Court Opinion

ID: 9739533
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 20:17:06.313699+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:12.854905
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE CLARK, dissenting: I must respectfully dissent because I believe that the trial court judge’s failure to recuse himself from this case violated defendant’s right to be tried and sentenced by an impartial adjudicator as provided by the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment to the United States Constitution. The majority’s decision that the trial court judge’s failure to recuse himself did not violate due process is based upon the court’s conclusion that the judge (1) “had no pecuniary interest in the matter” (129 Ill. 2d at 275), and (2) did not make any rulings which indicated that he was biased or prejudiced toward defendant (129 Ill. 2d at 276). However, as I will explain, the majority’s narrow analysis of defendant’s claim does not comport with the standards established by the United States Supreme Court for assessing whether a judge’s participation in a case violated the Federal constitutional right to due process of law. The Supreme Court has made clear that due process is violated where a judge “has a direct, personal, substantial pecuniary interest” in the case before him. (See Tumey v. Ohio (1927), 273 U.S. 510, 523, 71 L. Ed. 749, 754, 47 S. Ct. 437, 441.) However, as the majority recognizes, the Supreme Court has never indicated that such a situation is the only one which would require recusal. (See 129 Ill. 2d at 276-77.) Rather, the Supreme Court has repeatedly stated that due process requires recusal in situations where hearing the case “would offer a possible temptation to the average *** judge to *** lead him not to hold the balance nice, clear and true.” (Tumey, 273 U.S. at 532, 71 L. Ed. at 758, 47 S. Ct. at 444, quoted in Aetna Life Insurance Co. v. Lavoie (1986), 475 U.S. 813, 825, 89 L. Ed. 2d 823, 835, 106 S. Ct. 1580, 1587, and Ward v. Village of Monroeville (1972), 409 U.S. 57, 60, 34 L. Ed. 2d 267, 271, 93 S. Ct. 80, 83.) Furthermore, under the due process clause a judge must recuse himself from hearing a case not only where he is actually prejudiced, but also where his hearing the case would create even the appearance of partiality. As the Court recently explained: “The Due Process Clause ‘may sometimes bar trial by judges who have no actual bias and who would do their very best to weigh the scales of justice equally between contending parties. But to perform its high function in the best way, “justice must satisfy the appearance of justice.” ’ [In re] Murchison [(1955), 349 U.S. 133, 136, 99 L. Ed. 942, 946, 75 S. Ct. 623, 625].” Aetna Life Insurance Co., 475 U.S. at 825, 89 L. Ed. 2d at 835, 106 S. Ct. at 1587. As is apparent from the language of these Supreme Court decisions, the majority’s due process analysis should not have ended after the majority concluded that the trial court neither had a pecuniary interest in the case nor made erroneous rulings prejudicial to defendant. Instead, the court must then go on to decide whether the trial court judge’s participation in the case created the appearance of partiality. The majority’s reluctance to fully analyze defendant’s claim is apparently based upon the majority’s statement that “[Recently, the Supreme Court recognized that only under the most extreme cases would disqualification on the basis of bias or prejudice be constitutionally required.” (Emphasis added.) (129 Ill. 2d at 275.) The problem with this statement, however, is that the Supreme Court has never made such a broad recognition. Rather, what the Supreme Court stated in Aetna Life Insurance Co. is that: “We need not decide whether allegations of bias or prejudice by a judge of the type we have here would ever be sufficient under the Due Process Clause to force recusal. Certainly only in the most extreme of cases would disqualification on this basis be constitutionally required.” (Emphasis added.) (Aetna Life Insurance Co., 475 U.S. at 821, 89 L. Ed. 2d at 832, 106 S. Ct. at 1585.) The allegations being referred to by the Court in Aetna were that the judge in that case should have recused himself because he had a “general hostility towards insurance companies that were dilatory in paying claims.” (Aetna Life Insurance Co., 475 U.S. at 820, 89 L. Ed. 2d at 831, 106 S. Ct. at 1584.) The Court concluded that “allegations of bias and prejudice on this general basis, however, are insufficient to establish any constitutional violation.” (Emphasis added.) (Aetna Life Insurance Co., 475 U.S. at 821, 89 L. Ed. 2d at 832, 106 S. Ct. at 1585.) Thus, what the Supreme Court recognized was that only in rare instances would a judge be required to recuse himself because he may have a general bias which could be prejudicial to a defendant; not, as the majority believes, that the Constitution only requires recusal on the basis of bias or prejudice in “the most extreme cases.” Defendant’s allegations of bias in this case are not of the general type disparaged by the Court in Aetna. Rather, as is set forth in the majority’s opinion, defendant alleges that the trial court judge participated in the prosecution of a 1965 case in which defendant was convicted of murder. In that 1965 case, defendant, while under interrogation by a police officer and an assistant State’s Attorney, confessed that he committed the crime. The trial court judge in the present case was, at that time, chief of the Cook County State’s Attorney’s criminal division. He was also a supervisor of the assistant State’s Attorney who had taken defendant’s confession. As the assistant State’s Attorney’s supervisor, the trial