in two thousand and one mr ruiz went to the hospital where he later died of pneumonia in january of two thousand and two the state indicted mr ahmic on for the murder of alfonso are we and indicated that it was going to present his in custody statement confessing to the crimes in the two thousand and two indictment the defense objected and the court the tracker cook county trial court admitted the statement the objection was based on the fact that the statute had been changed and required that in murder indictments any custodial statement had to be electronically recorded the trial court looked at the case law and denied the motion to suppress that statement and that statement was given in to the trial testimony at the two thousand and two trial of the death of mystery ways in addition to that statement being in ruiz's testimony at the first trial was admitted as well and on the issue of causation dr nancy jones the cook county medical examiner presented evidence regarding the causation and connecting the death of mysteries from pneumonia to the gunshot wound when it mr we was in the hospital prior to the medical examiner receiving the body he had donated her consent of his family had donated several of his organs and much of his immune system was harvested for the transplant matching the immune system was not analyzed because it didn't exist and there were no bacteria cultures down at the autopsy because the state medical examiner ms jones dr jones did not get the body until risk of post mortem contamination at the close of evidence the or during the testimony of dr jones she stated that the mysteries died as a result of pneumonia due to khwaja police due to a gunshot  when the jury received the case and had to deliberate one of the things they asked for was the trial transcript of the medical examiner dr jones and the court replied that the transcript was unavailable  to police continue deliberating which they did and they are arrived at a guilty verdict and so mr ahmed on was convicted of mr ruiz's murder their contention in the appeal is there are actually two contentions they want him going to focus on or argument has to do with the proximate cause issue and going back to the statement the conclusion that dr jones made was that m understand your argument the the there was no such requirement that the statement be recorded at the time there was no correct in one thousand nine hundred five there was no requirement that and  electronically recorded that as a crack say no it can't i mean it's tough to fault the police for not complying with something that was in the effect is that true that is true in the second point is and probably more importantly the legislature  provided for a two year delay the implementation date for the statute to give police no or so there was two year even after the statute was passed there was likely to your grace period right that is correct so doesn't that show without a doubt that the legislature did not intend retroactive application i would have to agree with your honor in the sense that my research on the case law i was unable to find a case that provided for a retroactive application unfortunately i did not write the p l o and i'm not pushing blame but so i wanted to preserve the argument for my clients requests which is what i've done but i would have to agree with your statement here on earth thanks for your  you the issue on proximate cause i felt was the stronger issue in this case in the sense that because of the claim or the state's theory that the compromises the immune system the problem with the state's theory is the evidence presented the evidence couldn't present that there was a compromised immune system because there was no new system that was analyzed because it had been harvest for transplant matching and for organ donation or whether the organs actually use the lungs or not use i do know the lungs were not used the spleen the rest of the immune system is generally used for matching purposes to find an appropriate jonah or recipient from the donor but the heart was used there were was a was not the heart was genus and there were other organs that were used that did not have to do with the immune system but it wasn't because the immune system wasn't viable there was no determination of whether or not the immune system was healthy the lungs were not healthy because the lungs there was an ammonia in the lungs so the lungs were not donated so the state's theory that the immune system was compromised and that was an integral part of the data was that diminished capacity in breathing doesn't allow for full prominent toilet doesn't allow to expel the things in the lungs that need to be expelled so that the bacteria can grow in culture within the lungs and in this particular case it was testified at trial that mystery we came into the hospital with an upper respiratory infection dr jones explained that dr west a tory infractions who had moved into lower respiratory infections which infections which are the same as the monia they had no way of knowing in this particular case whether that happened because no bacteria cultures of the actual type of pneumonia were done because post mor contamination was too great so she did proven the defendant does concede that medical atrophy and medical wasting and quadriplegic as happens as a result of the immobility  chase but she then follow that statement with because of medical waste in the immune system was compromised but there was never any evidence presented about a compromised immune system and without that evidence and the fact that the jury requested the doctor's transcript so that they could look at her testimony to clarify perhaps some questions that they had and they weren't given and they were they were speculating as to whether or not the immune system was compromise which again was a strong part of the state's theory it was it was always two fold that diminished breathing capacity