutely necessary to impose victim-injury points, simply does not exist in this case. [12]