Court Opinion

ID: 9743859
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:47:12.217113+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:44.475068
License: Public Domain

Mr. JUSTICE THOMAS J. MORAN delivered the opinion of the court upon rehearing: The State’s petition for rehearing was allowed. Attached to the petition is an affidavit by the court reporter for the original trial which informs us that his shorthand notes of the hearing on aggravation and mitigation proceedings, held on March 21 and 22, 1966, cannot be found. (The transcript of this two-day hearing is the missing portion of the record of proceedings mentioned in the opinion.) One issue raised by defendant’s post-conviction petition is that his plea of guilty was based upon trial counsel’s promise that he would receive a penitentiary sentence of five to fifteen years.  On rehearing, the State argues that that portion of the record of proceedings which covers the hearing on aggravation and mitigation is unnecessary. We quote from the State’s brief: “A record of the sentencing hearing, however, whether a transcript or a by-stander’s report constructed through recollection, would reveal no information relating to the regularity of defendant’s conviction and sentence which has not already been adduced at the post-conviction hearing. Ordinarily, matters relating to a sentence or a sentencing hearing do not raise issues cognizable under the Post-Conviction Hearing Act. People v. Wilbourn, 48 Ill.2d 187; People v. Bollinger, 53 v.2d 388, 390. Hence, the only way in which a record of the sentencing hearing in this case might be helpful to defendant or his counsel would be if there had been some event recorded at the sentencing hedring which corroborated defendant’s post-conviction allegation that there was a plea agreement under which defendant’s sentence was to be only five years, not the fifteen to twenty year sentence actually imposed. Evidence which has already been adduced at the hearing on defendant’s post-conviction petition, however, supports no reasonable inference except that such an event would not be found in the record of defendant’s sentencing hearing.” (Emphasis added.) By the underscored exception (above) the State has effectively answered its own argument for it is precisely such circumstance, together with defendant’s post-conviction allegations, which makes it imperative that defendant be provided a record of his hearing in aggravation and mitigation. Alternatively, the State requests that, upon remand, the scope of review be limited to only new matters that may be revealed by the untranscribed portion of the proceedings. Subsequent to the post-conviction hearing, appellate counsel was furnished certain documentary evidence bearing upon the issue raised by defendant. In light of this and in fairness to the defendant, we direct the trial court to conduct a complete new hearing on defendant’s post-conviction petition and hereby reaffirm the orders of the opinion. ABRAHAMSON and SEIDENFELD, JJ., concur.