morning and welcome everyone this is the first day of our oral arguments for the may term wednesday may fifteenth two thousand and thirteen gender number one is our first case on the docket case number good afternoon your good morning honors that morning counsel my name is yasmina by and i represent the a petitioner appellant omar johnson on behalf of the state about the vendor the question before the court today is quite discreet and know very simply whether a provision of section for our dash two thousand two point one a of the illinois counties code which i referred to for simplicity sake as the piece that you provision of this statute provides for the recruitment of a fifty dollars state's attorney's fee but the state's involvement in mr johnson section two fourteen zero one proceedings the relevant provision of the thesis that you provides article ten of the on i code of civil procedure thus in answering the proceeding question this court must determine whether the legislature utilized the term he described this in a manner consistent with that terms  recognize principles of statutory construction guide the analysis here petitioner posits that the cardinal rule of statutory construction the plain language answers this question in the negative as this court has recognized time and time again the most reliable indicator of the legislature's intent is the actual language of the statute given its plain and ordinary meaning applying this important legal precept here it becomes apparent that k b s corpus was not to be broadly interpreted and the term the find here was improper three factor support the petitioners an this clear and unambiguous statute first the term hevia scorpius does not nor has it ever encompassed section two fourteen zero one petitions where are their predecessors a common law writ of ara court on notice in this regard the authorities are consistent but when the term hay vs corpus is used in isolation as it was in the instant feast statute it applies very specifically to a circumstances one where the presiding court lacks either personal or subject matter jurisdiction over the individual or to were some subsequent occurrence following conviction entitles the proceedings that we most often see for example at the state about the funders the section two fourteen zero one petitions and the post conviction petition and this brings me to my next point given the current state of the law it is important to know that the instant feast statute has been amended multiple times since it's an act meant in one thousand nine hundred two all of these amendments have occurred  following the advent of the post conviction hearing act and the refinement of section two fourteen or one law therefore it stands to reason but if the legislature had in fact intended to an employ e state's attorneys be in either of the two fourteen or one post conviction context it would have amended the feast actually to reflect the current state of the law that it did not must be construed as significant contrary to the state's argument this court has never held that it is the role of the judiciary to correct a perceived legislative shortcoming under the guise of judicial figure out the state illinois revamped the state of sex offenses within the state the state points to no such are legendary in this case in fact the state has cited no legislative history in support of its expansive interpretation of the answer to the statute this in a bit south serves to distinguish the instant case from those that the state relies upon but that brings me to finally to my third point and that is that all factors as the congress that the legislature did not intend for this key to apply every litigation scenario every conceivable litigation scenario there are two points in this regard must be construed as deliberate and this is also important because it shows that indeed one of legislature wants to apply court costs in the context of petitions to bake eight knows how to do so explicitly it does not need to go about employing circular list methods such as those to just get by the state here this brings me to my next point in fact this court has under the statute and the predecessor statute and noted certain circumstances rand the state is not compensated for substantive predication in miles met it was their role in bail hearings and in probable cause hearings and when when the defendant is denied bail and then re w w it was juvenile appeals all of these of course undercut the state's expansive interpretation of the impact petitioners absent a finding of valente if there is such an expansive interpretation so those filing two fourteen zero one petitions of any statistics on the amount of collection that is actually done by the state turns office judgments here none none that i'm aware of but i don't believe they do you collect them on a routine basis i'm not aware i don't have anything if impact on the fact that  judgment even for fifty dollars that goes on to someone's record would take their life over and i don't know that but it certainly would impact our clients i mean we are dealing with any statistics so in that regard   very defined when he is petitions are available and indeed in this court in mile smith looked also to the definition and black's law but to other courts and other states how it's been interpreted i think similarly we can make if we look at black's law if we look at u s supreme court precedent beginning in eighteen zero seven if we look at even our own case law in illinois we've consistently  designated or defined hate this petitions in a very narrow sense as applying because it is such an extraordinary remedy it if it applies only into very limited sense it i would simply or five of the illinois code of civil procedure based upon broad purposefully broad language there in in a broad manner the same cannot be said of the instant the statute indeed the appellate court by reading expansively a specific term of legal