Defendant notes that under the 1993 definition of stalking, one element of the offense is that the defendant has to knowingly and without lawful justification follow or place another person under surveillance on at least two different occasions. However, defendant argues that no mental state, such as knowledge, accompanies either of these two alternate subelements. Nor, he claims, is there a requirement that either subelement be committed without lawful justification. Additionally, he maintains there is no longer a requirement that the following or surveillance be in furtherance of the threat. As a result, defendant claims, the statute encompasses innocent conduct.
Statutes carry a strong presumption of constitutionality.
Courts will strike down a statute in violation of the due process clause if the statute does not bear a reasonable relationship to the public interest which it sought to protect. In Wick, the Illinois Supreme Court held that an aggravated arson statute, which subjected arsonists to more severe punishments if a firefighter or police officer was injured, was overly broad because the statute did not require that the arsonist have an unlawful purpose in setting the fire. The court found that the statute encompassed both innocent and criminal conduct. The court ruled that the statute swept too broadly in protecting its stated interests and was therefore unconstitutional. If the statute defining an offense prescribed a particular mental state with respect to the offense as a whole, without distinguishing among the elements thereof, the prescribed mental state applies to each such element.