where the trees were going to make a presentation today please a coach the podium and identify yourself and the party represent your honour's may have on either topic the simple facts of this case lead to a simple conclusion when a de leon did not commit an unlawful sale of a fire because the parties agree that a gun was delivered on april nineteenth two thousand and eight all this court needs to determine is when there was an application to buy that gun that's clear when the leo and his friend joe entered place for shop on april fifteenth picked out a gun paid for it and completed the application paperwork to buy it there was an application and agreement to purchase that gun it did not violate the statute but the status sensually wants to do here is fit a square peg into a round hole they're trying to apply an unlawful sale of a firearm statute section twenty four three three that simply doesn't fit the facts while under section twenty fourth ricci the parties must wait seventy two hours between the application to buy a gun and the delivery of that gun application has a clear and unambiguous definition in the statute it's defined as the agreement between the parties to purchase a firearm under the clear language of the statute to leon simply did not commit another lawful a fire and then the parties agree that delivery here occurs on april nineteenth that's when de leon and joe returned to the rights to pick up the gun that showed picked up picked out three days earlier the only issue then is when there was an application that agreement to purchase between the parties for the gun that's simple the application happened when joe and the leon applied when on the fifteenth they traveled the place sports shop picked out a gun and filled out the application paperwork the state is arguing there is really no complete agreement in this case because after the guy was delivered the of the individual gave the definit two hundred dollars there's no evidence in the record that two hundred dollars they were in any discussion had ever been agreed on before and that this transaction was not completed until the two hundred dollars was paid and he got a gun less than three days after that the issue that this court has to resolve is when there was an agreement when there was an application not when the transaction was necessarily complete if we have seventy two and it is the purchase price and there is no dispute nuno no discussion of the purchase price until the two hundred dollars was tendered is that when the agreement was form the agreement was formed between the parties on april fifteenth when there was an application to buy a firearm from blights the state wants to have it have the leon proof we need a green mentor rose but it's actually the state's burden to demonstrate that there was that application an agreement within seventy two hours of a delivery and the ambiguity of the record in that case shouldn't the result in favor of the state it's the state's burden to demonstrate a violation of the statute that require an agreement sometime after april fifteenth furthermore the facts here tend to show that peak reman did arise on april fifteenth the hats that the parties are wearing at that point really is somewhat immaterial under any rational view of the facts the relevant parties agreed at that point to buy a firearm was considered the buyer who is considered the seller isn't important so long as that agreements in place more than seventy two hours in advance of the delivery that purchase of a firearm that was certainly understood the details of the service that mr de leon was going to be providing acting as a purchaser of this weapon was understood but was the price and the price may have been understood there's nothing clear on the record that there was or was not a discussion of price as of april fifteenth we do have a course of dealing between these parties in a prior occasion dileo was paid the exact same amount by this same person when he did the same evidence in the record has some doubt as to when that agreement arose that should necessarily be resolved in favor of the the state burden the room by the state was not met on the evidence but well when the parties enter a play store shop fill out an application pick out the gun pay for it there's an agreement in place you can look at this as in a number of ways as to who exactly is acting as iron and seller but under any one of those interpretations it's clear that as an april fifteenth when julian and joe go together to go to the gun shop to pick one out there's an agreement between the parties that are relevant here well that's not to say that there isn't a to own one but that's not what the state charged here what they used was a statute that's really more appropriately applied to a gun seller like blights it's section twenty four three g is designed to ensure that a shop like lice has a chance to conduct that background check on the buyer and that the buyer has a chance to cool down from anything that might have provoked him or her to downplay you buying it then she has no application i'm sorry you don't argue that th this statute doesn't fit the facts here the leon did not commit a violation of section twenty four dash three ci and that's simply because there was an application an agreement to purchase europe in seventy two hours in advance of the delivery that occurred on april nineteenth section twenty four best three point five would be more fitting for the facts but the state didn't charge it because of the state's choice in charging it had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that that application agreement arose sometime before that's right