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Walters v. State6/28/2005
es that a defendant may waive his or her presence at pretrial conferences by written waiver and does not require the court to conduct a waiver hearing), cert. denied, 532 U.S. 945, 121 S.Ct. 1411, 149 L.Ed. 2d 352 (2001); cf. Reynolds v. State, 696 So. 2d 1275 (Fla. 5th DCA 1997)(holding there was no legal basis for issuance of capias warrant as defendant had waived presence at pretrial proceeding in writing and notice of docket sounding did not inform petitioner that her personal appearance was required and could not be waived), and Cruz v. State, 822 So. 2d 595, 596 (Fla. 3d DCA 2002)(although noting that "the trial court can require the personal presence of the defendant in court, notwithstanding the waiver, if there is a good reason to do so;" holding capias improperly issued after defendant failed to appear at pretrial hearing where defendant had filed written waiver of appearance pursuant to the rules of criminal procedure and where court did not give sufficiently clear notice to defendant that defendant's personal appearance would be required).
The case cited by the court below, Tellis v. State, does not mandate a different result. In Tellis, the trial court refused to accept the defendant's written plea of not guilty prior to arraignment thereby requiring the personal appearance of the defendant at arraignment. While noting that the refusal to accept written pleas would not be approved as standard procedure, the reviewing court nevertheless declined to grant the defendant in Tellis a writ of habeas corpus. The Tellis decision addressed the scope of rule 3.160(a), which provides that a defendant represented by counsel may file a written plea of not guilty before or at arraignment, in which case arraignment shall be waived. As the Tellis court observed, the Florida Supreme Court has previously held that a trial court may impose reasonable predicates and procedures in the use of the not guilty plea in writing by counsel, as may be reasonable and proper to facilitate the administration of the court so long as they are consistently applied and do not arbitrarily deny to a defendant the privilege afforded by the rule of filing a written plea of not guilty by his duly authorized counsel.
779 So. 2d at 354, quoting State of Florida ex rel. Evans v. Chappel, 308 So. 2d 1, 3 (Fla. 1975).
The instant case, however, involves rules 3.180(a) and 3.220(p), Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, and not rule 3.160. Further, the pre-trial proceeding at issue in the case before us was not scheduled for the purpose of the reading of the charges and the consequent entry of a plea. We are persuaded by the analysis in Lynch and Stout that, absent a finding of good cause for requiring the presence of the defendant at a pre-trial conference, Cruz, 822 So. 2d at 596, the trial court does not possess the discretion to deny a defendant the ability to waive his appearance at pre-trial proceedings, as permitted by rules 3.180(a)(3) and 3.220(p)(1). Similarly, the Eighth Circuit does not have the authority, by issuance of an administrative order, to adopt a blanket circumvention of the criminal rules of procedure. Accordingly, we reverse and remand for further proceedings in this cause consistent with this opinion.
REVERSED and REMANDED.
VAN NORTWICK, POLSTON AND THOMAS, JJ., CONCUR.
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