art hippias corpus in such a manner that it lacks meaning whatsoever has rendered this term virtually meaningless and it is for this reason that the app good morning honors counsel assistant state's attorney christine cook on behalf of the people many years ago the petitioner approached fifty eight year old dorothy jewel of his employer at a kentucky fried chicken restaurant in suburban chicago he pointed the gun at her for string to work car driver twenty undisclosed location where he shot are several times in the head while she was still much trunk of the car the petitioner and a friend then drove m dekalb illinois where they abandoned her vehicle and her corpse inside that trunk she was discovered several days later the petitioner was found guilty of murder armed robbery aggravated kidnapping agile aggravated vehicular hijacking and concealment of a homicidal da he was given life for the murder sixty years for the armed robbery the aggravated kidnapping the aggravated vehicular hijacking and ten years for the concealment and direct appeal the life imprisonment for the murder conviction was vacated pursuant to a pretty under this court's supervisory order that the appellate court reinstated the life conviction the petitioner then filed the post conviction now before you today is the two fourteen zero one petition none of the substantive issues are before this court the only issue is the fifty dollars state's attorney's fees it's quite nice to be aware that in this case an assistant state's attorney filed not one but two independent motions to dismiss she rid of the defendant then and provided counsel to the defendant which allowed him to actually withdraw his first two fourteen zero one petition so that he could raise new claims before the court allow statute was written a petitioner had only one option to obtain any type of what would be today's collateral relief and that was through hideous corpus the fisa statute as that as written is most generic it does not say a petitioner who files a postcondition petition it does not refer to the post conviction or to the hague is corpus act at all it doesn't refer to anything it just has this generic term of heavey a square pass this court must look to the entire scheme of the fees and salary statute to ascertain and give a fact to the legislative intent that is what precisely is missing and petitioners argument don't we look to the language and here the term hideous corpus is clearly ambiguous because there is no definition of who gets corpus in the act and the definition of heedless corpus by any definition especially in class logic scenary is that of a generic term in common law and has been repeatedly how that the term he'd use corpus is a generic term in the people's brief we have a string side of cases that were further to that very proposition that he views corpus is to be interpreted as a generic term in the reason because the when the fees and salaries act was enacted of course this was pretty fourteen zero one three post conviction herring act and should be left undisturbed because he views corpus as is written as a generic term that can and more modern interpretation of course and the filing fees have no impact on whether or not a fee will be imposed later on when a two fourteen zero one petition is found to be not meritorious which is the only time the fee would be impose counsel would have this court believe that this is some kind of a financial hindrance for anybody who wants to file a two fourteen zero one petition and that is simply untrue there is a separate filing fee which would of course impact anybody who wants to file a fourteen one petition but this  only applies to those individuals who file a non meritorious petition and this court should also note in the hundred ten years that this filing fee has been on the books this is now the second case in which i making petitioners claim that this would cause some undue hardship across the board completely merit  i don't have the statistics for all of those types of arguments i know from just some personal experience across the board fees are routinely not collected because most of these petitioners are indigent i can't give you a number i don't have access to that type of because no appellate court other than gutierrez and city before this court has this fee ever been subject to litigation so that pauses one to think that this probably is not being filed the filing fees are not being requested and certainly aren't at issue next regarding this defendant just written this in this case there are all those other defendants out there who try to who have possibility of getting their lives back together they must live with these kind of years that don't put you still be alive just as i can answer that question those are not the premiers of the issue before me the collection of fees is is it in this case is not at issue this petitioner has been given a life sentence for what the trial court called a shockingly evil case this defendant isn't getting out this defendant is not going to get a hit on his credit report for a fifty dollars fee and in that same line of questioning justice freiman there are filing fees of course which are at issue which get imposed upon everybody who files a two fourteen zero one petition or post conviction petition these are fees that are only imposed and again this is only the second case in over one hundred years that's this is been litigated in where the fee is imposed when the case is found to be non meritorious there are a lot of hoops that have to be jumped through before this fee can be amat the people have to engage in substantive in court litigation as they did in this absolutely certainly because the whole point of the fisa statute there is no question that when the legislature wittily wrote this statute in eight hundred seventy two they outlined every chronology of litigation that he be a hearings breaches of the peace paternity then you trial appeal