Thomas Bevel v. State of Florida ( 2023 )

Supreme Court of Florida
____________
No. SC2022-0210
____________
THOMAS BEVEL,
Appellant,
vs.
STATE OF FLORIDA,
Appellee.
October 26, 2023
PER CURIAM.
Thomas Bevel appeals his two death sentences, which were
imposed by the trial court for the second time following this Court’s
grant of postconviction relief and remand for a new penalty phase.
See Bevel v. State, 221 So. 3d 1168, 1185 (Fla. 2017). We have
jurisdiction. See art. V, § 3(b)(1), Fla. Const. For the reasons we
explain, we affirm Bevel’s death sentences.
I. BACKGROUND
Bevel was convicted in 2005 of the first-degree murders of his
friend and roommate, Garrick Stringfield, and Stringfield’s thirteen-
year-old son, Phillip Sims, and the attempted murder of Feletta
Smith, whom Bevel and Stringfield knew from childhood. Bevel v.
State, 983 So. 2d 505, 513 (Fla. 2008). This Court summarized the
facts of Bevel’s crimes in the original direct appeal as follows:
Thomas Bevel, who was twenty-two years old at the time
of the crime[s], resided with Garrick Stringfield, who was
thirty. The two were close friends, such that Stringfield
referred to Bevel as “nephew” or “Tom Tom” and Bevel
referred to Stringfield as “Unc.” On February 28, 2004,
both men were at a street parade in Jacksonville where
they ran into Feletta Smith, whom they both knew from
their childhood. Smith exchanged telephone numbers
with Stringfield and made plans to meet later that
evening.
After leaving the parade, Bevel and Stringfield
purchased a bottle of gin and went back to Stringfield’s
house later in the evening. Because Stringfield was going
out, he asked Bevel to wait for his thirteen-year-old son,
Phillip Sims, who was being dropped off by his mother,
Sojourner Parker. Although Parker noticed that
Stringfield’s car was not in the driveway when she arrived
at the house, she was unconcerned because Bevel, a
person she considered Stringfield’s roommate, answered
the door and let her son inside.
Around 9 p.m., Stringfield met Smith at a
Walgreens store and she followed him back to his house.
When they arrived at Stringfield’s house, Bevel and Sims
were playing video games in the living room where Smith
and Stringfield joined them. Although no illegal drugs
were being consumed, Smith stated that Bevel and
Stringfield were drinking gin out of the bottle and she
had a half cup of gin and grapefruit juice. At some point,
Smith and Stringfield went into his bedroom to watch
television. Stringfield showed Smith an AK-47 rifle that
he kept under his bed and, because Smith was scared of
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it, he handed the gun to Bevel who removed it from the
room. Stringfield and Smith remained in the bedroom
with the door closed. Smith said that she last saw Sims
playing video games in the living room.
Bevel then drove Stringfield’s car to a BP gas station
to meet his girlfriend, Rohnicka Dumas, took her to a bar
where he purchased another bottle of gin, and brought
her back to the house. When they returned, Stringfield
and Bevel went into the backyard, Dumas went inside,
Smith remained in Stringfield’s bedroom, and Sims
continued to play video games in the living room.
Stringfield and Bevel then came back into the house and
each had a gun in his possession; Stringfield was
carrying a smaller handgun and Bevel had the AK-47 rifle
that Stringfield had handed to him earlier in the evening.
Bevel and Dumas went into the other bedroom, located
across the hall from Stringfield’s room, and talked.
Bevel then left the bedroom with the AK-47 rifle in
his hand. He went to Stringfield’s bedroom, where Smith
and Stringfield were lying in bed nearly asleep, knocked
on the door and said, “Unc, open the door.” Stringfield
got up from the bed, unarmed, and opened the door in
his pajamas. Bevel immediately shot Stringfield in the
head and he instantly fell to the floor in the doorway.
Smith began screaming and Bevel yelled, “Bitch, shut up”
while he shot her several times as she lay in the bed.
