Court Opinion

ID: 9945771
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2024-02-28 16:04:29.565574+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:25:39.992378
License: Public Domain

FIRST DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL
                STATE OF FLORIDA
                 _____________________________

                        No. 1D2022-0704
                 _____________________________

RILEY ADAIR SMITH,

    Appellant,

    v.

STATE OF FLORIDA,

    Appellee.
                 _____________________________

On appeal from the Circuit Court for Escambia County.
Gary L. Bergosh, Judge.

                       February 28, 2024

                    ON MOTION FOR REHEARING

    The Court grants Appellant’s Motion for Rehearing filed
August 23, 2023, withdraws its opinion rendered August 9, 2023,
and substitutes the following in its place.

PER CURIAM.

    AFFIRMED.

ROWE and KELSEY, JJ., concur; TANENBAUM, J., concurs with
opinion.
                  _____________________________

    Not final until disposition of any timely and
    authorized motion under Fla. R. App. P. 9.330 or
    9.331.
               _____________________________

TANENBAUM, J., concurring.

     The appellant is correct that the error he argues on appeal is
not a “sentencing error” that requires a motion under rule 3.800(b)
as a condition precedent to our consideration of it. Jackson v. State,
983 So. 2d 562, 572, 574 (Fla. 2008) (recognizing distinction
between “sentencing errors,” which are “apparent in orders
entered as a result of the sentencing process” and are subject to
the requirements of rule 3.800(b), and an “error in the sentencing
process” itself, which are not subject to those requirements). Our
affirmance with a citation to Jackson—indicating that we would
not consider his fundamental error argument at all because he did
not raise it in a rule 3.800(b)(2) motion—is being withdrawn
accordingly. After consideration of his argument in favor of
vacating the sentence, however, we still must affirm.

      The appellant contends that he was deprived of his right to
due process because, according to him, the trial court imposed a
thirty-year, habitual felon sentence on a conspiracy to commit
armed robbery based on an impermissible sentencing factor. Cf.
Yisrael v. State, 65 So. 3d 1177, 1178 (Fla. 1st DCA 2011), approved
sub nom. Norvil v. State, 191 So. 3d 406 (Fla. 2016) (“Consideration
of pending or dismissed charges during sentencing results in a
denial of the defendant’s due process rights.”); State v. Potts, 526
So. 2d 63, 63 (Fla. 1988) (“The state through its criminal process
may not penalize someone merely for the status of being under
indictment or otherwise accused of a crime, as it has attempted to
do here.”). The trial court discussed quite a bit at sentencing the
fact that one of the co-conspirators shot and killed the target of
that conspiracy during the robbery. Whether the trial court
sentenced the appellant based in part on this fact is unclear. Even
if it had, though, there is no fundamental error to be found because
the link between the killing and the robbery that the appellant

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conspired to commit was not an “unsubstantiated” fact. Cf.
Williams v. State, 193 So. 3d 1017, 1018 (Fla. 1st DCA 2016)
(noting “constitutionally impermissible factors, such as
unsubstantiated allegations of wrongdoing”).

                _____________________________

Jessica J. Yeary, Public Defender, and Megan L. Long, Assistant
Public Defender, Tallahassee, for Appellant.

Ashley Moody, Attorney General, and Zachary F. Lawton,
Assistant Attorney General, Tallahassee, for Appellee.

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