STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLANT,
v.
WILLIE CHARLES BROWN, APPELLEE
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Florida's highest court reversed a trial court's order suppressing a defendant's confession, holding that the trial court violated statutory procedures by considering newspaper articles and other extrajudicial information regarding an officer's credibility without giving the prosecution an opportunity to challenge such information before taking judicial notice.
The court may not consider newspaper articles and other extrajudicial information without complying with section 90.204(3), Florida Statutes, which requires that documentary evidence not received in open court be made part of the record and that each party be given a reasonable opportunity to challenge the information before judicial notice is taken.
[1] A trial court may not consider documentary evidence not received in open court without making the information and its source part of the record and affording parties an o…
[2] A trial court's reversal of its own ruling based on information received after a hearing, without providing parties an opportunity to challenge that information, is impro…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“We hold that the court's consideration of the newspaper articles and other information was in contravention of section 90.-204(3), Florida Statutes (1989).”
Establishes the core holding that the trial court violated statutory procedures by considering extrajudicial evidence.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAt a suppression hearing, the trial court heard testimony from sheriff's deputies by deposition and other witnesses. After initially denying the motio…
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PER CURIAM.
We reverse the trial court’s order granting the motion to suppress the appellee’s confession. The trial court had held a hearing at which sheriff’s deputies testified by way of deposition, and other testimony was taken. At the hearing the court denied the motion. He noted that the issue was one of credibility of the witnesses. The next day he reversed himself and granted the motion based upon information he had received after the hearing regarding the credibility of one of the officers. The information included newspaper articles. What the trial court said on the record also indicates a misstatement of the role during appellee’s interrogation of the officer whose credibility he questioned. Further, because of apparently conflicting statements it is not entirely clear whether the officer’s credibility figured into the trial court’s determination regarding the giving of the Miranda warnings and waiver thereof or whether the credibility of the officer affected the court’s determination on whether appellee actually had made incriminating statements.
We hold that the court’s consideration of the newspaper articles and other information was in contravention of section 90.-204(3), Florida Statutes (1989). That section requires that when a trial judge resorts to documentary evidence not received in open court, “the court shall make the information and its source a part of the record in the action and shall afford each party reasonable opportunity to challenge such information before judicial notice of the matter is taken.”
We reverse and remand for a new hearing at which time the parties will be given an opportunity to challenge the matters of which the court had taken judicial notice.
HERSEY, C.J., and GUNTHER and WARNER, JJ., concur.