Smith became quiet and pretended to be dead. She
testified that there was “no doubt in [her] mind” that
Bevel was the shooter. Rohnicka Dumas corroborated
Smith’s testimony. She observed Bevel pick up the rifle,
go out into the hallway, knock on Stringfield’s bedroom
door and say, “Unc, look here.” She testified that
multiple shots were fired, during which she heard both
the woman in the other room screaming and Bevel yell,
“Bitch, shut up.”
Bevel then went into the living room where Sims
was still sitting on the sofa with the television remote in
his hand and shot him twice, once grazing his arm and
chest and once in the face. Subsequently, Bevel returned
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to the bedroom where Dumas had been and they walked
out the front door. Bevel locked the burglar bar door, a
barred security gate located on the outside of the front
door to the house, and drove away in Stringfield’s car
with Dumas sitting in the passenger seat. While driving
to Dumas’s house, Bevel held the AK-47 rifle under his
chin and stated that he did not mean to kill the boy
(Sims), but had to because he was going to be a witness.
Bevel abandoned Stringfield’s car near Dumas’s house.
Smith was eventually able to reach 911 by using
Stringfield’s cell phone. Because Smith was unable to
give the police an exact address, it took some time for the
police and rescue to find the house. Ultimately, rescuers
were able to transport her to the hospital where she
stayed for almost a month while undergoing multiple
surgeries for various gunshot wounds to her pelvis and
upper legs.
After hiding for almost a month, Bevel was finally
found by officers from the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office on
March 27, 2004. Bevel was informed of his
constitutional rights and indicated his understanding of
each right by signing the rights form. The police
questioned Bevel on two occasions over the course of
twenty-four hours. During these two interviews, Bevel
gave four different versions of the story but ultimately
confessed to the murders.
Although Bevel confessed to murdering Stringfield
and Sims, his version of events was contrary to the
testimony of both Smith and Dumas. Bevel stated that
he and Stringfield had been fighting recently about
money that Stringfield believed he was owed and that
Bevel feared that Stringfield was going to try and kill him.
He said that when he brought Dumas back to the house
that night, Stringfield began to get angry, saying that he
should have killed Bevel a long time ago. While Dumas
and Smith were in opposite bedrooms, the fight escalated
until Stringfield was pointing the handgun at Bevel and
Bevel had picked up the AK-47 rifle. Then, Stringfield
went into his bedroom and, when Bevel heard a clicking
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noise that sounded like a magazine being loaded into the
handgun, Bevel moved towards the room and shot
Stringfield when he reached the door. Bevel said the gun
went off several times but he did not mean to shoot
Smith.
Id. at 510-11 (second alteration in original).
In 2017, on appeal from the denial of his motion for
postconviction relief, this Court reversed and remanded for a new
penalty phase after concluding that counsel was ineffective during
the penalty phase and that Bevel was entitled to relief under Hurst
v. State, 202 So. 3d 40 (Fla. 2016), receded from in part by State v.
Poole, 297 So. 3d 487 (Fla. 2020), for the death sentence imposed
for Stringfield’s murder. Bevel, 221 So. 3d at 1172, 1177, 1185.
Both Bevel and the State presented witnesses at the second
penalty phase. Particularly relevant to this appeal, Bevel presented
testimony from three expert witnesses: Steven Gold, Ph.D., a
psychologist specializing in trauma; Robert Ouaou, Ph.D., a
psychologist with a specialization in neuropsychology; and Geoffrey
Negin, M.D., a diagnostic radiologist. After hearing the evidence,
the jury unanimously found that the proposed aggravators—prior
violent felony (based on a prior attempted robbery conviction and
the contemporaneous murder and attempted murder) as to both
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murders and that the murder was committed for the purpose of
avoiding arrest as to Sims’s murder—were proven beyond a
reasonable doubt and unanimously voted to sentence Bevel to
death for each murder. None of the jurors found that any of the
mitigating circumstances were established by the greater weight of
the evidence. The trial court ultimately agreed with the jury that
the aggravators were proven beyond a reasonable doubt and
afforded each very great weight. As to the statutory mitigating
circumstances, the trial court agreed with the jury that Bevel had
not established that he committed the murders while under the
influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance 1 and that
Bevel’s age of twenty-two at the time of the offenses was not
mitigating. As to the proposed other factors in Bevel’s background
that would mitigate against imposition of the death penalty under
section 921.141(7)(h), Florida Statutes (2021), the trial court found
1. Although the trial court in its sentencing order and the
parties in their briefing refer to this mitigator as being under the
influence of extreme mental or emotional distress, the statute
actually refers to extreme mental or emotional disturbance. This
Court believes this to be an inadvertent scrivener’s error and will
use only the term “disturbance” in discussion of this mitigator.
