Opinion
May 23, 1952.
Appeal from the Criminal Court of Record for Dade County, Ben C. Willard, J.
Pine Taylor, Miami, for appellant.
Richard W. Ervin, Atty. Gen., and William A. O'Bryan, Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellee.
Appellant was tried and convicted for operating a gambling house. He was sentenced to pay a fine of $1,000 or in default thereof to be imprisoned at hard labor in the State penitentiary for a term of six months. This appeal was prosecuted from that judgment.
The sole point for determination is whether or not there was sufficient legal evidence to support the conviction and judgment.
We have reached the conclusion that this question requires a negative answer. The locus in quo was known as the Ritz Drug Store located at 500 Ocean Drive, Miami Beach. There is no direct proof that defendant had any proprietary or other connection with the said drug store. To convict one of operating a gambling house it must be shown that the place was used as such with the owner's knowledge or consent and that some game or device condemned as gambling has been habitually indulged in there. Creash v. State, 131 Fla. 111, 179 So. 149; Millman v. State, Fla., 55 So.2d 713; State v. Hicks, 101 Kan. 782, 168 P. 861; White v. State, 115 Ga. 570, 41 S.E. 986.
The evidence not only fails to meet the rule approved in these cases but is deficient in other respects, for which the judgment must be and is hereby reversed.
Reversed.
SEBRING, C.J., and THOMAS and HOBSON, JJ., concur.