Samuel L. Smithers, Appellant v. State of Florida, Appellee.

Summary

The court affirmed the summary denial of Smithers’s first successive postconviction motion, holding that any constitutional sentencing error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt because the jury unanimously recommended death. The court relied on its precedent treating a unanimous death recommendation as satisfying the jury-factfinding requirement for imposing a death sentence. Justice Quince, dissenting, would have rejected harmless-error treatment because the trial judge, rather than the jury, made factual findings supporting serious aggravators.