causes pneumonia and so does a compromise mutism it was never in or issue state and assume that even the compromised immune system was proven at what point so if mr or we died a scenario he mr on  pneumonia due quadriplegia due to a gunshot wound is always going to be the chain of events so that good what about if mr were you ruiz and gone into the hospital and he's being treated  but the problem we have here is five over five years had passed mr weasley counsel us to examine that statement a little bit is is the time the lapses between the the significance generally generally it has not been right in this case in this case i would argue that it is because in intervening act can break the causal connection and if pneumonia over a period of recovery i mean this isn't one year this wasn't two years we're talking about over five years isn't there  years is ok yes but those cases can be distinguished because the victim didn't recover and i think you have here the time frame of five over five years and you have recovery whereas in those cases the length of time of recovery where perhaps five weeks was the longest recovery and then the victim ended up dying anyway you don't have a case before you where the recovery is to this extent where the victim is learning to drive a car equipped for a quadriplegic so he has some use of his arms and i'm not saying that the incident isn't tragic it is tragic but when you have the recovery that mr ruiz had and you have the fact that the state did not present abbott ends of a compromised immune system which was an integral part of their theory i think you have to question was the length of time with the type of recovery that was sustained in this case and intervening and and the bacteria or the pneumonia was a community acquired bacteria that whether he was quadriplegic or not he could've just he could have acquired and he could have died from the medical examiner finder of fact but in this case the jury was unclear and they asked for clarification and they told it and they were told it wasn't available so i mean i guess the decision could have gone either way they could have acquitted but but you're going to have an issue as to any abuse of discretion the answer in jurors notary no i don't have an issue with it at all but i think the jury struggled greatly with this issue of what do we do when when there is a recovery of five and a half years in the victim is doing relatively well under the circumstance in in the brown case in that case the testifying doctor could only speculate and their case was a blood clot as to the cause of the blood clot correct in this case again going to the usual of the jury having heard the evidence and making to determine the patient as to proximate cause there was testimony although you don't think you don't like the testimony oftentimes we don't like the testimony of experts but there was testimony that quadriplegia causes respiratory difficulty and a compromised immune system now from that testimony alone i mean that is evidence right to go at that testimony as evidence a rational trier of fact could find based on that evidence that even with the five year interlude i mean that evidence was certainly subject to cross examination and everything else couldn't they determine that it was a cause of the pneumonia they could determine it was a top cause of pneumonia but i think what's happening then is where does the liability so then they liability never ends in that case because if mr  had contracted pneumonia twenty years after the fact of the incident that same analysis could be used and i'm not sure if that's analysis is justice in the sense of for policy reasons obviously yes you are correct that the the evidence was presented in dr jones was qualified as an expert and i don't argue that she should not have been qualified but i will again go back to say she was saying that the know now i i wouldn't take it that far and i think when you have an individual who has survived and is out in the community and he we don't expect victims to live in a bubble so that they don't  live their lives and they were lucky enough to survive but at the same time there are so many other intervening forces and there was no history presented that mr ruiz had contracted pneumonia before or that he was sickly he was and the testimony is that he was in usual health despite the fact that he was quadriplegic and he was somebody who experienced medical waste and because of  he usual however was he unusual which there was no clarification about that the unfortunately the testimony was just that dr jones agreed on cross examination that he was in fact yes he to medical technology and that rule of the year and the day and why the rule was abolished in the first place the rules abolished because medical technology has advanced so much but now we're at the other end of the spectrum where medical technology has advanced so much that i think that a look at adding i'm asking that the intervening cause be in relation to recovery and in one of the points i'm arguing is that part of an intervening cause could be recovery and time that there is enough that has passed that has allowed the the defendant to survive in a in a state of edge in he was quadriplegic so i don't want to say normal because i don't consider that normal but the issue becomes pneumonia acquired when it could have been acquired by anybody who was healthy should have been determined as an it could have been determined as an intervening cause and i think that's what the jury struggled with in the fact that they were trying to figure out if there was an inner feeling cause her opinion she yes she answered bad she believed in her expert opinion isn't that basically the same as what happens and medical malpractise cases across this country were experts divide and whether there could have been another cause or whether that was the cause or even the expert who says that i thought it was