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as follows: IQ of seventy-one (little weight); Bevel’s childhood was
impacted by the trauma of his mother’s death at age twelve (little
weight); Bevel’s father did not actively participate in his life and
subsequently died due to heroin use (no weight); Bevel’s childhood
and teenage years were plagued by witnessing repeated acts of
violence and substance abuse within his family (no weight); Bevel
was essentially raised by his grandmother, who attempted to raise
multiple grandchildren with very little financial or emotional
resources (no weight); Bevel grew up in the eastern part of
downtown Jacksonville, where drug selling, gunshots, violence, and
substance abuse were common (no weight); Bevel was brought into
the criminal lifestyle at a young age by his then criminal role
models (no weight); Bevel was heavily influenced by the much older
Garrick Stringfield (no weight); Bevel was shot multiple times in
2001 in front of his grandmother’s house (no weight); Bevel, in spite
of his traumatic childhood, has repeatedly shown the capacity for
love and kindness (no weight); Bevel has exhibited good jail conduct
as well as appropriate courtroom behavior (no weight); Bevel
responds well in structured environments (no weight); Bevel
confessed to his crimes and has shown immediate and repeated
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remorse (not established/no weight); Bevel continues to impact the
lives of his family members and has developed a nurturing, caring
relationship with his daughter (no weight); Bevel suffers from brain
damage which affects his decision making (little weight); Bevel was
raised in a strong religious faith (no weight).
In sentencing Bevel to death, the court gave great weight to
the jury’s death recommendation and “wholly agree[d] with the
jury’s verdicts based on an assessment of the aggravating factors
and mitigating circumstances presented and their respective
weights.” The court concluded that “the aggravating factors heavily
outweigh[ed] the mitigating circumstances[] and that death is the
only proper penalty for the murders.” This appeal followed.
II. ANALYSIS
Bevel raises five issues. First, Bevel argues that the trial court
abused its discretion in disregarding the “unrefuted” expert
testimony that he was under extreme mental and emotional
disturbance at the time of the murders. In other words, he believes
that the trial court erred in failing to find that he established the
applicability of the statutory mitigating circumstance that “[t]he
capital felony was committed while the defendant was under the
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influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance,” section
921.141(7)(b), Florida Statutes, based on his diagnoses of post-
traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression. Bevel also asserts
that the trial court’s sentencing order improperly focused on
causation and dismissed Bevel’s personal and medical history as
“self-reported” without acknowledging corroboration in the record.
Dr. Gold, a psychologist specializing in trauma, met with Bevel
in 2014 and reviewed educational, medical, and legal records. Dr.
Gold testified that Bevel suffered from depression and PTSD.
During cross-examination, the following exchange occurred between
the prosecutor and Dr. Gold:
Q So the bottom line is you did not interview [Bevel] or
ask him what happened regarding both of these murders
and attempted murder, correct?
A No, I did not.
....
Q [S]ince you didn’t focus on interviewing the
defendant regarding what happened, what I am trying to
ask and making sure the record is clear is that you are
not stating -- your opinion is not that he was under the
influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance,
correct?
A He was under the influence of extreme mental or
emotional disturbance. He had PTSD. He had
depression.
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Q So you believe he -- at the time he committed these
murders he was under the influence of extreme or
emotional -- extreme mental or emotional disturbance?
A I believe that throughout his life he was under the
influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance.
That would include the time of the murders.
Q So how can you make that assessment if you don’t
even ask him about the murders?