court judge probably received a copy of the assistant State’s Attorney’s written report of the interrogation, investigation and confession of defendant. The trial court judge, in his former role, also agreed to expedite the indictment of defendant so that defendant, who was 16 years old at the time of the 1965 murder, could be sentenced as a youth rather than as an adult. Defendant’s 1965 confession and murder conviction both played important roles in the 1979 trial and sentencing hearing. To prevent the confession from being used to impeach defendant’s testimony and rebut his possible insanity defense, defendant moved to suppress the confession because it had been involuntary, Mirandaviolative, and the product of fourth amendment violations. For the same reasons, defendant moved that evidence of his 1965 confession and conviction not be admitted into his sentencing hearing. The trial court judge, however, did not grant either motion. While it may be true, as the majority states, that the trial court judge’s rulings on these motions were correct, or that defendant waived any argument that they were erroneous (129 Ill. 2d at 276, 293), such conclusions are not particularly relevant to the issue of whether the trial court judge’s participation in the case presented the appearance of partiality (see Aetna Life Insurance Co., 475 U.S. at 825, 89 L. Ed. 2d at 835, 106 S. Ct. at 1587; In re Murchison, 349 U.S. at 136, 99 L. Ed. at 946, 75 S. Ct. at 625). Instead, the relevant inquiry must be whether the trial court judge’s participation in defendant’s 1965 case could possibly “ ‘ “lead him not to hold the balance nice, clear and true.” ’ ” (Aetna Life Insurance Co., 475 U.S. at 825, 89 L. Ed. 2d at 835, 106 S. Ct. at 1587, quoting Ward, 409 U.S. at 60, 34 L. Ed. 2d at 271, 93 S. Ct. at 83; see also Taylor v. Hayes (1974), 418 U.S. 488, 501, 41 L. Ed. 2d 897, 909, 94 S. Ct. 2697, 2704.) In light of these principles, I conclude that the trial court judge should have recused himself from the case. My conclusion is based upon two factors. The first is that the trial court judge was a supervisor of the assistant State’s Attorney who had obtained the 1965 confession. As a supervisor, it is likely that in 1965 he received a copy of the report prepared by the assistant State’s Attorney describing the interrogation, investigation and confession of defendant. Even if, as supervisor, he had never seen the report, in these circumstances there is at least the appearance that the trial court judge would not be able to make an impartial decision regarding defendant’s motions to suppress the confession since the trial court judge (then chief of the State’s Attorney’s criminal division) supervised the assistant State’s Attorney who had actually procured the confession. The second factor which leads me to conclude that the trial court judge should have recused himself is that he is the one who in 1965 ultimately decided to expedite the indictment which allowed defendant to be sentenced as a juvenile rather than as an adult. This decision, as the majority notes, possibly allowed defendant to be released from prison earlier than if he had been sentenced as an adult, “and as a result of this early release he was able to perform the subsequent crimes.” (129 Ill. 2d at 274.) Although it may be, as the majority characterizes it, “speculatponj” (129 Ill. 2d at 273), it is not too far fetched to believe that the trial court judge may have regretted his 1965 decision to expedite the indictment. Nor is it far fetched to think that this regret would “offer a possible temptation” to the trial court judge to “not hold the balance nice, clear and true” at either the trial or the sentencing hearing. Though we need not determine whether or not this in fact happened, the mere potential is enough to require recusal. The majority attempts to bolster its conclusion that defendant’s due process rights were not violated by noting that defendant: “was tried before a jury and that he had a jury sentencing hearing. The jury made the findings that [defendant] was death-eligible and the jury determined that the aggravating factors making defendant eligible for the death sentence were present and that there were no mitigating factors sufficient to preclude the imposition of the death penalty. The judge had virtually no role in these decisions.” (129 Ill. 2d at 274.) As I read this statement, its implication is that even if the trial court judge had been prejudiced, his prejudice had no impact upon defendant’s conviction since it was the jury that made all of the factual determinations in the case. Such an assertion, however, is simply not true. Of course the jury made the factual determinations. However, the jury had to make these determinations based upon the evidence which the judge allowed into the case. Thus, the trial court judge, through his rulings as to the admissibility of defendant’s 1965 confession and conviction, certainly played a major role in the jury’s decisions. Likewise, any bias that possibly influenced the trial court judge in making these evidentiary rulings would also have influenced the jury’s decisions. The majority’s rather cursory review of defendant’s due process claim is particularly disturbing in this case since defendant’s life quite literally hangs in the balance. Where a judge has a possible bias or prejudice which could throw off this balance, the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment to the United States Constitution requires that he recuse himself. Because I believe that the trial court judge’s participation in the case presented the appearance of partiality, I would reverse and remand for a new trial and therefore respectfully dissent.