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537 So. 2d 207

Docket No. 88-0500.

Huggins v. State

James HUGGINS, Appellant, v. STATE of Florida, Appellee.

District Court of Appeal of Florida

Decided January 25, 1989.

District Court of Appeal of Florida · decided 1989-01-25

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“Since all three cases pending before the court were of the same degree, the sanction would be the same no matter which one was scored as the primary offense. Thus, to calculate the sentences for each case, it was only necessary to compute one of them on a scoresheet as the primary offense.”

quoted by 1 later decision, including 830 So. 2d 191 - Peters v. State

Relies on 491 So. 2d 1284 - Leopard v. State

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1989-01-25

How this case has been cited

Cited by 7 later decisions — most recently October 2002

7 state decisions

40198919902000decided

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 →

¶1Richard L. Jorandby, Public Defender, and Anthony Calvello, Asst. Public Defender, West Palm Beach, for appellant.

¶2Robert A. Butterworth, Atty. Gen., Tallahassee, and Carolyn V. McCann, Asst. Atty. Gen., West Palm Beach, for appellee.

¶3DOWNEY, Judge.

¶4In three separate cases appellant was charged with grand theft. He pled nolo contendere in each case and was placed on two years' community control in each, all three sentences to run concurrently. Affidavits were filed in each case charging violation of his community control, which appellant admitted. The scoresheet prepared reflected a presumptive guidelines sentence range of three and one-half to four and one-half years in prison, and the court sentenced appellant to four and one-half years in prison. Appellant contends that the trial court erred in scoring his guidelines scoresheet.

¶5Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.701 d. 3. provides that the "primary offense" is that which, when scored, recommends the most severe sanction. Since all three cases pending before the court were of the same degree, the sanction would be the same no matter which one was scored as the primary offense. Thus, to calculate the sentences for each case, it was only necessary to compute one of them on a scoresheet as the primary offense. However, the state concedes that the other two offenses of the same degree should have been counted as additional offenses rather than "prior record." Another scoring error involved adding six points for "legal status at time of offense." In fact, the three grand theft offenses were committed prior to appellant's being placed on concurrent community control sentences and, thus, no points for "prior restraint" were appropriate. Be that as it may, it is unnecessary to remand the matter for resentencing because a correction of these errors would not eliminate enough points to take appellant out of the same recommended range. Leopard v. State,491 So.2d 1284 (Fla. 1st DCA 1986).

¶6Accordingly, the sentences appealed from are affirmed.

¶7ANSTEAD, J., and RIVKIND, LEONARD, Associate Judge, concur.

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