and it also distinguishes the different types of fees that are allowed for different felonies murder cases being giving a higher fee than  was clearly in viewing he views corpuses some time bob what we would consider today to be a collateral attack its physical placement in the fisa statute is most telling and the language used in that field statute is generic constitutional matters so clearly that is addressed in today's present day collateral claims however in one thousand nine hundred seven the only form of relief anybody could ever receive and in the great wet which is a  become much more narrowly construed in one thousand seven under the second prong which counsel has referred to today that would allow somebody in one thousand seven to get collateral relief whether it was pretrial or certainly it would be more convenient if they had amended the statute to reflect to fourteen i want to be in a post conviction is a month only answer isn't plain reading the first rules yes but in that vein justice the term and the way the statute is written as in the case common law meaning means illegal detention illegal detention has evolved in modern day times to encompass fourteen zero one factual matters and post conviction hearing  constitutional matters those are all stemming not only from quorum notice on the two fourteen zero one but from he vs two because even today one can still request crossover related for hay vs and two fourteen  would if you minutes ago were discussing generally that the language of the statute in the hearing of a case of his corpus and you start to talk about that this was a frivolous petition that had been filed now  the frivolous filing the legislature was able to set out very specifically corpus actions under article ten of the code postcondition petitions in section two fourteen zero one petition this this is a big section dealing with costs and fees based on a frivolous plan and the legislature is able to break out these different kinds of files absolutely shouldn't we take that into consideration when we go back and state's attorney has absolutely no interaction or hasn't filed a motion to dismiss and has literally no action in that case this fee applies to states attorneys being compensated for their self student in court trial and one has to go back to one thousand no seven and determine whether today's two fourteen zero one would have been recognized under that provision under he vs corpus petition and absolutely would have because there was no other alternative in  in which to file any collateral claim of relief whether it be factual or constitutional i'd also like to address counsel's argument that we are discussing a legislative shortcoming and we are requesting that you fix that it is not the people's position that this is a legislative shortcoming it could not have been a legislative shortcoming because two fourteen zero ones and post conviction hearing didn't exist in one thousand and seven there's no legislative shortcoming in the few statute at all the fee applied in fee and the court has to make a finding that this is a non meritorious petition which is wholly independent of a phyllis frivolous petition the case law the common law and common sense as well as statutory construction mandate that this court apply a broad interpretation just as the appellate court did and find that he be a scorpius in this statute should be interpreted broadly counsel is right the issue before the court is narrow but its application should be brought and for all of the reasons set here today and those set forth in our brief the people respectfully request that this court affirmed the appellate court's decision and imposing the fifty dollars state's attorney fee in this case of string sites that it has in its brief i'm one of those is ex parte berman i'm going to quote when we say the writ of habeas corpus out addition we most generally mean the great re again we are dealing with one particular problem of the great read there is no ambiguity in this statute there is no reason to go beyond the plain meaning of the statute justice thomas you are right in that regard there is no grounds for going beyond the plain meaning but getting to the second point i think the absurdity here actually would be to go beyond the given this claim understanding of this term to go beyond this and to read into effectively this statute the terms post conviction proceedings section two fourteen zero one proceedings when justice tice's you you point out that when the legislature ena instance the statute we have to read very separate types of collateral remedies now i'd also like to go back to the first point that the state made based on their motion to  additional authority i have read that case people be crux to my mind it does not refute to state my argument in any way shape or form and that quote the court was just reaffirming what was known at common law which was that rates of error corum novus could be used in the criminal context indeed in that case the court was just dealing with whether the trial court the circuit court had jurisdiction to consider the motion to withdraw guilty plea which the defendant presented and it was the defendant's position that they could as a read of no basis so that doesn't support the state's position they state also suggest that there's points out people be good cheer us so that's incorrect as far as this statute covering every conceivable litigation again as i pointed out in my opening brief that is simply not the case  miles smith this court recognized two instances where the fisa actually did not compensate the state for substantive their substantive wrong but a geisha and in re w w again the state has in point of fact the cases of the state site suggest that no this is not the case of they are distinct animals and that a void order generally cannot be attacked and i hate this petition it must relate back to the 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