A short excerpt from the long Gervin v. Florence, decided yesterday by the Eleventh Circuit (opinion by Judge Robin Rosenbaum, joined by Judges Nancy Abudu and Charles Wilson):
DeShawn Gervin has not been a model citizen. But he did do at least one thing right. As Gervin's sole condition of probation, a Georgia court kicked him out of its jurisdiction and banned him from returning. And Gervin followed that instruction. He moved to North Carolina.
But he didn't stay out of trouble there, either. North Carolina imprisoned Gervin for breaking and entering, larceny, and robbery and kidnapping.
Soon after, a probation officer with the Georgia Department of Community Supervision learned of Gervin's North Carolina transgressions. And she sought a warrant for his arrest in Georgia. In support, she swore that Gervin had "failed to report" and "absconded from probation supervision" in violation of his probation conditions. Another probation officer under her supervision then petitioned to revoke Gervin's probation based on his failure to report.
After the probation officer obtained the warrant, police officers in North Carolina arrested Gervin on the Georgia warrant. Then they extradited Gervin to Georgia. And Gervin spent 104 days in jail waiting for the court to resolve his probation-revocation charges.
But as we've recounted, the Georgia court's only probation condition for Gervin required him never to reenter its judicial circuit. And that's the one thing he had not done. So however else Gervin had broken the law, he had not violated his Georgia probation.
