Title: People v. Redmond

State: illinois

Issuer: Illinois Supreme Court

Document:

67 Ill. 2d 242 (1977)
367 N.E.2d 703
THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Appellant,
v.
GILL REDMOND, Appellee.
No. 49360.

Supreme Court of Illinois.
Opinion filed June 27, 1977.
Rehearing denied October 3, 1977.
*243 William J. Scott, Attorney General, of Springfield and Bernard Carey, State's Attorney, of Chicago (Laurence J. Bolon and Larry L. Thompson, Assistant State's Attorneys, of counsel), for the People.
James J. Doherty, Public Defender, of Chicago (John Thomas Moran, Assistant Public Defender, of counsel), for appellee.
Reversed and remanded.
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE WARD delivered the opinion of the court:
This is a direct appeal (58 Ill.2d R. 603) from a judgment of the circuit court of Cook County which dismissed a count charging attempted murder in a criminal information of four counts filed against the defendant, Gill Redmond, and which held section 111-2(e) of the Code of Criminal Procedure of 1963 (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 38, par. 111-2(e)) to be unconstitutional.
On April 19, 1976, Redmond was charged in a complaint with the offense of aggravated battery (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 38, par. 12-4). A preliminary hearing was held on April 28, 1976, at which the complainant, Lesley *244 Illidge, testified. Illidge stated that he had approached the defendant and several other men on the evening of April 18 and inquired if they knew where he could obtain drugs. Told to follow them, he entered an apartment building, and as they were leaving the building's elevator the defendant attempted to draw a revolver from his pocket. Illidge said that, as he reached to grasp the defendant's arm, the gun went off and a bullet struck him in the leg. On cross-examination Illidge admitted he had known the defendant for two years and had no previous difficulties with him. No other witnesses appeared, and a finding of probable cause was entered by the court.
On May 6, 1976, a four-count information was filed by the State's Attorney charging the defendant with one count of attempted murder (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 38, pars. 8-4 and 9-1) and three counts of aggravated battery (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 38, par. 12-4). This was done under section 111-2(e) of the Code of Criminal Procedure of 1963 (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1975, ch. 38, par. 111-2(e)), which provides that, following a finding of probable cause at a preliminary hearing, the prosecution may proceed by information for all offenses arising from the same transaction or conduct of the defendant even though the complaint on which the preliminary hearing was held charged only one or some of the offenses set out in the information.
On December 6, 1976, the defendant moved to quash count I of the information, which charged attempted murder, on the ground that a preliminary hearing had not been held on that charge at which a judge had determined the existence of probable cause, which he said was required by article I, section 7, of the Constitution of Illinois of 1970. The defendant also argued that section 111-2(e) violated the fourth and fourteenth amendments of the Constitution of the United States by permitting a prosecutor to bring a criminal charge against an accused *245 without providing for a preliminary hearing and a judicial determination of probable cause. The circuit court allowed the defendant's motion, holding section 111-2(e) to be unconstitutional.
Article I, section 7, of our constitution declares:
In 1975 the General Assembly, acting under the power granted by article I, section 7, to "abolish the grand jury or further limit its use," amended section 111-2 of the Code of Criminal Procedure to provide in part:
Contrary to the defendant's claim, we consider that a *246 prosecution by information under section 111-2(e) does not violate the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment. The provision of the fifth amendment requiring indictment by a grand jury is not applicable to State criminal proceedings. (Hurtado v. California, 110 U.S. 516, 28 L. Ed. 232, 4 S. Ct. 111 & 292; Morford v. Hocker (9th Cir.1968), 394 F.2d 169.) Too, a State may, consistent with due process, dispense with the preliminary hearing procedure and authorize the prosecutor to initiate the criminal proceeding directly. Lem Woon v. Oregon, 229 U.S. 586, 57 L. Ed. 1340, 33 S. Ct. 783.
The defendant repeats here his contention that section 111-2(e) violates an accused's right to a prompt preliminary hearing to establish probable cause as declared in article I, section 7, of our constitution, because, he says, the constitutional provision requires a probable cause determination for each separate charge which might be brought in a criminal information. The defendant's contention cannot be supported.
In considering the provision of article I, section 7, requiring the holding of a prompt preliminary hearing, it is appropriate to observe that this court has stated that the first purpose of the provision is to insure that a defendant is not held without a prompt showing of probable cause. "[T]he assurance of a prompt probable-cause determination of our new constitution * * * [is addressed to] the constitutionally given right not to be unduly detained in any event." People v. Howell, 60 Ill. 2d 117, 122.
This is clear from the proceedings of the constitutional convention. The report of the Bill of Rights Committee to the convention stated:
When the proposal for a required preliminary hearing was submitted to the convention, Delegate Bernard Weisberg, who spoke in behalf of the committee, stated:
Later Mr. Weisberg was questioned as to whether a *248 second preliminary hearing would be required if an accused was bound over to the grand jury after a preliminary hearing on one charge and a true bill returned by the grand jury charged another offense. He expressed the opinion that the accused would be entitled to a second preliminary hearing if the new charge were "completely unrelated" and "fundamentally different." (We need not consider the correctness of this view under the facts here.) The delegate went on to say:
Although the discussion in the convention proceedings referred to an indictment of an accused subsequent to a preliminary hearing, the discussion is applicable to a subsequent criminal information, as is the case here.
Considering the historical purpose of the preliminary hearing and the relevant proceedings, including the report of the Bill of Rights Committee and the colloquy concerning it, we judge that the provision of section 111-2(e) that "such prosecution may be for all offenses, arising from the same transaction or conduct of a defendant even though the complaint or complaints filed at the preliminary hearing charged only one or some of the offenses arising from that transaction or conduct," was not contrary to the intendment of that part of article I, section 7, providing for a prompt preliminary hearing for an accused.
California has a constitutional provision and a statute resembling the ones we are considering. Article I, section 14, of the Constitution of California provides that "[f]elonies shall be prosecuted as provided by law, either by indictment or, after examination and commitment by a magistrate, by information." (Cal. Const. 1879, art. I, sec. *249 14 (1974); see also Cal. Const. 1879, art. I, sec. 8.) Section 739 of the California Penal Code authorizes the prosecuting attorney to file, following the preliminary examination and commitment, "an information against the defendant which may charge the defendant with either the offense or offenses named in the order of commitment or any offense or offenses shown by the evidence taken before the magistrate to have been committed." Cal. Penal Code sec. 739 (West 1970).
This statute, and its predecessor, were held to be constitutional. (People v. Bird (1931), 212 Cal. 632, 300 P. 23.) In People v. Evans (1952), 39 Cal. 2d 242, 249, 246 P.2d 636, 640, it was said: "The effect of the court's declarations of the constitutional operation of the section was to approve the filing of an information charging a different but related crime shown by the evidence taken before the magistrate bearing on the transaction involved in the commitment order."
The State's Attorney's charging the defendant here with a count of attempted murder was authorized under our statute. The offense of attempted murder under the evidence might certainly be said to have been an offense which arose "from the same transaction or conduct" of the defendant as was testified to at the preliminary hearing.
For the reasons given, the judgment of the circuit court of Cook County is reversed and the cause is remanded for further proceedings.
Reversed and remanded.