Supreme Court of Florida

A conviction and death sentence for first degree murder are affirmed over claims of error regarding: 1) admission of out-of-court statements made by the victim during a 911 call, to an officer, and while in the intensive care unit of the hospital; 2) the alleged departure of the trial court from a neutral stance; 3) jury access to a transcript of a 911 call that was prepared by the state; 4) admission of evidence of the victim's pregnancy; 5) submission of a felony murder case with sexual battery or attempted sexual battery as the underlying felony; 6) jury instruction on the aggravating circumstance that the murder occurred during a sexual battery or an attempted sexual battery; 7) premeditation; 8) improper constructive amendment of the indictment; 9) the presumption of innocence; 10) the unanimity of the verdict; 11) the weighing of aggravating and mitigating factors; 12) a failure to make the required findings for imposition of the death penalty; 13) the use of defendant's conviction for indecent assault as a prior violent felony aggravator; 14) the heinous, atrocious, or cruel (HAC) aggravator; 15) the cold, calculated, and premeditated (CCP) aggravator; 16) the proportionality of the death sentence; and 17) the constitutionality of the death penalty.

Appellate Information

• Decided 06/21/2007
• Published 06/21/2007

Judges

• PER CURIAM.

Court

• Supreme Court of Florida

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Carey Haughwout, Public Defender and Jeffrey L. Anderson, Assistant Public Defender, Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, West Palm Beach, FL, for Appellant.


• For Appellees:
  
• Bill McCollum, Attorney General, Tallahassee, FL and Leslie T. Campbell, Assistant Attorney General, West Palm Beach, FL, for Appellee.