the cause often i cross examination will say yeah there could have been other factors but i think the cause was the quadriplegic and then the jury is left to sort out whether you know who they believe yes or the experts but in this in this case on cross examination the expert did ed meant that and the appellate court admitted that should have been able to foresee that the severe compromise state of the victim's body could perhaps render him to many different further injuries and i see my red light unless there are other question i would respectfully ask the court to reverse the lower court's decision morning they please the court i'm heather farm croque on behalf of the people of the state of illinois your honour's alphonso rule was was gunned down and left for dead the bullet that the defendant fired and his neck severed his spine rendering him a quadriplegic he was unable to move his body except for his biceps and his head and he was just seventeen years old the jury heard extensive medical testimony that connected the defendant's act to the victim's  ultimately his death from pneumonia the jury heard testimony testimony that not only did the bullet wound compromise mystery was his ability to breathe fully and deeply but it also severely compromised his immune  system counsels speaks that the immune system was harvested somehow for testing the testimony was that his lymph nodes were harvested for matching purposes his immune system will was by nature his his whole body and the doctor explained how his body was compromised because he was unable to move his muscles his muscles wasted away his spinal cord atrophied his brain was liquefying and slipping down into his spinal column all of this was was extensively explained to the jury along with photographic evidence by dr jones it was also explained the jury that the defendant's act need not be the sole cause of death or the direct cause of death or even the immediate cause of death that it needed to contribute to the victim's death and the jury heard that testimony and understood that the defendant set in motion a chain of events that ultimately led to him contracting pneumonia and dying of pneumonia dr jones also said that normal twenty two year olds do not die of pneumonia that babies and the elderly die of pneumonia and that a normal twenty two year old that yes people do contract pneumonia but to die of pneumonia at age twenty two was was not a normal thing as for the the organs that were harvested there were several organs that were harvested potentially for for use council spoke to the heart being used we don't know if those organs were able to be actually used when donated there was only testimony of what was harvested and what was left in the body because of its disease state dr jones also spoke about the bacteria this whole issue of whether it was community acquired versus hospital  yes the mystery was was out of the hospital he was doing his best to live a life and he can track the germs that we all encounter every single day what type of bacteria it was really was was no it was never an issue  this case as far as the jury being being confused all we have on the record is the jury asking for dr jones's testimony they asked once they were told to continue to deliberate and the jury returned a verdict in two hours so any suggestion that the jury was somehow confused i think her words were struggling with struggle greatly is completely belied by the record it took them two hours to find a defend guilty of murder in this case and as this court asked for see ability clearly is the issue here was it forseeable that somebody who was shot in the neck and had their spinal cord severed and was unable to breathe would eventually contract pneumonia and be unable to fight it off because of his compromised immune system and dr jones gave extensive testimony connecting the acts of defendant to the pneumonia it was explained to the jury how that was forseeable whether it happened a year after the defense act or five years proximate cause here was proof was proven ultimate legal issue is resolved by this court or to nova review your honour's in conclusion pneumonia was a natural and forseeable consequence of the victim's quadriplegi replies favorable to the prosecution the jury's verdict here was perfectly perfectly reasonable and we asked this court to affirm the defense conviction for first degree murder and to sentence thank you just briefly to clarify a couple things the standard view is the sufficiency of the allison evidence and whether any rational trier of fact would be able to arrive at a different decision than this jury arrived at the testimony that the immune system was severely compromised was not supported by fact because the need system wasn't analyzed so whether they whether the expert's opinion that diminished freedom came at capacity and whether a compromised immune system is enough to have a any rational trier of fact believe that the pneumonia was caused by the gunshot wound is what we have that contention with normal twenty two year olds according to the testimony of dr jones don't die from pneumonia and that the individuals that do die from pneumonia she of those with compromised immune systems going right back again to the fact that she was saying that mr rees's immune system was compromised and again there are no facts to support that the immune system was compromised and then the foreseeability argument yes it is a huge part of the argument but mr i'm a gun could not foresee that five and a half years later that mr ruiz would die of a community acquired bacteria pneumonia the request in this is to reverse the conviction and part of the reason again is to say that the immune system was not analyze and i may have misspoken about the use of the organs but the storing the adrenal glands the heart and parts of the pancreas were harvested for organ transplant and unless there are any other questions thank you