Luis Enrique Juarbe v. State of Florida

Third District Court of Appeal
                               State of Florida

                         Opinion filed April 22, 2026.
       Not final until disposition of timely filed motion for rehearing.

                            ________________

                             No. 3D24-1706
                       Lower Tribunal No. F21-7195
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                         Luis Enrique Juarbe,
                                  Appellant,

                                     vs.

                            State of Florida,
                                  Appellee.


      An Appeal from the Circuit Court for Miami-Dade County, Milton
Hirsch, Judge.

      Carlos J. Martinez, Public Defender, and Deborah Prager, Assistant
Public Defender, for appellant.

      James Uthmeier, Attorney General, and Camilo Montoya, Assistant
Attorney General, for appellee.


Before FERNANDEZ, GORDO and BOKOR, JJ.

     PER CURIAM.
      Affirmed. See Kitchings v. State, 291 So. 3d 181, 193 (Fla. 4th DCA

2020) (“A ruling on Williams rule evidence is a matter within the broad

discretion of the trial court. In the absence of an abuse of discretion, the trial

court's ruling on admissibility will not be overturned on appeal.” (internal

citations omitted)); § 90.404(2)(b), Fla. Stat. (2025) (“In a criminal case in

which the defendant is charged with a crime involving child molestation,

evidence of the defendant's commission of other crimes, wrongs, or acts of

child molestation is admissible and may be considered for its bearing on any

matter to which it is relevant.”); McLean v. State, 934 So. 2d 1248, 1259 (Fla.

2006) (“Section 90.404(2)(b) broadly provides that evidence of the

defendant’s commission of other acts of child molestation is admissible

regardless of whether the charged and collateral offenses occurred in the

familial context or whether they share any similarity.”); State v. Hall, 292 So.

3d 851, 854 (Fla. 2d DCA 2020) (“[T]he lynchpin to the admissibility of

Williams rule evidence in child sexual molestation cases after the

amendment—whether within or outside the familial context—is its relevance,

not its strict, substantial, or relaxed similarity to the crime being tried.”);

Moore v. State, 312 So. 3d 544, 548 (Fla. 1st DCA 2021) (“‘similar’ does not

mean ‘exactly the same’” and finding sufficient similarity in the collateral

crimes where all three victims were the defendant's biological children, all



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acts occurred while victims were asleep in the defendant's bed, and all

involved touching of vaginas, even though the charged offense also involved

penile penetration); Pridemore v. State, 301 So. 3d 454, 460 (Fla. 4th DCA

2020) (“[C]ases applying the McLean framework to child molestation cases

have often focused on the similarity between means of access while

requiring less commonality between the charged offense and the collateral

crime.”); Pulcini v. State, 41 So. 3d 338, 346 n. 3 (Fla. 4th DCA 2010) (finding

remoteness in time factor did not automatically render prior abuse evidence

inadmissible, especially in intrafamilial or generational abuse cases); State

Farm. Mut. Auto. Ins. Co. v. Resnick, 636 So. 2d 75, 77 (Fla. 3d DCA 1994)

(“In general, the trial court has broad discretion to determine whether to grant

or deny a motion for mistrial and a mistrial should not be granted unless an

absolute legal necessity to do so exists.”); Ramirez v. State, 739 So. 2d 568,

579 (Fla. 1999) (“As an evidentiary principle, the concept of ‘opening the

door’ allows the admission of otherwise inadmissible testimony to ‘qualify,

explain, or limit’ testimony or evidence previously admitted. The concept of

‘opening the door’ is ‘based on considerations of fairness and the truth-

seeking function of a trial.’” (internal citations omitted)).




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