Illinois Official Reports 

Appellate Court

People v. Robinson, 2018 IL App (3d) 170287

Appellate Court 

Caption

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, Plaintiff-Appellee, v.

TERRANCE ROBINSON, Defendant-Appellant.

District & No. Third District

Docket No. 3-17-0287

Filed December 20, 2018

Decision Under 

Review

Appeal from the Circuit Court of Will County, No. 00-CF-2095; the 

Hon. Daniel J. Rozak, Judge, presiding.

Judgment Reversed and remanded.

Counsel on

Appeal

James E. Chadd, Patricia Mysza, and S. Amanda Ingram, of State 

Appellate Defender’s Office, of Chicago, for appellant.

James W. Glasgow, State’s Attorney, of Joliet (Patrick Delfino, David 

J. Robinson, and Justin A. Nicolosi, of State’s Attorneys Appellate 

Prosecutor’s Office, of counsel), for the People.

Panel JUSTICE HOLDRIDGE delivered the judgment of the court, with 

opinion.

Justices O’Brien and Wright concurred in the judgment and opinion.
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 OPINION 

¶ 1 The defendant, Terrance Robinson, filed a pro se postconviction petition in which he 

asserted that he had been sentenced in violation of the guidelines set forth in Miller v. 

Alabama, 567 U.S. 460 (2012). The circuit court dismissed the petition as frivolous and 

patently without merit. 

¶ 2 I. BACKGROUND 

¶ 3 In 2001, the defendant was convicted of first degree murder (720 ILCS 5/9-1(a)(3) (West 

2000)). The defendant was 15 years old at the time of the offense. Following a three-day 

sentencing hearing, the circuit court sentenced the defendant to a term of 50 years’ 

imprisonment. In imposing the sentence, the court’s only reference to the defendant’s age was 

the following remark: “On the mitigating side there is the defendant’s age. He is 15 years old, 

but just the same his actions caused the death directly of another human being.”

¶ 4 On direct appeal, this court affirmed the defendant’s conviction and sentence. People v. 

Robinson, 336 Ill. App. 3d 1062 (2003) (table) (unpublished order under Illinois Supreme 

Court Rule 23). Specifically, this court found that the circuit court’s sentence was not 

excessive. 

¶ 5 On June 8, 2016, the defendant filed a pro se postconviction petition.1 In the petition, the 

defendant asserted that his sentence of 50 years’ imprisonment constituted a de facto life 

sentence. Given his status as a juvenile at the time of the offense, the defendant argued that 

such a sentence violated the eight amendment of the United States Constitution under Miller. 

The circuit court dismissed the petition as frivolous and patently without merit. In the written 

order dismissing the petition, the court commented: “This court did (and always does) consider 

youthful age and potential for rehabilitation as mitigation and the record indicates that this 

court specifically referred to same.”

¶ 6 II. ANALYSIS 

¶ 7 On appeal, the defendant argues that his pro se postconviction petition stated the gist of a 

constitutional claim and that the circuit court therefore erred in dismissing the petition at the 

first stage. We review the circuit court’s summary dismissal of the defendant’s pro se

postconviction petition de novo. People v. Brown, 236 Ill. 2d 175, 184 (2010). 

¶ 8 The Post-Conviction Hearing Act (725 ILCS 5/122-1 et seq. (West 2014)) sets out a 

three-stage proceeding in which a criminal defendant may assert that his conviction resulted 

from a substantial denial of his rights under the United States Constitution, the Illinois 

Constitution, or both. People v. Hodges, 234 Ill. 2d 1, 9 (2009). At the first stage, the court 

must accept as true and liberally construe all of the allegations in the petition unless 

contradicted by the record. People v. Edwards, 197 Ill. 2d 239, 244 (2001). A defendant need 

only allege sufficient facts to state the “gist” of a constitutional claim in order for his petition to 

be forwarded to the second stage. Hodges, 234 Ill. 2d at 9. 

 

1Though labeled as a successive petition, the filing was the defendant’s first postconviction petition 

and was treated as such by the circuit court. 
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¶ 9 The first stage of postconviction proceedings “presents a ‘low threshold’ [citation], 

requiring only that the petitioner plead sufficient facts to assert an arguably constitutional 

claim.” Brown, 236 Ill. 2d at 184 (quoting People v. Jones, 211 Ill. 2d 140, 144 (2004)). The 

circuit court must summarily dismiss a postconviction petition at the first stage of proceedings 

if the petition is frivolous or patently without merit. Id. A petition is frivolous or patently 

without merit if it “has no arguable basis either in law or in fact.” Hodges, 234 Ill. 2d at 16. “A 

petition which lacks an arguable basis either in law or in fact is one which is based on an 

indisputably meritless legal theory or a fanciful factual allegation.” Id.

¶ 10 In Miller, the United States Supreme Court held that a mandatory sentence of life 

imprisonment without the possibility of parole violates the eighth amendment of the United 

States Constitution when imposed upon a juvenile offender. Miller, 567 U.S. at 470. The Court 

noted that its holding “mandates only that a sentencer follow a certain process—considering an 

offender’s youth and attendant characteristics—before imposing a particular penalty.” Id. at 

483. Among those attendant circumstances cited by the Miller Court were diminished 

culpability, greater prospects for reform, lack of maturity, underdeveloped sense of 

responsibility, limited control over their environment, and inability to extricate themselves 

from crime-producing settings. Id. at 471. In Montgomery v. Louisiana, 577 U.S. ___, 136 S. 

Ct. 718 (2016), the Supreme Court held that Miller applied retroactively. 

