Second District Court of Appeal Rules Jury Finding on Victim Injury Wasn’t Required Due to Overwhelming Evidence
TAMPA, Fla. – A Florida appeals court has affirmed the conviction and sentence of a woman who ran over a victim twice with a car, ruling that while the trial court erred in calculating her sentence, the mistake was “harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.”
On Friday, the Second District Court of Appeal released a decision in the case of Cathleen Namanda Harvis, who appealed her conviction for aggravated battery with a deadly weapon. Harvis’s legal team argued that the trial court improperly added victim injury points to her sentencing scoresheet, a task her lawyers claimed should have been done by the jury.
The case centered on a physical altercation that began in an alleyway when the victim, confronted her ex-boyfriend. According to court documents, Harvis, who was the ex-boyfriend’s current girlfriend, was waiting in her car…