definition application and they did a good response to the title decision maybe not we don't know about fourteen years earlier it's tough yes a pretty long way if that's what they want to do but we don't know let's leave history tells us nothing about it but we have to say hey i like i'm yours i want to buy and i said you i want to sell it to you we have an agreement to purchase before i told you how much i'm going to make you pay for it now in the hypothetical you're proposing no but i don't think that's an area an analogy to the case here but why don't we have an agreement to purchase at the moment it's because we haven't agreed on a price range it's because you haven't agreed to all the material terms of the contract so yes including price however in this case you have evidence both that there was a private person dealing between these parties where you know a price was agreed upon the same price was paid a few months before this transaction so the parties had an understanding you also have their behavior in this case which indicates agreement was in place as of april fifteenth there's simply no reason for show the travel to indiana with billy on pick out the gun that he wants and you deliver on the money to buy that gun unless they've already agreed that that gun is going to be joe's after the waiting period ends that agreement was already in place once they traveled in the end on the fifteenth if there are no further questions from the court because the parties observed the relevant seventy two hour waiting period when the delay is conviction must be reverse the morning your honor is again assistant state's attorney mary laird on behalf of the people and they please the court your honor is by his own statement defendant provided the exact address at which the agreement transfer payment into libya forty caliber handgun took calumet park illinois this court reviews the evidence in the light most favorable to the people and emphasizing that standard defendant did not wait the required seventy two hours before transferring the handgun where all essential terms if you commit to purchase were not agreed upon until it from nineteen and your honors defendant was in essence a straw purchaser of a handgun for individual joe who based on the circumstantial evidence of the transaction itself was clearly unable to purchase the forty caliber handgun in his own right and this is exactly the type of conduct that the legislature sought to criminalize by making the unlawful sale of a firearm statute specifically applicable to private parties had joe been able to purchase a handgun for himself or simply would have been reasonable doubt that joe the individual did not possess a forward card in reasonable inferences that are presented to this court from the circumstantial evidence of how the transaction was conducted we know that joe was unable to purchase a firearm his own not necessarily because he  did find it was not convicted of count two but because in the first instance joe provided an extra two hundred dollars for a transaction that simply would defy common sense that he had been able to purchase the gun on his own he would not have needed to pay someone else to do it for him and s that the purchase price was actually paid by the other individual and then this definit basically got a commission or fee for service but your honor there's a distinction between the two amounts that are paid there's the unknown amount that's paid on april fifteenth and there's two fifteenth directly to plights gun shop but the plain language the statute makes it clear i'm like opposing counsel's contention that the parties to the agreement do not matter that the agreement needs to be between the buyer and the seller and the agreement to any agreement that occurred on april fifteenth between defendant and the store and whether or not why would the one with this third party pay the full price of the purchase price of the gun there was no agreement your honor and certainly that the question then on the back end is whether on april nineteenth had had  job refused to pay the defendant whether or not he would have transferred him the firearm there was no evidence in the record until april nineteenth that the two hundred dollars the reason other than he he may be made with he'll deliver because he didn't get his commission that he was pro commission that he expected based on their prior doing rather then failed to agree on the purchase price the purchase price of the guy was apparently paid to the gun store and so that was the retail value that was paid by the defendant to the store however the agreement again needs to pick between the buyer in the sellers of the specific transaction for the firearm not only is joe unable to participate as a member of that transaction by virtue of the fact that he cannot purchase this gun for himself who the buyer and the sell is matter is it matters who fills out the application and it matters who agree it's and in this case just when the defendant as it was charged under the unlawful stale sale of a firearm statute after two thousand and five are the buyer and the seller who reached an agreement to purchase the firearm and did not withhold delivery of that firearm until seventy two hours later you argue or might make sense to me for example if there was evidence in the record that the retail value of the gun was the hundred dollars and he later gave it to  e the finished for two hundred but hypothetically so if the value of the gun say hypothetically is a forty caliber whatever it is and it was four hundred dollars and then the next day he got to have the defendant get two hundred dollars for that gun would it