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Garcia v. State4/21/2005
area of the law, a brief historical review is necessary. In 1973, State v. Medlin, 273 So. 2d 394 (Fla. 1973), established a presumption, arising from actual possession, of the scienter element of drug charges. In Medlin, the defendant was convicted of unlawful delivery of a barbiturate. It was undisputed that he gave another person a barbiturate capsule, stating that it would make her "go up." On appeal, the district court reversed the conviction because no proof was adduced at trial to show that the defendant delivered the capsule with knowledge that it contained a barbiturate. However, on review, this Court quashed the district court's decision, holding:
Proof that defendant committed the prohibited act raised the presumption that the act was knowingly and intentionally done. . . . . . . he State was not required to prove knowledge or intent since both were presumed from the doing of the prohibited act.
Id. at 397. Importantly, the Court limited this presumption by distinguishing Medlin's case, which involved actual possession, from other cases in which possession was constructive. Id. at 395-96.
Sometime after Medlin, the standard jury instruction for the offense of possession, the relevant offense in the instant case, was first adopted. Knowledge of the presence of the substance was listed as an element, and the Medlin presumption was incorporated by the following additional language: "If a person has exclusive possession of a thing, knowledge of its presence may be inferred or assumed." Fla. Std. Jury Instr. (Crim.) Drug Abuse (1981). The instruction did not, however, list knowledge of the illicit nature of the substance as an element. An accompanying "Note to Judge" simply stated, "If the defense seeks to show a lack of knowledge as to the nature of a particular drug, an additional instruction may be required. See State v. Medlin, 273 So. 2d 394 (Fla. 1973)." Id. This note provided little guidance to the courts regarding what that instruction should be because Medlin did not address jury instructions.
Thereafter, in State v. Dominguez, 509 So. 2d 917 (Fla. 1987), this Court addressed whether the jury instructions on trafficking offenses were erroneous because they did not include knowledge of the nature of the substance as an element. The Court found, under the relevant statutes at the time, that mens rea was an element of all trafficking charges. Id. at 918. The Court then expressly amended all jury instructions on trafficking offenses to include a fourth element: that the defendant "knew the substance was (specific substance alleged)." Id. at 918. The Court did not address, however, whether the same applied to possession offenses.
That issue came before the Court in 1996, in Chicone v. State, 684 So. 2d 736 (Fla. 1996). In Chicone, the trial court denied Chicone's request to instruct the jury that a charge of possession of cocaine required the State to prove that the defendant knew the substance he possessed was cocaine. On review, this Court held that "guilty knowledge is part of the statutory offense charged." Id. at 738. In a lengthy opinion, the Court first rejected the argument that Medlin stood for the proposition that guilty knowledge is not an element of possession, stating:
We held in Medlin . . . that the State established a prima facie case and sufficient proof that the "defendant was aware of the nature of the drug" to get the case to the jury. That's a far cry from holding that guilty knowledge is unnecessary. . . . Medlin stands for the proposition that evidence of actual, personal possession is enough to sustain a conviction.
Id. at 739. Next, the Court cited favorably to the decision in State v. Oxx,
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