## Facts

- In October 2007, John Rynell Richards and three homeless acquaintances drank alcohol in a public park in St. Petersburg, Florida, affecting witnesses’ recollection.
- It was undisputed that Richards stabbed Mr. Russell, one of the group.
- Two witnesses testified Richards waved a knife, bit Russell’s arm, and then cut Russell’s ear and stabbed him in the neck after Russell grabbed Richards’s face.
- Police testified Richards appeared intoxicated, loudly admitted stabbing Russell, and claimed Russell was trying to kill him; Richards was injured during a struggle at arrest.
- Richards testified Russell demanded beer, then punched him, grabbed his throat, and slammed him into a bench; Richards claimed he used the knife in self-defense because he feared for his life.
- At trial, self-defense was a central theory; the jury was instructed on justifiable use of deadly force.
- The trial court’s instruction included a “duty to retreat” component (deadly force not justified if the defendant could have safely retreated).

## Issues

1. Whether it was reversible error to instruct the jury that Richards had a duty to retreat before using deadly force, despite Florida’s Stand Your Ground statutes eliminating that duty for a person lawfully present and not engaged in unlawful activity.
2. If the instruction was erroneous, whether the error was harmless given the contested evidence on self-defense.

## Decision

- The appellate court held the trial court erred by giving an outdated deadly-force instruction imposing a duty to retreat.
- The court held the error was not harmless because self-defense was central and the evidence on who was the aggressor materially conflicted.
- The conviction and sentence for attempted second-degree murder were reversed, and the case was remanded for a new trial.

## Legal Principles

- Under Florida’s Stand Your Ground statutory framework, a person lawfully present and not engaged in unlawful activity has no general duty to retreat before using deadly force if the person reasonably believes such force is necessary to prevent death or great bodily harm.
- A jury instruction that incorrectly imposes a duty to retreat in a Stand Your Ground case misstates governing law and can improperly increase the defendant’s burden on self-defense.
- When self-defense is a central disputed issue, an erroneous instruction on the duty to retreat is reversible if there is a reasonable possibility it affected the verdict.

## Conclusion

The court reversed Richards’s attempted second-degree murder conviction because the jury was instructed under superseded “duty to retreat” law, and the error could have affected the jury’s evaluation of his self-defense claim.


Richards v. State, 39 So. 3d 431 (Fla. 2d DCA 2010)