Background
Marcus Anthony Smith pleaded guilty in 2022 to fraudulently using personal identification information and possessing forged notes or bills. After serving concurrent jail sentences and completing community control, he began a two-year probation term that required him to remain at his approved residence between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m.
Two probation officers conducted a curfew check at Smith’s listed residence at approximately 10:25 p.m. on June 26, 2024. Although a car was in the carport and a scooter was in the yard, Smith did not respond when an officer knocked on the front door and an adjacent window, called his name, and repeatedly called his cellphone. Smith testified that he was asleep in a rear bedroom, an air-conditioning unit masked outside noise, and his cellphone was turned off because he could not afford the bill. The trial court disbelieved him, revoked his probation, and sentenced him to forty-five months in prison.
The Court’s Holding
The Second District reversed, holding that the State failed to present competent, substantial evidence proving by the greater weight of the evidence that Smith willfully and substantially violated probation by being away from his residence. An unanswered door, window, and telephone did not establish that Smith was absent, particularly because the officers did not testify how long or forcefully they knocked, how loudly they called, or where Smith’s bedroom was located.
The majority concluded that finding Smith absent would require unsupported stacked inferences: first that he heard the officers and then that his failure to respond meant he was not home. It remanded with instructions to vacate the revocation order and sentence and reinstate probation. Chief Judge Lucas dissented, reasoning that the officers’ testimony and the trial court’s credibility determination constituted competent, substantial evidence and that the majority’s approach imposed an unclear, excessively demanding standard for curfew checks.
Key Takeaways
- A probationer’s failure to answer knocks or telephone calls, without more, may be insufficient to prove that the probationer was away from the approved residence.
- The State must prove a willful and substantial probation violation by the greater weight of the evidence.
- The majority relied on the rule against pyramiding inferences, while questioning whether some related circumstantial-evidence precedents remain viable after the Florida Supreme Court’s decision in Bush v. State.
Why It Matters
The decision reinforces the evidentiary limits on revoking probation for an alleged curfew violation. Probation officers and prosecutors need evidence supporting a reasonable inference that the probationer was actually absent, not merely evidence that efforts to obtain a response were unsuccessful.
The dissent highlights an unresolved tension between deferential review of trial-court credibility findings and the Second District’s precedents requiring more detailed evidence about the duration, force, and location of officers’ attempts to make contact.