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442 So. 2d 209

State v. Clark

Supreme Court of Florida

Decided December 8, 1983

Supreme Court of Florida · decided 1983-12-08

Relies on State v. Waters · Rozier v. State · 436 So. 2d 73 - State v. Rozier

Decided 1983-12-08

BOYD, Justice.

¶1This case is before us on petition for review of State v. Clark, 416 So.2d 13 (Fla. *2101st DCA 1982). Our jurisdiction was invoked and the case accepted for review on the ground of express and direct conflict of decisions. Art. V, § 3(b)(3), Fla. Const.

¶2Respondent was charged with burglary by an information which alleged in pertinent part that he

did then and there unlawfully enter or remain in a structure ... with the intent to commit the offense of Theft therein, or did enter through a window at about 4:45 A.M. stealthily without the occupant’s consent with intent to commit some offense, contrary to Sections 810.07 and 810.02, Florida Statutes.

¶3Thus the information charged burglary by the conventional method first and then as an alternative charge set out the elements of section 810.07, Florida Statutes (1981). The defendant moved to strike the alternative allegation of burglary by stealthy entry, etc., in response to which the trial court entered an order dismissing the entire information.

¶4On appeal the district court reversed the order dismissing the entire information but affirmed the dismissal of the charge made by alleging the elements set forth in section 810.07. The district court relied on Rozier v. State, 402 So.2d 539 (Fla. 5th DCA 1981), which held that section 810.07 does not establish a substantive offense.

¶5We recently approved the Rozierdecision relied on by the court below. State v. Rozier, 436 So.2d 73 (Fla.1983). There and in State v. Waters, 436 So.2d 66 (Fla.1983), we held that the elements in section 810.07 do not constitute the crime of burglary and therefore do not provide an alternative method of alleging the crime. Under these recent decisions of this Court, the decision of the district court in the present case was substantially correct.

¶6It should be noted that in State v. Waters we modified the law and held that a charge of burglary need not always descend to particulars on the matter of the specific offense the accused intended to commit. It should also be noted that in State v. Rozier the principal problem we found with the alternative allegation of burglary used there was the absence of an allegation of intent to commit an offense. In the present case it might be argued that the alternative set of allegations was sufficient to charge burglary because, after Waters, all the essential elements were there. However, we held in Watersand Rozier that section 810.07 should not be used as an allegational alternative but only as an evidentiary alternative on the issue of intent.

¶7Accordingly, the decision of the district court, reversing the trial court’s dismissal of the entire information, is approved.

¶8It is so ordered.

ALDERMAN, C.J., and ADKINS, OVERTON, McDonald, EHRLICH and SHAW, JJ., concur.
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