be more likely than not that he's basically getting a commission your honor that it's a reasonable inference if the statute did not provide for specific agreement for a transaction for this firearm the agreement is for the sale it's not for the service and so the agreement is for the sale of his firearm that defendant purchased as a straw purchaser after crossing state lines drawn in a manner basically saying this i'm not the real person of this guy's the real purpose your honor and certainly would not be in the situation i on his application to buy the handgun he did not state that he was the actual purchase of her of a firearm that he did not intend to transfer to another party and that he was purchasing it in his own right we did not he reached an agreement on april fifteenth with the store and then on april nineteenth reached an agreement under the claim terms of section three eighty that he was going to transfer this firearm to daily i am exchange for two hundred dollars and that these constitute the assault on you or anything in the record that identifies a reflects the nature of the two hundred  for the purpose of the two hundred now because the gun at that point is already purchased is the car they're traveling back to calumet city is there anything in the record that or anything to suggest to the court the nature with the purpose of the two hundred dollars because exempted the two hundred dollars the gun at that point is somewhere in the room but is there anything in the record even in the defendant's statement that i didn't it's for the state or for the parties the purpose of that additional two hundred dollars  you're on a defendant's exact words were that joe gave me approximately two hundred dollars for buying a gun for him and he kept the gun and once i gave the guns to joe i never saw the guns again and that occurred on april nineteenth and that transaction of two hundred dollars by his own language and his own statement was for the purchase of that firearm which is exactly what's criminalized by section three a g and where we have an ambiguous term such as an agreement to purchase that is not defined within the statute itself or your honor is correct this court would be the first to  give meaning to the term agreement to purchase and that's most commonly done through proper canons of statutory construction this court has looked at several things including the plain language of the statute as we discussed the purpose behind the statute the legislative history in the two thousand and five amendment terms that the statute requires a buyer and a seller who engage in a transaction and then deliver a movable good condition upon that transaction and it criminalizes the delivery of that good within seventy two hours and so where we're looking for meaning of the term agreement to purpose agreement to purchase contract law and contracts provide some guidance as to what essential terms need to be agreed to and here again in the light most favorable to the people the first time a price is mentioned on record a price that is indicative of agreement of that price is on april nineteenth and therefore by the plain language of the statute by the plain language of defendant statement this is precisely the type of conduct that the legislature sought to criminalize as the only jurisdiction in the united states that makes the unlawful sale of a firearm waiting period of clickable to a private party and in so doing they sought to give it a more specific meaning than the second district afforded it in people versus hurtado and people versus hurtado defendants conduct in this case would have constituted an agreement on april fifteenth because they defined an application as a mere request and certainly on april fifteenth a defendant had requested to purchase a firearm but the legislature did not  making it clear that an application is when a buyer and seller wish that agreement to purchase a firearm and that's well grounded in the language of contract law in this court's decisions interpret in contract law and that's not to say that the u as the different hats that people wear in the transaction and under the statute it matters who wears which hat and it matters who paid the price to do it and it matters who receive the consideration of the statue criminalizes the payment of money from the buyer to the the fifteen defendant walks away with no money to fund it doesn't walk away with any consideration the store has been paid four hundred dollars and the parties to the agreement are done joe and the defendant joe is totally on did not apply to purchase this gun the defendant applied to purchase gun joe was in our poll for ineligible for that application and again under the plain language of a statute which specifically applies to straw purchasers of illegal handguns that end up here in the city of chicago like this handgun did it was recovered illinois state police and chicago police department in the hands of a known gang member in connection with criminal activity here in chicago and that's pretty simple as i understand your you would you would consider the transaction flies to be somewhat of a detail what you're what you're prosecuting is really in some sense of the word nothing to do with blogs i think you're saying that the agreement the purchase application of purchase we can interchangeably use those whose occurred between mr hill and the defendant to the parties that the state seeks to prosecute and so certainly had a blights or the state known at the time which defendant filled out the application that he planned to sell it to a known gang member that he planned to sell it to somebody who could not purchase it