## Facts

- William and Christine Hermanson were members of the First Church of Christ, Scientist, and relied on spiritual treatment rather than conventional medical care.
- Their daughter, Amy Hermanson, died from untreated juvenile diabetes.
- The State charged the Hermansons based on their failure to provide “necessary” medical treatment to Amy.
- Two statutes were central: Florida’s child-abuse statute criminalizing culpably negligent deprivation of necessary medical treatment, and a separate statutory proviso recognizing spiritual treatment in the child-abuse reporting framework.
- The Hermansons were convicted of child abuse resulting in third-degree murder, received suspended four-year prison sentences, and were placed on fifteen years’ probation.

## Issues

1. Whether the spiritual-treatment proviso in § 415.503(7)(f), Florida Statutes (1985), operated as a statutory defense to prosecution under § 827.04(1), Florida Statutes (1985), for culpably negligent failure to provide necessary medical treatment.
2. Whether the combined operation of §§ 827.04(1) and 415.503(7)(f) was so ambiguous that it failed to provide fair notice of criminal liability, violating due process.

## Decision

- The Florida Supreme Court quashed the district court’s decision affirming the convictions.
- The Court held that, when read together, §§ 827.04(1) and 415.503(7)(f) were ambiguous and denied due process because they failed to give parents notice of when reliance on spiritual treatment lost statutory approval and became culpably negligent.
- The Court concluded that a person of ordinary intelligence could not determine the extent to which spiritual healing was permitted before criminal liability attached.
- The Court indicated the statutory scheme created a “trap” requiring legislative correction, and the convictions could not stand under the existing framework.

## Legal Principles

- Due process requires criminal statutes to give a person of ordinary intelligence fair notice of what conduct is prohibited.
- A statutory scheme may be unconstitutional as applied when related provisions send conflicting or unclear signals about what conduct is permitted versus criminal.
- When a legislature provides an accommodation for spiritual treatment without clearly defining its limits against a criminal neglect standard, the ambiguity can render enforcement constitutionally defective.
- The decision did not establish a general immunity from child-welfare criminal laws for religiously motivated choices; it turned on the lack of clear notice produced by the interaction of the specific statutes.

## Conclusion

The Florida Supreme Court set aside the convictions because the interaction between Florida’s child-abuse criminal statute and its spiritual-treatment proviso was ambiguous and failed to provide constitutionally adequate notice of when reliance on spiritual healing becomes criminally culpable neglect.


Hermanson v. State, 604 So. 2d 775 (Fla. 1992)