Moore v. State
The Third DCA affirmed Moore's armed carjacking conviction, rejecting his claim that a police officer's testimony about 'general criminal behavior' (that most stolen-car thieves, like Moore, leave the original license plate on) was improperly admitted. The court held that a relevance objection at trial did not preserve an unfair-prejudice argument, so the claim was reviewed only for fundamental error, and found none given the substantial identification and physical evidence of guilt and because the defense had opened the door to the testimony in opening statement.
Key facts
- Moore was charged with armed carjacking; the trial court admitted police officer testimony about general criminal behavior patterns of car thieves (that most leave original license plates on vehicles), which Moore argued was improperly prejudicial.
- Moore objected to the testimony on relevance grounds at trial but did not separately raise an unfair-prejudice objection under Florida Statute section 90.403.
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Why it matters
This opinion is useful to criminal practitioners primarily for its preservation holding: a bare 'relevance' objection at trial will not preserve an appellate argument that the same evidence was unfairly prejudicial… — full analysis with a trial
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