¶ 11 In People v. Reyes, 2016 IL 119271, ¶ 9 (per curiam), the Illinois Supreme Court expanded 

the reasoning of Miller to include mandatory de facto life sentences. The court reasoned: 

“A mandatory term-of-years sentence that cannot be served in one lifetime has the 

same practical effect on a juvenile defendant’s life as would an actual mandatory 

sentence of life without parole—in either situation, the juvenile will die in prison. 

Miller makes clear that a juvenile may not be sentenced to a mandatory, unsurvivable 

prison term without first considering in mitigation his youth, immaturity, and potential 

for rehabilitation.” Id.

One year later, in People v. Holman, 2017 IL 120655, ¶ 40, the court held that the reasoning in 

Miller applied whether the life sentence imposed was mandatory or discretionary. In other 

words, any life sentence imposed upon a juvenile—whether de facto or de jure, mandatory or 

discretionary—is “disproportionate and violate[s] the eight amendment, unless the trial court 

considers youth and its attendant circumstances.” Id. Thus, to prevail on a Miller-based claim 

and be subject to resentencing, a defendant sentenced for an offense committed while a 

juvenile must show that (1) he was subject to a life sentence and (2) the sentencing court failed 

to consider youth and its attendant circumstances in imposing the sentence. 

¶ 12 The defendant argues on appeal that his is a de facto life sentence. Pursuant to that 

sentence, the defendant is scheduled to be released from prison on September 17, 2051, 

approximately a month prior to his sixty-sixth birthday. In making this argument, the 

defendant relies in part on data cited approvingly in People v. Sanders, 2016 IL App (1st) 

121732-B, ¶ 26, and People v. Buffer, 2017 IL App (1st) 142931, ¶ 59, which suggests the 

average life expectancy in the prison population is 64 years. The defendant also cites to a 

number of cases in which courts have determined similar sentences to be de facto life 

sentences for juveniles. Buffer, 2017 IL App (1st) 142931, ¶ 62 (50-year sentence); People v. 
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Ortiz, 2016 IL App (1st) 133294, ¶ 24 (60 years); Bear Cloud v. State, 2014 WY 113, ¶ 11, 334 

P.3d 132 (Wyo. 2014) (45 years).2

¶ 13 The State insists that the defendant, as well as the above-cited authorities, go too far in 

defining the term “de facto life sentence.” Pointing out that the Reyes court defined a de facto

life sentence as one “that cannot be served in one lifetime,” (Reyes, 2016 IL 119271, ¶ 9), the 

State asserts that sentences such as that imposed upon the defendant here, where a reasonable 

possibility exists that the defendant will be released from prison, should not be considered 

de facto life sentences. The State, in turn, cites a number of cases in which courts have 

determined that sentences similar to the defendant’s were not de facto life sentences. People v. 

Rodriguez, 2018 IL App (1st) 141379-B, ¶ 7 (50 years); People v. Applewhite, 2016 IL App 

(1st) 142330, ¶ 16 (45 years); People v. Perez, 2018 IL App (1st) 153629, ¶ 38 (53 years); 

People v. Pearson, 2018 IL App (1st) 142819, ¶ 49 (50 years). 

¶ 14 Importantly, this appeal does not call on us to determine the precise point at which a 

sentence becomes a de facto life sentence or which side of that line the defendant’s sentence 

falls on. Instead, we must only determine whether the defendant’s Miller claim, as stated in his 

postconviction petition, has an “arguable basis either in law or in fact.” Hodges, 234 Ill. 2d at 

16. Given the apparent disagreement between numerous courts, as well as the intrinsically 

difficult nature of such a question, it is clearly at least arguable that the defendant’s 50-year 

sentence amounts to a de facto life sentence. 

¶ 15 Next, we must consider whether the circuit court arguably failed to consider the 

defendant’s youth and the attendant circumstances of that youth, in fashioning its sentence. See 

Holman, 2017 IL 120655, ¶ 40. The circuit court referenced the defendant’s youth once at 

sentencing, when it commented: “He is 15 years old, but just the same his actions caused the 

death directly of another human being.” The State asserts that this comment satisfies Miller

and Holman but concedes that “the trial court’s analysis of the impact of defendant’s youth as 

it relates to his culpability and sentence was not as thorough as mandated by Miller.”3

¶ 16 The extreme brevity with which the circuit court addressed the defendant’s youth at 

sentencing stands in stark contrast with the detailed approach to addressing youth and 

attendant circumstances seen in Miller. Miller, 567 U.S. at 470. As with the portion of our 

analysis, we need not determine whether the circuit court’s comments were sufficient or 

insufficient under Miller. Instead, we simply find that it is arguable that the court’s brief 

comment was an insufficient consideration of youth and its attendant circumstances. Because 

the defendant’s postconviction petition set forth an arguable basis in law and fact for his Miller

claim, we reverse the circuit court’s summary dismissal of that petition and remand so that the 

matter may be docketed for second-stage proceedings. 

 

2While Bear Cloud, as an out-of-jurisdiction case, is merely persuasive authority, it was cited 

approvingly by our supreme court in Reyes, 2016 IL 119271, ¶ 9. 

3The State contends that the circuit court only failed to be more thorough because it imposed the 

sentence before Miller was decided. While this is no doubt true, it is of no legal import because Miller

applies retroactively. Montgomery, 577 U.S. ___, 136 S. Ct. 718. 
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¶ 17 III. CONCLUSION 

¶ 18 The judgment of the circuit court of Will County is reversed and the matter is remanded for 

further proceedings. 

¶ 19 Reversed and remanded.