DAWOO T. SHANNON, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE

Fla. 1st DCA | 2008-08-07
No. 1D07-6173
BROWNING, C.J., WOLF and WEBSTER, JJ., concur.
988 So. 2d 165 Florida District Court of Appeal, First District (2008)

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

This case involves a post-conviction motion where appellant Shannon claims his trial counsel was ineffective for failing to object to the state's undisclosed oral statements made by the appellant during investigation. The court affirmed most of the trial court's denials but found merit in the discovery violation claim and reversed for an evidentiary hearing on the ineffective assistance of counsel claim.


Holding

The court held that trial counsel's failure to object to the discovery violation was not harmless error and likely prejudiced the defense. The appellate court could not conclude from the record that the defense was not materially affected by the state's failure to disclose the oral statements pursuant to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.220(b)(1)(C).


Headnotes

[1] A defendant's oral statements to law enforcement, including apologies and admissions, must be disclosed by the state prior to trial.

[2] Failure to object to the introduction of undisclosed oral statements made by the defendant constitutes ineffective assistance of counsel.

Previewing 2 of 4 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Key Quotes

“the appellant argues that his trial counsel was ineffective because he failed to object when the state put on a rebuttal witness — -Officer Fields— who testified that during the investigation the appellant had made an oral statement apologizing to the victim and stating that he knew where the stolen wallet was located, and also cried.”

Describes the core claim of ineffective assistance—counsel's failure to challenge undisclosed statements

Previewing 1 of 3 key quotes on this case — the court’s exact language, pinpointed for members.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

Facts & Procedural History

At trial, the state called Officer Fields as a rebuttal witness to testify that during investigation, the appellant made an oral statement apologizing…

The full statement of facts, procedural history, and disposition for this case are member content.

Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence

© FLexlaw, Inc. — AI-generated enrichments are proprietary. All rights reserved.


Opinion of the Court
PER CURIAM.

PER CURIAM.

The appellant has filed a motion pursuant to Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.850, in which he raises multiple claims involving alleged discovery violations committed by the state and ineffective assistance by his trial counsel.

We affirm the trial court’s denial of relief on all of the claims except one which appears to have merit and is not refuted by the attached record. In this claim the appellant argues that his trial counsel was ineffective because he failed to object when the state put on a rebuttal witness — -Officer Fields— who testified that during the investigation the appellant had made an oral statement apologizing to the victim and stating that he knew where the stolen wallet was located, and also cried. The appellant asserts that these oral statements were not disclosed to the defense prior to trial, and thus the state committed a discovery violation to which counsel should have objected and requested a hearing pursuant to Richardson v. State, 246 So. 2d 771 (Fla.1971), once the violation became known at trial. See Fla. R.Crim. P. 3.220(b)(1)(C) (requiring the state to disclose any oral statements made by the defendant along with the name and address of each witness to the statement).

After a careful review of the record, we cannot conclude that trial counsel’s failure to object was harmless and did not prejudice the defense. See State v. Schopp, 653 So. 2d 1016, 1020-21 (Fla.1995) (“If the reviewing court finds that there is a reasonable possibility that the discovery violation prejudiced the defense or if the record is insufficient to determine that the defense was not materially affected, the error must be considered harmful”).

We therefore reverse and remand for the trial court to conduct an evidentiary hearing on this claim.

AFFIRMED IN PART, REVERSED AND REMANDED IN PART.

BROWNING, C.J., WOLF and WEBSTER, JJ., concur.


Cases With Similar Vibessemantic neighbors from the corpus


Citator

Authorities Cited

Full citator, related cases, and AI research tools

Open in FLexlaw