on his own certainly now alternative theories but your theory seems to be the clock has nothing to do with blogs yes the clock has to do with when hill and leon made their deal yes or no you say that that didn't happen until one thousand nine hundred because that's when all the material terms of the agreement were reached yes your honor and if i may just boil it down to one sentence it's because the statute provides who the parties are and it's the buyer and the seller blights is neither the buyer or the seller for this agreement to purchase and so any transaction that occurred with lights it's not support for is because certainly had they known that if and it was purchasing the gun for somebody else it would have been criminal activity in and of itself well would you would you concede that on april fifteenth the first trip to the gun that i don't know what were the use because i don't want to get caught up in legal issues but there were some understanding between dealing on and the defendant i'm the defendant and hill that defendant was going to get a gun for d for help and so i do now is that more to the second district opinion people versus hurtado if you just answer my question first i mean right would you concede that hill wasn't just driving through indiana because he wanted to see the sights yes there was that there was some kind of a plan whether it was a legal april fifteenth and that were people vs for title still good law after the two thousand and five amendment and we did not have the clarification of a fire in a salad reaching an agreement to purchase but certainly they would have met the definition of an initial request that joe had requested that defendant purchase a firearm for him and together they drove to indiana which would you agree that the evidence is in the record here that whether they specifically agreed on the price of two hundred dollars if there was some agreement that hill and the defendant would engage in this transaction for money  and so your honor i would say that the evidence especially most favorable to people is that there would be some consideration paid but there would be no specific price and that those terms were left open for discussion and were settled on april nineteenth you would agree that there was a deal the defendant was going to get a gun for hill in exchange for compensation for care yes your honor i would agree however i would state that the amount requests is not enough we want to read yes which which at a minimum means there must be more than one party to the other side has to say i stopped your request i'm going to help you out but how do you get to the leap that it requires all the elements of a contract i mean we've never in reaching has a great and read his understanding of whether an agreement occurred secondarily simply by the plain language of the statute itself in that it requires again a buyer and a seller who reach an agreement to purchase a specific good and then it criminalizes on the backend t purchase of that good and it criminalizes the delivery of it within seventy two hours and so simply by the plain language of the statute the legislature sought to make it more specific than a mere request it now has right now and then you're saying the plain language says contract divides terms that it doesn't involve two parties to a transaction where there's a buyer and a seller who reach an agreement to purchase and again one of the principles of statutory construction is absent any other indication by the legislature either well established bodies of law that use similar language that use similar terms might be instructive and contract law is instructive here but it was relied upon by the trial court it was right upon by both parties in their briefs that in agreement to purchase might have some grounding in contract law where essential terms have already been defined by contract law we know when parties reach an agreement and we know who the parties to the transaction are we know when and where they're going to deliver and conduct their business and certainly where the legislature sought to make t equally to let you know for example stores like plates gun shop it was already a clickable to them by virtue of the application so the legislature amended the statutes so that application for purchase could almost have a more colloquial meaning for private parties so that they could loosely to terms but if under illinois law the minimum is nine transactions as far as the case law goes that after nine transactions or so you have an established course of dealing such that a simple meeting of the minds would suffice to give you one oral contract or a wo purchase as it is here in this scenario the agreement is kind of a condition precedent to the formation of a contract and the u c c says you can agree to terms and that agreement turns into a contract if you're a commercial party that has a prior course of dealing i suppose  private party that would have established a kind of de facto that commercial course of doing that you would have had this transaction that you didn't gauged in over nine or ten times with that other party but that's not the case here here we have one prior transaction that was conducted differently agreement will commercially and we're making your distinction right and so it does define agreement on a contract differently and it says that you know a contract requires all these essential terms and then it says if for example and the price term is the most notable a price term is missing then you can have an agreement that still suffices to make a contract because the price term will be supplanted by a course of conduct or course of dealing