RANDOLPH v. STATE (2021)

Richard Barry Randolph appeals a circuit court order denying his second successive postconviction motion filed pursuant to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.851. We have jurisdiction. See art. V, § 3(b)(1), Fla. Const.

BACKGROUND

Randolph was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death in 1990, and this Court affirmed his conviction and sentence. Randolph v. State, 562 So. 2d 331, 332-34 (Fla. 1990), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 992, 111 S.Ct. 538, 112 L.Ed.2d 548 (1990). In 2003, Randolph filed a motion to vacate the judgment and sentence, and we affirmed the denial of that motion. Randolph v. State, 853 So. 2d 1051, 1069 (Fla. 2003). We also denied a petition in which Randolph sought relief under Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (2002). Randolph v. Crosby, 861 So. 2d 430 (Fla. 2003).

In 2010, Randolph filed another postconviction motion, which the trial court denied for being untimely, successive, procedurally barred, and failing to present any new basis for relief that applied retroactively. In 2017, Randolph filed a second successive postconviction motion, raising four claims—all based on the retroactivity of Hurst v. State, 202 So. 3d 40 (Fla. 2016), Hurst v. Florida, 577 U.S. 92, 136 S.Ct. 616, 193 L.Ed.2d 504 (2016), and chapter 2017-1, Laws of Florida.¹ Randolph amended his motion to add a fifth claim, asserting that his sentence violated the Eighth Amendment. He now appeals the denial of his most recent postconviction claims.

ANALYSIS

Randolph's primary argument on appeal is that this Court's decision in Hurst v. State established a new criminal offense—capital first-degree murder—and that the jury sentencing determinations described in Hurst are “elements” of that new offense. From that assertion, Randolph insists that Hurst created a substantive rule of law that dates back to Florida's original capital sentencing statute, thereby requiring Randolph's death sentence to be vacated on the ground that certain elements of his crime were never found by a jury.

We rejected a similar argument in Foster v. State, 258 So. 3d 1248, 1251 (Fla. 2018). As we explained in Foster, there is no independent crime of “capital first-degree murder”; the crime of first-degree murder is, by definition, a capital crime, and Hurst v. State did not change the elements of that crime. Id. at 1251-52 (holding that when a jury makes Hurst determinations, “it only does so after a jury has unanimously convicted the defendant of the capital crime of first-degree murder”).

Moreover, “[w]e have consistently applied our decision in Asay [v. State, 210 So. 3d 1 (Fla. 2016)], denying the retroactive application of Hurst v. Florida as interpreted in Hurst v. State to defendants whose death sentences were final when the Supreme Court decided Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584, 122 S.Ct. 2428, 153 L.Ed.2d 556 (2002).” Hitchcock v. State, 226 So. 3d 216, 217 (Fla. 2017). Randolph echoes other pre-Ring defendants who have advanced myriad legal theories that, in the end, turn on pleas for a retroactive application of Hurst. But this Court has rejected such arguments, however styled. See, e.g., Lambrix v. State, 227 So. 3d 112, 113 (Fla. 2017) (rejecting arguments based on “the Eighth Amendment,” “denial of due process and equal protection,” and “a substantive right based on the legislative passage of chapter 2017-1, Laws of Florida”). Randolph's argument that his death sentence was insufficiently reliable to satisfy the Eighth Amendment is similarly unavailing.

Finally, Randolph offers an extensive critique of this Court's decision in State v. Poole, 297 So. 3d 487 (Fla. 2020), where we partially receded from Hurst. We need not address Poole here, however, because Randolph's claims fail even under our pre-Poole jurisprudence on Hurst and retroactivity.

For these reasons, we affirm the trial court's denial of postconviction relief.

It is so ordered.

FOOTNOTES

1.   Chapter 2017-1, Laws of Florida was a legislative enactment by which Florida's capital sentencing statute was amended to require jury sentencing determinations of the kind described in Hurst v. State.

PER CURIAM.

POLSTON, LABARGA, LAWSON, MUÑIZ, COURIEL, and GROSSHANS, JJ., concur. CANADY, C.J., concurs in result.