A If someone is diagnosed with cancer and you were
to ask me did the person have cancer when they
committed the murders my answer would be, yes, cancer
doesn’t come and go. PTSD doesn’t come and go. The
type of major depression that Mr. Bevel has had since he
was a child did not come and go. He -- he had these
diagnoses at the time of the murders. What I am not
saying is the diagnoses made him do it.
....
Q So you are saying that when he shot this 13-year-
old young boy he shot him because he was under the
influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance,
correct?
A You keep restating what I am telling you what I am
not stating. I am not saying he committed these offenses
because he had these diagnoses. Did these diagnos[e]s
impair his functioning, yes. Am I saying we can explain
away the offense based on these diagnoses? I am not.
He was impaired at the time, yes. There is a difference.
Q Why do you say he was impaired at the time he
committed both murders and the attempted murder?
A Because you asked me was he impaired at that
time. He was impaired through most of his life from
childhood.
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Q So he is impaired as he sits here today?
A Yes.
Q Okay. So at any time there can be an outburst you
are saying?
A I am saying that any time somebody has cancer, if it
hasn’t resolved they have cancer. Mr. Bevel -- Mr. Bevel’s
PTSD is very unlikely to have resolved without treatment.
His major depression is very unlikely to have resolved
without treatment. Within a reasonable degree of
certainty as a professional I can say as he sits here he is
impaired by PTSD and major depression.
The trial court’s analysis and rejection of this mitigator
spanned nearly four pages of the sentencing order and included a
summary of the relevant law, a summary of the relevant testimony
of the three experts on whom Bevel relied in his attempt to establish
this mitigator, a recounting of Dr. Gold’s diagnoses, and the
numerous traumatic events in Bevel’s life that he reported to Dr.
Gold.
In ultimately rejecting the mitigator, the court concluded that
“[a]though Dr. Gold opined that Defendant suffers from PTSD, no
evidence exists that Defendant suffered from PTSD at the time of
the murders or that the PTSD caused Defendant to commit the
offenses while at that time suffering extreme mental or emotional
distress [sic].” The trial court noted that Dr. Gold did not discuss
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the murders with Bevel, and that his evaluation of Bevel occurred
approximately nine years after the murders. The trial court also
noted that Bevel engaged in purposeful, thoughtful, and deliberate
conduct at the time of the murders, admitting that he killed Sims to
eliminate him as a witness and securing the burglar bar on the door
of the house after the murders in the hope of delaying discovery of
the bodies.
We find no abuse of discretion in the trial court’s rejection of
this mitigator. We have previously upheld the rejection of the
extreme mental or emotional disturbance mitigator in cases where
there was expert testimony, even uncontroverted expert testimony,
of its existence. For example, in Foster v. State, 679 So. 2d 747,
755 (Fla. 1996), Foster presented expert testimony that he was
under the influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance
and argued on appeal that since this expert testimony was
uncontroverted, the trial court should have found the statutory
mitigator established. In upholding the rejection of this mitigator,
this Court wrote:
The decision as to whether a mitigating
circumstance has been established is within the trial
court’s discretion. Preston v. State, 607 So. 2d 404 (Fla.
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1992), cert. denied, 507 U.S. 999 (1993). Moreover,
expert testimony alone does not require a finding of
extreme mental or emotional disturbance. See
Provenzano v. State, 497 So. 2d 1177 (Fla. 1986), cert.
denied, 481 U.S. 1024 (1987). Even uncontroverted
opinion testimony can be rejected, especially when it is
hard to reconcile with the other evidence presented in the
case. See Wuornos v. State, 644 So. 2d 1000, 1010 (Fla.
1994), cert. denied, 514 U.S. 1069 (1995). As long as the
court considered all of the evidence, the trial judge’s
determination of lack of mitigation will stand absent a
palpable abuse of discretion. Provenzano, 497 So. 2d at
1184.
679 So. 2d at 755. This Court found no error in Foster despite
uncontroverted evidence of extreme mental or emotional
disturbance because “the trial court considered all of the evidence
presented, and it was not a palpable abuse of discretion for the trial
court to refuse to find the statutory mitigator of extreme emotional
disturbance.” Id. at 756.