or some other extrinsic evidence that you look agreed to this contract despite not agreeing to  agreement to purchase and it's an agreement to purchase between two private parties a buyer and a seller and it criminalizes the transaction of that good and it's it is again more properly understood as an oral contract between the parties while uses the term agreement with people are not urging that the u c c is to be implanted upon this body of criminal law just that we were provided with a term like agreement to purchase it has analogous terms in contract law whether it's purchase agreement whether it's oral contract but all require certain attention  sential terms to be agreed to in the legislative intent in amending the statute was to make it more specific than this mere request and it was to require two specific parties of fire and a seller to reach that agreement and to reach an agreement on price which did not occur in this case until april nin h you say and correct me if i'm incorrect as you were describing your explaining the u c c's use of the term or definition of the term if the price term is not agreed upon or if it's not known and if there has been a course of conduct nine i think you nine times in the price term can be supplanted yes your honor answer was there any proof or was there any evidence put forth the low with respect to the number of times an exchange occurred or a purchase with an agreement to purchase had occurred between joe and the leon yes your honor and by the defendant's own state and which is people's exhibit number three i believe it would fall into just one through three he describes that he only engaged in two transactions of the first was for thirty eight caliber pistol and the transaction charge in this case was for forty caliber and certainly the two prior courses of dealing just that one prior transaction and this one which was conducted wholly differently than the prior is insufficient to rise to the level of such an understand if they would know that two hundred dollars was going to be the purchase price for this because firstly they were wholly different on each case they drove the same gun store thing a second time and so for what if we're looking at it in terms of what the actual terms of the agreement where the essential terms of the agreement were different they did have a different manner of delivery they had a different good that they were purchasing in the first transaction they drove separately to the stor separately afterwards they pulled over on the side of the road in indiana and then effectuated a transfer and then he paid him when they further got into illinois here they went together they left together they came back to illinois with a forty caliber handgun not a thirty eight they effectuated a different and in that when they ended up in indiana they essentially traded gun for money if they in the first instance transfer the firearm then waited until they got back into illinois to pay for it on the second instance they purchased the gun from place gunshop drove from indiana into illinois at which point they transferred and almost simultaneously paid the money for it and while it's not that certainly differences between the two transactions whether or not they're the same they don't rise the level of the nine transactions that this court would need to hold that there was an established course of conduct really needs to be an established whether business or personal relationship between two parties such that it's almost funny in big us what the price is going to be that every day i sell you something for five dollars and every day after that you know that it's going to be five dollars because it's always been that way but here we only have one prior transaction we were prior transactions for a different gun that while not significantly different was different and so to implant the terms of a prior transaction onto a transaction in a very briefly your honour's as opposing counsel noted the exact language from the record from de leon statement was that joe gave to leon approximately two hundred dollars for buying the gun for him at state exhibit three page five the  on is acting simply as a service provider he selling strong purchasing services it is as your honor put it like a commission and you have to strike which assert statute section twenty four that's three point five wasn't charged here that's different from the fo count that opposing counsel mentioned which leon was acquitted for for other reasons the state's burden here was to show that the agreement a rose seventy two hours before delivery on april nineteenth and they failed to do that an agreement can arise before money changes hands those things don't necessarily have to be simultaneous and the parties can agree and the circumstantial evidence shows that they did so through prior dealings and through their actions on the date they traveled the circumstantial evidence indicates an agreement before that it indicates when joe is traveling with de leon to brights picking out the gun and giving him the front money to pay for that gun and move them out that's more than he would eventually agreed here that's understood between the parties when they travel to place on the fifteenth the circumstantial evidence demonstrates that there's simply no reason to go there unless you already know what's going to happen later on you've already transacted for a different gun on a prior the exact same amount it's clear that the parties knew two hundred dollars is going to be what you're paid for your services as a straw purchaser there are no other questions from the court i'd submit the case for the thank you very much