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680 So. 2d 628

Docket No. 95-2306.

Shea v. Cochran

Phillip J. SHEA, Appellant, v. Sheriff Ron COCHRAN and Broward County Sheriffs Office, Appellees.

District Court of Appeal of Florida

Decided October 16, 1996.

District Court of Appeal of Florida · decided 1996-10-16

Key passage — most relied on by later courts

“Mandamus is an appropriate remedy to compel the performance of a ministerial act that an agency has a clear legal duty to perform. `A duty or act is defined as ministerial when there is no room for the exercise of discretion, and the performance being required is directed by law.'”

quoted by 2 later decisions, including 798 So. 2d 799 - Shulmister v. City of Pompano Beach, 965 So. 2d 365 - Wright v. Frankel

Relies on 674 So. 2d 789 - Town of Manalapan v. Rechler · 596 So. 2d 753 - Quigley v. Satz

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1996-10-16

How this case has been cited

Cited by 8 later decisions — most recently September 2016

8 state decisions

40199620002010decided

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 →

¶1*629 Phillip J. Shea, Punta Gorda, pro se.

¶2Ronald R. Torres of Whitelock, Rodriguez & Williams, P.A., Fort Lauderdale, for appellees.

¶3PER CURIAM.

¶4We affirm the trial court's dismissal of appellant's request for issuance of a writ of mandamus against the Sheriff of Broward County because the pleading did not demonstrate a prima facie case for mandamus relief. See Fla.R.Civ.P. 1.630(d).

¶5Mandamus is an appropriate remedy to compel the performance of a ministerial act that an agency has the clear legal duty to perform. See Town of Manalapan v. Rechler,674 So.2d 789, 790 (Fla. 4th DCA 1996). "A duty or act is defined as ministerial when there is no room for the exercise of discretion, and the performance being required is directed by law." Id.

¶6Based on the factual allegations of appellant's pleading, mandamus was an inappropriate remedy because the Sheriff provided a specific reason for refusing to comply with appellant's records request, claiming the records were part of an ongoing criminal investigation. Cf. Rechler,674 So.2d 789 (Fla. 4th DCA 1996); Quigley v. Satz,596 So.2d 753 (Fla. 4th DCA 1992).

¶7Appellant has an adequate legal remedy for expeditiously obtaining relief pursuant to the Public Records Act, section 119.11, Florida Statutes (1995). Section 119.11 provides for an accelerated hearing so that the trial court can determine whether or not the agency properly refused to produce the record, but appellant must first serve a complaint on the appropriate agency. Neither the trial court's order, which dismissed appellant's petition without prejudice, nor this court's opinion prevent appellant from pursuing his request pursuant to these provisions of the Public Records Act.

¶8WARNER, PARIENTE and STEVENSON, JJ., concur.

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