Here, the trial court also thoroughly considered the evidence
presented. The only evidence that Bevel might have been under the
influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance at the time of
the murders was Dr. Gold’s testimony that because Bevel had
begun suffering with depression and PTSD many years before the
murders and because those conditions do not “come and go,” he
was, in Dr. Gold’s opinion, “throughout his life . . . under the
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influence of extreme mental or emotional disturbance,” “includ[ing
at] the time of the murders.” But Dr. Gold did not explain why
depression or PTSD might have caused “extreme mental or
emotional disturbance” at the time of the murders. When asked
what could have triggered a manifestation of PTSD at the time of
the murders, Dr. Gold responded that he did not know because he
did not assess Bevel about that. In sum, Dr. Gold’s opinion that
Bevel qualified for the extreme mental or emotional disturbance
mitigator was based on the fact that he had diagnoses of depression
and PTSD based on events that happened in his childhood and, as
a result, he is “impaired” every moment of his life. Under Dr. Gold’s
theory, any capital defendant who had ever been diagnosed with
depression or PTSD would qualify for this mitigator.
In Nelson v. State, 850 So. 2d 514, 529-30 (Fla. 2003), this
Court discussed the rejection of uncontroverted expert testimony
regarding the extreme mental or emotional disturbance mitigator:
This Court has defined the circumstances under
which a trial court may reject a mitigator:
Whenever a reasonable quantum of
competent, uncontroverted evidence of
mitigation has been presented, the trial court
must find that the mitigating circumstance
has been proved. A trial court may reject a
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defendant’s claim that a mitigating
circumstance has been proved if the record
contains competent substantial evidence to
support the trial court’s rejection of the
mitigating circumstance.
Spencer v. State, 645 So. 2d 377, 385 (Fla. 1994) (citation
omitted).
We considered the issue of expert opinion testimony
in Walls v. State, 641 So. 2d 381 (Fla. 1994), stating:
Walls contends that the trial court
improperly rejected expert opinion testimony
that he was suffering extreme emotional
disturbance and that his capacity to conform
his conduct to the law’s requirements was
substantially impaired. In Florida as in many
states, a distinction exists between factual
evidence or testimony, and opinion
testimony . . . .
. . . Certain kinds of opinion testimony
clearly are admissible—and especially qualified
expert opinion testimony—but they are not
necessarily binding even if uncontroverted.
Opinion testimony gains its greatest force to
the degree it is supported by the facts at hand,
and its weight diminishes to the degree such
support is lacking. A debatable link between
fact and opinion relevant to a mitigating factor
usually means, at most, that a question exists
for judge and jury to resolve.
Id. at 390-91 (citations omitted). Thus, the trial court
was entitled to evaluate and disregard Dr. Dee’s opinion
if the trial court felt that the opinion was unsupported by
facts. The testimony that Nelson was “seeing things” on
the day of the murder, that he suffered from
hallucinations, and that he suffered from depression for
many years provided perhaps the most relevant evidence
to support this mitigator. However, the record reflects
that the source of this evidence was largely Nelson’s self-
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reports to Dr. Dee, and that the trial court basically
rejected Dr. Dee’s uncontroverted expert opinion.
Nelson, 850 So. 2d at 529-30. Based on the witnesses’ testimony
that Nelson was acting normally before and after the murder, this
Court concluded that “there was competent, substantial evidence
refuting the allegation that Nelson was under extreme mental or
emotional disturbance” and upheld the trial court’s rejection of the
mitigator. Id. at 530.
In Nelson, the evidence offered to support the extreme mental
or emotional disturbance mitigator was that Nelson suffered from
depression for many years and he told his mental health expert that
he was “seeing things” on the day of the murder and that he
suffered from hallucinations. Id. And this evidence was
controverted by witnesses who testified that Nelson was acting
normally before and after the murders. Id.Here, Dr. Gold’s opinion that Bevel qualified for the extreme
mental or emotional disturbance mitigator was based solely on
Bevel’s longstanding diagnoses of depression and PTSD, but Dr.
