Opinion
No. 98-04396.
Opinion filed January 15, 1999.
Appeal pursuant to Fla. R. App. P. 9.140(i) from the Circuit Court for Polk County; Robert E. Pyle, Judge.
In the trial court, Joel Don Adams challenged his consecutively-imposed minimum mandatory sentences for firearm possession, arguing that all his crimes arose from the same criminal episode and were thus barred under Palmer v. State, 438 So.2d 1 (Fla. 1983), and its progeny. The trial court denied the motion as untimely, declaring that this issue was not cognizable under Florida Rule of Criminal Procedure 3.800(a) and was hence subject to the time limitations of rule 3.850(b). We agree and affirm.
See § 775.087, Fla. Stat. (1981).
In Young v. State, 638 So.2d 532 (Fla. 2d DCA 1994), a divided panel of this court ruled that a prisoner could question the stacking of mandatory firearm minimums by means of rule 3.800(a). Since that decision, however, the Florida Supreme Court has effectively overruled Young. In State v. Callaway, 658 So.2d 983 (Fla. 1995), the supreme court limited collateral attacks on prohibited consecutive habitual offender sentences under Hale to rule 3.850 motions. The supreme court in Callaway held that the dispositive issue in those challenges — whether offenses resulting in consecutive habitual sentences were committed during a single criminal episode — was only suitable for review under rule 3.850 because of the necessity for the trial court to make factual determinations. This identical question is raised in an attack upon consecutively imposed minimum mandatory sentences under Palmer and Bass v. State, 530 So.2d 282 (Fla. 1988). We perceive no reason to treat Palmer questions in a fashion different from the manner the supreme court in Callaway directed that trial courts treat Hale issues. Callaway has discredited the rule in Young, and, we believe, overruled it.
Hale v. State, 630 So.2d 521 (Fla. 1993).
We note that the supreme court has also recently confined prisoners to the strictures of rule 3.850, including its time limitations, when dealing with the application of related issues questioning the propriety of mandatory firearm minimum sentences.See State v. Mancino, 705 So.2d 1379 (Fla. 1998) (holding that rule 3.850 is the exclusive post conviction vehicle available to test whether a prisoner factually qualified for a mandatory firearm sentence).
Adams' convictions and sentences predated Palmer, and Bass in 1988 gave retroactive application toPalmer. The time limitations of rule 3.850, in existence at the time of Bass, provided Adams two years after Bass to bring this issue to the trial court's attention. He failed to do so. Now, sixteen years after his convictions, his claim is time-barred.
Affirmed.
CAMPBELL, A.C.J., and BLUE and WHATLEY, JJ., Concur.
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION AND, IF FILED, DETERMINED.