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370 So. 2d 10

Docket No. 55220.

Carson v. Miller

Dale CARSON, Etc., et al., Appellants, v. Richard Franklin MILLER, et al., Appellees.

Supreme Court of Florida

Decided April 12, 1979.

Supreme Court of Florida · decided 1979-04-12

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“unambiguous statutory language must be accorded its plain meaning.”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 413 So. 2d 15 - Roush v. State

Relies on A. R. Douglass, Inc. v. McRainey, as Admrx. · Van Pelt v. Hilliard · 335 So. 2d 815 - Thayer v. State

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1979-04-12

How this case has been cited

Cited by 27 later decisions — most recently September 2016 · most notably 450 So. 2d 217 - Holly v. Auld (1984), 604 So. 2d 452 - Forsythe v. Longboat Key Beach Erosion (1992)

1 federal appellate · 25 state decisions

16019791980199020002010decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

¶1Jim Smith, Atty. Gen., Gary L. Conover, Asst. Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, for appellants.

¶2William J. Sheppard, Jacksonville, for appellees.

¶3*11 PER CURIAM:

¶4We have for resolution the following question certified from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals pursuant to section 25.031, Florida Statutes (1977), and Florida Rule of Appellate Procedure 9.510:

WHETHER THE RULE PROPOSED BY THE SECRETARY OF THE FLORIDA DEPARTMENT OF OFFENDER REHABILITATION COMPLIES WITH THE REQUIREMENTS OF SECTION 951.23(2)(b), FLORIDA STATUTES.

¶5We hold that this question must be answered in the negative.

¶6Section 951.23(2)(b) provides:

The Department of Offender Rehabilitation is ... directed to adopt rules and regulations prescribing standards and requirements with reference to ... the number of county and municipal prisoners who may be housed therein per specified unit of floor space....

¶7Appellant Wainwright, Secretary of the Department of Offender Rehabilitation, asserts that rule 33-8.02(10) of the Florida Administrative Code satisfies the statute by requiring that

[t]he Secretary shall ascertain the maximum numbers of prisoners ... that can properly be housed in any detention facility... . The Officer-in-Charge ... shall thereafter insure that the actual prisoner populations do not exceed such maximum numbers; provided, however, that the Secretary may authorize exceptions or modifications when in his opinion there is good cause for such action.

¶8The assertion is untenable.

¶9Section 951.23(2)(b) requires that "standards and requirements" governing the density of detention populations be prescribed by rules adopted in the manner specified in section 120.54, Florida Statutes (1978 Supp.). The Department did not discharge its rulemaking duty by delegating to the Secretary authority to "ascertain" proper housing capacities of the state's detention facilities. We have consistently held that unambiguous statutory language must be accorded its plain meaning. Thayer v. State, 335 So.2d 815 (Fla. 1976); McDonald v. Roland, 65 So.2d 12 (Fla. 1953); A.R. Douglass, Inc. v. McRainey, 102 Fla. 1141, 137 So. 157 (1931); Van Pelt v. Hilliard, 75 Fla. 792, 78 So. 693 (1918).

¶10In carrying out its rulemaking duty, the Department is not obliged to establish a single uniform square footage requirement for all existing county and municipal detention facilities, without regard for variables such as cell sizes, dayroom sizes, recreational area sizes, open cell block areas, individual cell block areas, or common open areas. Section 951.23(2)(b) requires the promulgation of "standards" which are determinative of population densities in varying situations, and the choice of a particular scheme satisfying the statute is left to the Department, to whose action this Court would accord a strong presumption of regularity. See Florida Citrus Commission v. Gift, Inc., 91 So.2d 657 (Fla. 1956). Yet plainly the Department must act by rules.

¶11Rule 33-8.02(10), as proposed by the Secretary of Offender Rehabilitation, does not comply with the requirements of section 951.23(2)(b), Florida Statutes (1977). The certified question posed by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals is answered in the negative.

¶12It is so ordered.

¶13ENGLAND, C.J., BOYD, OVERTON, SUNDBERG and ALDERMAN, JJ., and SMITH, Associate Justice, concur.

¶14ADKINS, J., dissents.

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