Mondesir v. State

In Mondesir v. State, 814 So. 2d 1172 (Fla. 3d DCA 2002), while still on probation for the possession and sale of cocaine, the defendant, Mondesir, committed and was convicted of aggravated assault with a firearm, kidnapping with a firearm, car-jacking with a firearm, robbery with a firearm, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. Id. at 1172-73. The trial court revoked his probation and sentenced him to 141 months of imprisonment on the cocaine charges. The court further sentenced him to prison terms of five years and 141 months for the various firearm violations. Id. at 1173. All of the sentences in both the probation and the new case, however, were ordered to be served concurrently. On appeal, the State contended the trial court erred in imposing concurrent sentences. The court agreed in part and disagreed in part. Specifically, the court found that section 775.087(2)(d), Florida Statutes (2000), required that the substantive firearm sentences be imposed consecutively to those in the cocaine case. Id. However, the court disagreed with the State that the statute also required consecutive sentences as to each of the four firearm offenses. In reaching this decision, the court held that the last sentence of section 775.087(2)(d), which states "the court shall impose any term of imprisonment provided for in this subsection consecutively to any other term of imprisonment imposed for any other felony offense," means that sentences imposed pursuant to section 775.087(2)(d) must only be consecutive to other felony sentences from a separate crime rather than those involved in a single prosecution: Merely on the face of the statute, the reference to "any other" felony refers, as in this case, only to another separate crime, rather than those involved in a single prosecution. In the comments to its Final Analysis of CS/CS/HB 113 (SB 194), which became Chapter 99-12, Laws of Florida, and subsection 775.087(2), the Committee on Crime and Punishment in the House of Representatives so stated: Consecutive Sentences The bill provides that the Legislature intends for the new minimum mandatory sentences to be imposed for each qualifying count, and the court is required to impose the minimum mandatory sentences required by the bill consecutive to any other term of imprisonment imposed for any other felony offense. This provision does not explicitly prohibit a judge from imposing the minimum mandatory sentences concurrent to each other. Mondesir, 814 So. 2d at 1173.