Neither defendant nor his attorney had notice of the hearings. Indeed, defendant says that he never would have known about them except for an accidental discovery. The State contends that defendant had no right to appear at the hearings and cites several cases involving pretrial or posttrial motions to support its argument. In all of the cited cases, however, defendant or counsel had notice, and counsel attended the hearing. Here, neither counsel nor defendant received notice.
Defendants have the right to appear and defend themselves in person at all stages of trial.
Ill. Const. 1970, art. A defendant should have notice of every stage of trial. The State and defendant appear to agree that the material witness bond hearing was a stage of defendant's trial. There is no question that he should have had notice of the filing of the petitions and the hearings, and it was clear error not to have given him notice. B. Defendant does not argue that the hearing alone was a critical stage of his trial, but he does claim that prejudice flowed from the lack of notice because the trial court was tainted by the allegations in the petitions.