Court Opinion

ID: 9528617
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:42:32.709073+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:27:07.517023
License: Public Domain

Mr. PRESIDING JUSTICE SMITH, specially concurring: I concur in the ultimate disposition of this case in the majority opinion, but not with its disposition of the theft count. The ownership of the property is alleged to be in Bachrach Clothing Store. It is a certainty that such ownership is in an individual, an association of individuals or a corporation. The store was not operated by a nonentity nor was the property taken owned by a nonentity. Ownership is thus alleged but imprecisely stated. As alleged, the legal entity is not precisely identified. People v. Hill cited in the majority opinion as authority uses as a springboard a 1910 decision holding that ownership must be alleged in a legal entity capable of owning property. In so holding it returns us as does the majority in this case to the overly technical unrealistic formalism of yester-years which the Code of Criminal Procedure was designed and expected to eliminate. People v. Reed, 33 Ill.2d 535, 213 N.E.2d 278; People v. Blanchett, 33 Ill.2d 527, 212 N.E.2d 97; People v. Petropoulos, 34 Ill.2d 179, 214 N.E.2d 765; People ex rel. Ledford v. Brantley, 46 Ill.2d 413, 263 N.E.2d 27, dissenting opinion. This indictment is nullified after judgment without previous utilization by the defendant of either a motion to quash or a bill of particulars. While the authorities cited by the majority support the conclusions reached, it is incomprehensible to me as to why it is essential that the defendant know precisely from whom he steals property, but it is not important to him to know precisely whom he defrauded. If adequate trial preparation is available in the one, it is likewise available in the other. If double jeopardy protects in the one, it likewise protects in the other. It seems to me that the law followed in the majority opinion blows hot and cold on the same fundamental issue. This, I submit, is neither necessary nor desirable in the proper and efficient administration of justice.