Gold’s opinion is difficult to reconcile with the fact that he did not
discuss the murders with Bevel or assess his mental or emotional
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state at the time of the murders, and that Bevel—as described in
his confession—engaged in purposeful conduct at the time of the
murders, including killing Sims to eliminate him as a witness and
securing the burglar bar on the door of Stringfield’s house after the
murders. Further, although Dr. Gold did testify when asked
directly that Bevel was under the influence of extreme mental or
emotional disturbance at the time of the murders, Dr. Gold also
testified several times that Bevel was simply “impaired” at all times,
including the time of the murders, by his depression and PTSD.
But mere “impairment” cannot be equated with the “extreme
disturbance” required to establish the mitigator; thus, Dr. Gold’s
opinion as to the extent that the depression and PTSD affected
Bevel’s baseline mental or emotional state and therefore his mental
or emotional state at the time of the murders is not entirely clear.
Under the circumstances before us, there is competent,
substantial evidence in the record to support the rejection of this
mitigator. Moreover, the trial court did consider all of the evidence,
and its determination—which reflected the same conclusion
reached by the jury—that the extreme mental or emotional
disturbance mitigator was not established by the greater weight of
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the evidence will “stand absent a palpable abuse of discretion,”
Foster, 679 So. 2d at 755 (quoting Provenzano, 497 So. 2d at 1184),
which is simply not present here.
As to Bevel’s complaint that the resentencing order improperly
focused on causation, we disagree. The trial court simply
accurately noted that “Dr. Gold emphasized during his testimony
that Defendant’s PTSD did not cause him to commit the offenses
but increased the likelihood Defendant would engage in criminal
behavior.” And as to his complaint that the trial court dismissed
Bevel’s personal and medical history as “self-reported” without
acknowledging corroboration in the record, even assuming that the
trial court did overlook corroboration in the record, any
corroboration of Bevel’s personal and medical history would not
have undermined the trial court’s conclusion that this mitigator
was not established by the greater weight of the evidence that Bevel
was under extreme mental or emotional disturbance at the time of
the murders. Dr. Gold did not testify that he reviewed any records
pertaining to Bevel’s mental state at the time of the murders.
Finally, even if we were to conclude that the trial court erred in
rejecting this mitigator, we would find any error harmless. In light
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of the fact that the mitigation that was established was not
extensive or weighty, even if the trial court had found this mitigator
established and afforded it greater weight than any other mitigator,
the additional mitigation that this circumstance would have
provided would not have tipped the scale such that the mitigation
would have outweighed the aggravation, requiring the imposition of
life sentences for the murders.
Bevel next argues that the trial court erred in denying his
requests that the jury be instructed that regardless of its findings
regarding the aggravators and mitigators, it may always consider
mercy in determining whether Bevel should be sentenced to death.
The trial court denied these requests for special instructions and
instead read Florida Standard Jury Instruction (Criminal) 7.11,
informing jurors that “[r]egardless of the results of each juror’s
individual weighing process—even if you find that the sufficient
aggravators outweigh the mitigators—the law neither compels nor
requires you to determine that the defendant should be sentenced
to death.”
“A trial court’s denial of special jury instructions is reviewed
for abuse of discretion.” Snelgrove v. State, 107 So. 3d 242, 255
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(Fla. 2012). Here, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in
denying Bevel’s requested special instructions. We have repeatedly
determined that Standard Jury Instruction 7.11 adequately informs
jurors of the applicable legal standard. E.g., Woodbury v. State, 320
So. 3d 631, 656 (Fla. 2021), cert. denied, 142 S. Ct. 1135 (2022);
Bush v. State, 295 So. 3d 179, 210 (Fla. 2020). We have even
referred to the relevant provision in this instruction as the “mercy
instruction.” See Woodbury, 320 So. 3d at 656 (quoting Reynolds v.
