SIDNEY JAFFE, PETITIONER,
v.
THE HONORABLE EDWIN SANDERS, AS JUDGE, ETC., RESPONDENT

Fla. 5th DCA | 1984-12-27
No. 84-1783
ORFINGER and FRANK D. UP-CHURCH, Jr., JJ., concur.
463 So. 2d 318 Florida District Court of Appeal, Fifth District (1984) Positive Treatment
Cited by 4 cases

AI-generated. These summaries, headnotes, and key points are machine-generated and may contain errors or omissions. Always verify against the full opinion text below. Not legal advice.

Synopsis

Sidney Jaffe seeks a writ of prohibition to bar prosecution on organized fraud charges, claiming double jeopardy and collateral estoppel based on a prior land sales practice conviction that was reversed due to charging document defects. The court denies the petition, holding that the two statutory offenses are substantively different and collateral estoppel does not apply because the first jury convicted rather than acquitted.


Holding

The court holds that double jeopardy does not bar the organized fraud prosecution because the two statutory offenses are substantively different with distinct essential elements, and because Jaffe was never put in jeopardy of a valid conviction in the first prosecution. Collateral estoppel does not apply because it requires an adverse jury verdict in the first prosecution; here, the jury convicted rather than acquitted, so no fact was determined in Jaffe's favor.


Headnotes

[1] Double jeopardy does not bar a subsequent prosecution when the statutory offenses charged in each prosecution are substantively different, each containing essential eleme…

[2] A prior prosecution that is dismissed for failure to state a criminal cause of action does not place the defendant in jeopardy for purposes of a double jeopardy defense i…

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Key Quotes

“the two statutory offenses involved are substantively different in that each statutory offense has many essential constituent elements that the other offense does not have”

Establishes that different statutes do not violate double jeopardy even if based on same facts

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Facts & Procedural History

Jaffe was first charged, tried, convicted and sentenced on twenty-eight counts of unlawful land sales practices under Florida Statutes sections 498.03…

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Opinion of the Court
COWART, Judge.

COWART, Judge.

This case involves double jeopardy and collateral estoppel.

Petitioner, Sidney Jaffe, was first charged, tried, convicted and sentenced as to twenty-eight counts of unlawful land sales practices allegedly in violation of sections 498.033(3) and 498.059, Florida Statutes (1979). Those convictions and sentences were reversed by this court not because of any insufficiency of the evidence to establish a properly charged crime but because the charging document failed to state a criminal cause of action, in that, the cited statutes prohibited material changes, alterations or modifications in the subdivider’s offering and the charging document in that prosecution alleged that Jaffe had made a material change, alteration or modification of the order of registration. Jaffe v. State, 438 So. 2d 72 (Fla. 5th DCA 1983).

Jaffe has now been charged with the offense of organized fraud as proscribed by section 817.036, Florida Statutes (1981), it being alleged that he fraudulently obtained money from certain persons by misleading them to believe he would deliver them marketable title to certain property.

Petitioner moved to dismiss the organized fraud charge on the grounds of double jeopardy and collateral estoppel. The trial judge denied those motions. This is a petition for this court to issue its writ of prohibition to bar Jaffe’s continued prosecution on the organized fraud charge on the same two grounds asserted in the motions to dismiss before the trial court.

There is no double jeopardy impediment to prosecution of the organized fraud charge against Jaffe by virtue of the prior unlawful land sales practice charges in that, even if the two criminal prosecutions related to the exact same factual circumstances (and they do not), the two statutory offenses involved are substantively different in that each statutory offense has many essential constituent elements that the other offense does not have. See Borges v. State, 415 So. 2d 1265 (Fla.1982); State v. Baker, 452 So. 2d 927 (Fla.1984); State v. Baker, 456 So. 2d 419 (Fla.1984); Monarca v. State, 412 So. 2d 443 (Fla. 5th DCA 1982); Bartee v. State, 401 So. 2d 890 (Fla. 5th DCA 1981); Preston v. State, 397 So. 2d 712 (Fla. 5th DCA 1981).

Furthermore, Jaffe, supra, in effect held the charging document in the first prosecution failed to allege a crime, therefore, Jaffe was never put in jeopardy of a valid conviction in the first prosecution.

There is no collateral estoppel impediment to prosecution of Jaffe on the organized fraud charge by virtue of the prior unlawful land sales practice prosecution because under that doctrine as set forth in Ashe v. Swenson, 397 U.S. 436, 90 S.Ct. 1189, 25 L.Ed.2d 469 (1970), the first prosecution must result in a jury verdict that necessarily determines some fact in favor of the defendant which fact is contrary and inconsistent with some fact the prosecution must necessarily prove in order to prevail in the second prosecution.

The jury in the first prosecution of Jaffe, unlike the jury in Ashe, found Jaffe guilty and therefore found no fact in favor of Jaffe. As to a defense of “former” jeopardy it makes no difference whether the first prosecution results in a conviction or acquittal but as to the doctrine of collateral estoppel the State is estopped to prosecute a second charge and relitigate a fact only when the State has in a collateral criminal case once suffered an adverse jury verdict as to some one fact which is essential to a successful prosecution of the subsequent charge and that only occurs when the defendant has been found not guilty in the first prosecution, as in Ashe.

WRIT DENIED.

ORFINGER and FRANK D. UP-CHURCH, Jr., JJ., concur.


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Citator

Cited By

  • Jaffe v. Hardy M. Snow, Jr., 610 So. 2d 482 (Fla. 5th DCA 1992)
    …to benefit from it. See Ashwood v. Patterson, 49 So. 2d 848 (Fla.1951). Accordingly, we affirm the judgment below refusing to recognize and enforce Ruth Jaffe’s Canadian judgment. AFFIRMED. DAUKSCH and DIAMANTIS, JJ., concur. . Jaffe v. Sanders, 463 So. 2d 318 (Fla. 5th DCA 1984); Jaffe v. State, 438 So. 2d 72 (Fla. 5th DCA), rev. dismissed, 436 So. 2d 99 (Fla. 1983); State ex rel. Boyles v. Florida Parole and Probation Commission, 436 So. 2d 207 (Fla. 1st DCA 1983); Accredited Sur. & Cas. Co., Inc. v. St…
  • Jaffe v. Grant, 793 F.2d 1182 (11th Cir. 1986)
    …ilure to appear conviction was upheld. Jaffe v. State, 438 So. 2d 72 (Fla. 5th Dist.Ct.App. 1983). Jaffe’s partial victory in the Court of Appeals may prove pyrrhic, however; Jaffe was subsequently charged with organized fraud. See Jaffe v. Sanders, 463 So. 2d 318 (Fla. 5th Dist.Ct.App.1985). . Jaffe et al. also challenge the district court’s purported application of res judicata to the state court criminal judgment which was later reversed-in-part on appeal. Jaffe et al. have, made no attempt to show that r…

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