Court Opinion

ID: 9522246
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:20:45.334773+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:02:26.578656
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE GREEN, specially concurring: I concur in the decision to affirm. I disagree with the holding of the majority that the trial court properly refused to give the accomplice instruction. Lindsey admitted that he participated in a transaction whereby defendant sold him a truck for $5,700 which he then sold to the district, without looking at the truck, for $5,800. He admitted that he knew defendant wished to conceal the fact that the vehicle had belonged to him. Before making a purchase of equipment of a price in excess of $5,000 for the district, defendant was required to take bids. (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1981, ch. 121, par. 6 — 201.7.) For defendant to knowingly do this was official misconduct. (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1981, ch. 38, par. 33 — 3.) For Lindsey to aid or abet defendant in committing the offense with the intent that the offense be committed would make Lindsey guilty as an accomplice. Ill. Rev. Stat. 1981, ch. 38, par. 5 — 2(c). The majority concludes that Lindsey’s statement did not provide a sufficient proof of Lindsey’s mental state to require the instruction, citing Ware. That case concerns the sufficiency of proof of mental state to convict on an accountability theory when all of the evidence is circumstantial. Here the proof need only show probable cause. The circumstantial evidence that (1) Lindsey knew that defendant was asking for his participation in order to conceal the true nature of the transaction, and (2) Lindsey proceeded with the transaction without examining the vehicle to see if the transaction was bona fide creates a sufficiently strong inference of the necessary mental state to make a showing of probable cause. Because of the strength of the other evidence of defendant’s guilt and the flimsy nature of the explanation given by defendant, I consider the evidence of defendant’s guilt to be overwhelming without Lindsey’s testimony. Therefore, the refusal to give the accomplice instruction was harmless error. The affirmance was correct.