Florida

Dupont, employed by Speedway convenience stores, sued her employer alleging a hostile work environment and 13, in violation of Florida’s Civil Rights Act. Dupont’s complaint stemmed from her interactions with a coworker, Coryell, who shared Dupont’s midday shift. Dupont had for months complained to her superiors that Coryell acted inappropriately with her, both violently and sexually. For instance, Dupont complained that Coryell had inappropriately grabbed her, made sexual comments concerning female customers, and humiliated her.

After stabbing her husband in self-defense, Hickson was charged with second-degree murder. As a defense, Hickson sought to admit evidence that she suffered from battered-spouse syndrome. The Court held that expert testimony concerning the battered-spouse syndrome was admissible. The expert was permitted to testify about the syndrome in general or to answer hypothetical questions based on facts in evidence.

Rider was charged with sexual battery on his wife. The trial court dismissed the charges, reasoning that under a common-law exception to rape, a court could not convict a husband for the rape of his wife. The Court of Appeal disagreed, finding no legal authority for the exception and noting that Florida had replaced the common-law crime of rape with the statutory crime of sexual battery. Accordingly, consent to marriage did not include consent to acts of violence. Thus, the court reversed the dismissal and remanded with an order to reinstate prosecution.

Vizzi, an assistant public defender, was defending his client charged with sexual battery, kidnapping, and false imprisonment and referred to the victim as “a woman who’s trash, gutter filth.” After being admonished by the court, Vizzi proceeded to call the victim “a whore, a two-bit whore.” The prosecutor petitioned the court to instruct Vizzi not to call the victim a prostitute again and the trial court ruled, based on Florida’s Rape Victim Shield Statutes, that Vizzi was not permitted to attack the character of the victim by delving into her prior sexual behavior (other than prior sexual

The state sought involuntary commitment of the defendant as a sexually violent predator under the Jimmy Ryce Act. The Act, enacted in 1999, provided for civil commitment procedures for “all persons currently in custody who have been convicted of a sexually violent offense . . . as well as to all persons convicted of a sexually violent offense in the future.” The defendant had been convicted of rape in 1969 and 1976. In 2004, he was sentenced to prison for burglary charges.

In the midst of an abusive marriage, Weiand shot her husband in self-defense. A jury found Weiand guilty of second-degree murder. Weiand appealed, claiming the court had erred by failing to instruct the jury that the duty to retreat did not apply where Weiand was attacked in her own home. Florida law provides that a person may use deadly force in self-defense if she reasonably believes it necessary to prevent imminent death or severe bodily harm. A person is not entitled to use such deadly force in self-defense, where she may safely retreat from harm.