State, 251 So. 3d 811, 816 n.5 (Fla. 2018)). “Thus, the court did
read an instruction on mercy, and although [the defendant] might
have preferred the wording of his proposed instruction, Standard
Jury Instruction 7.11 is not ambiguous when it comes to
addressing the jurors’ options.” Id. Bevel is not entitled to relief on
this claim.
Bevel also argues that the trial court erred in precluding any
argument to the jury about the proportionality of his possible
sentence. The trial court did not err in its ruling. “The jury’s
responsibility in the process is to make recommendations based on
the circumstances of the offense and the character and background
of the defendant.” Herring v. State, 446 So. 2d 1049, 1056 (Fla.
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1984), receded from on other grounds by Rogers v. State, 511 So. 2d
526, 533 (Fla. 1987). It is not to compare the facts of the case
before it to the facts of other cases or to compare the aggravation
and mitigation applicable to the defendant before it to the
aggravation and mitigation applicable to other defendants.
Bevel’s remaining arguments are similarly without merit.
Bevel acknowledges that his argument that the jury’s determination
regarding the sufficiency and weight of aggravating factors should
be subject to proof beyond a reasonable doubt is contrary to
precedent from this Court and states that this issue is being raised
only to preserve it for federal review. Bevel is correct that we have
repeatedly reaffirmed our conclusion that determinations regarding
the sufficiency and relative weight of the proven aggravators are not
subject to proof beyond a reasonable doubt. E.g., McKenzie v. State,
333 So. 3d 1098, 1105 (Fla.), cert. denied, 143 S. Ct. 230 (2022);
Joseph v. State, 336 So. 3d 218, 227 (Fla.), cert. denied, 143 S. Ct.
183 (2022); Davidson v. State, 323 So. 3d 1241, 1247-48 (Fla.
2021), cert. denied, 142 S. Ct. 1152 (2022). As to his argument that
Florida’s capital sentencing scheme is unconstitutional because it
does not limit the class of persons eligible for the death penalty and
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violates the Eighth Amendment due to the elimination of
comparative proportionality review in Lawrence v. State, 308 So. 3d
544, 549 (Fla. 2020), and an overprovision of aggravating factors,
we have consistently rejected similar arguments, e.g., Joseph, 336
So. 3d at 227 n.5 (declining to address claim that Florida’s death
penalty statute is unconstitutional because it does not sufficiently
narrow the class of individuals eligible to receive the death penalty
on the ground that this Court has repeatedly rejected the same
argument); Covington v. State, 348 So. 3d 456, 480 (Fla. 2022)
(rejecting claim that elimination of proportionality review in
Lawrence rendered Florida’s capital sentencing scheme
unconstitutional); Colley v. State, 310 So. 3d 2, 15-16 (Fla. 2020)
(rejecting claim that Florida’s capital sentencing scheme is
unconstitutional because the number of aggravating factors does
not sufficiently narrow the class of individuals who are eligible to
receive the death penalty), and Bevel makes no novel or compelling
argument that would warrant reconsideration of the numerous
recent decisions of this Court.
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III. CONCLUSION
Having concluded that none of Bevel’s claims warrant relief
from his death sentences, we affirm.
It is so ordered.
MUÑIZ, C.J., and CANADY, COURIEL, GROSSHANS, and
FRANCIS, JJ., concur.
LABARGA, J., concurs in result with an opinion.
SASSO, J., did not participate.
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION
AND, IF FILED, DETERMINED.
LABARGA, J., concurring in result.
Because I continue to adhere to my dissent in Lawrence v.
State, 308 So. 3d 544 (Fla. 2020), wherein this Court abandoned
this Court’s decades-long practice of comparative proportionality
review in the direct appeals of sentences of death, I can only concur
in the result.
An Appeal from the Circuit Court in and for Duval County,
Adrian G. Soud, Judge
Case No. 162004CF004525AXXXMA
Jessica J. Yeary, Public Defender, and Barbara J. Busharis,
Assistant Public Defender, Second Judicial Circuit, Tallahassee,
Florida,
for Appellant
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Ashley Moody, Attorney General, Tallahassee, Florida, and Doris
Meacham, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Daytona Beach,
Florida,
for Appellee
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