Court Opinion

ID: 9723604
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 10:22:49.696868+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:50.347503
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE COOK, dissenting: I dissent and would reduce defendant’s sentence to 30 years. Effective January 1, 2000, the legislature added a mandatory sentence enhancement to certain offenses if a firearm was used in the commission of the offense. 720 ILCS 5/33A — 1 (West 2000) (the “15/ 20/25-to-life” provisions). Defendant argued that his 45-year sentence for home invasion included an unconstitutional 15-year enhancement for use of a firearm during that offense. 720 ILCS 5/12 — 11(c) (West 2002). The State agreed that the 15-year sentence enhancement was unconstitutional but argued that defendant was sentenced under an entirely different statutory provision: “[bjefore defendant was sentenced the Illinois Supreme Court had struck down mandatory sentencing enhancements as unconstitutional, so the assistant [Sjtate’s [Attorney had a good reason not to request such an enhancement and the judge had a good reason not to impose one. People v. Moss, 206 Ill. 2d 503, 795 N.E.2d 208 (2003).” A great deal has transpired since the briefs were filed in this case. On October 6, 2005, the supreme court overruled Moss. “After much reflection, we have concluded that cross-comparison analysis has proved to be nothing but problematic and unworkable, and that it needs to be abandoned.” Sharpe, 216 Ill. 2d at 519. That same day the supreme court reversed a trial court that had found that section 12— 11(a)(3), the home-invasion statute, violated the proportionate-penalties clause under the Moss cross-comparison analysis. Guevara, 216 Ill. 2d at 544-45. “These arguments fail because a defendant may not challenge a penalty under the proportionate[-]penalties clause by comparing it with the penalty for an offense with different elements.” Guevara, 216 Ill. 2d at 545. The question now before us, which the parties were unable to address because of these developments since the filing of their briefs, is whether the mandatory 15-year enhancement was unconstitutional when defendant was sentenced. Defendant could not be sentenced under an unconstitutional statute. The fact that the supreme court later changed its mind is irrelevant. Was there a mandatory sentence enhancement in effect at the time defendant was sentenced? More broadly, is there a mandatory-sentence-enhancement statute in effect even after Sharpe and Guevara? If a defendant receives a mandatory sentence enhancement for armed robbery (720 ILCS 5/18 — 2 (West 2000)), specifically held to be unconstitutional in Moss, it would appear that the sentence cannot stand, despite the overruling of Moss. The supreme court has the power to declare a statute unconstitutional, rendering the statute null and void as though no such law had ever been passed. People v. Zeisler, 125 Ill. 2d 42, 46, 531 N.E.2d 24, 26 (1988). Once that has been done, the supreme court has no power to reenact the statute. It is the legislature that must make that decision. See Zeisler, 125 Ill. 2d at 48, 531 N.E.2d at 27. In the case before us, the question is whether Moss held the mandatory 15-year enhancement to the home-invasion statute invalid or whether the supreme court in Moss expressly limited its holding to the statutes before it, which did not include the home-invasion statute. The Second District concluded that Moss held the enhancement to the home-invasion statute invalid. “We find no such limiting language in the supreme court’s opinion, and, in any event, we see no reason that the rationale of Moss should not apply to the instant case.” Dryden, 349 Ill. App. 3d at 122, 811 N.E.2d at 309. On December 1, 2005, the supreme court directed the Second District to vacate its judgment and reconsider in light of Sharpe. People v. Dryden, 217 Ill. 2d 575 (2005) (nonprecedential supervisory order). The supreme court did not disagree that Moss had held the sentence enhancement invalid in home-invasion cases; the supreme court held only that Moss was overruled. Our court has held that the Moss court expressly limited its decision to sentence enhancements applied to convictions for (1) armed robbery, (2) aggravated kidnaping, and (3) aggravated hijacking. Standley, 359 Ill. App. 3d at 1106-07, 835 N.E.2d at 954. Although those were the offenses involved in Moss, the Moss decision seems to be a broad one, and I see no reason to conclude it was limited to those offenses. Standley also concluded that, even under the Moss test, the sentence enhancement to home invasion was appropriate, but no other decisions have agreed. “In sum, we have little difficulty concluding that shooting someone with a firearm is more serious than merely possessing a firearm, regardless of the circumstances under which the firearm is possessed.” Dryden, 349 Ill. App. 3d at 124, 811 N.E.2d at 310. In the unusual circumstances of this case, where the Supreme Court of Illinois had entered a final order declaring a mandatory sentence enhancement to be unconstitutional when defendant was sentenced, I conclude that defendant could not be sentenced to that mandatory enhancement, even though the supreme court later overruled its decision. Moss was the law until Sharpe was decided, more than a year after the April 9, 2004, sentencing in this case. I am also uncomfortable with the State’s changing positions on how the sentence may be supported. In the charging instrument, the State asked for a mandatory sentence enhancement under section 12 — 11(c). On appeal, the State abandoned that argument, conceding that section 12 — 11(c) was unconstitutional under Moss and arguing that defendant in fact was sentenced under another provision. Now that Moss has been overruled, the State (or more accurately, this court) takes a different position on how defendant was sentenced. Even assuming there was some question as to the extent of Moss, due process requires that sentencing provisions not be so vague that persons of common intelligence must necessarily guess at their meaning or application. People v. Hickman, 163 Ill. 2d 250, 256, 644 N.E.2d 1147, 1150 (1994). The State should not be allowed to sustain a sentence on the basis of events it had expressly denied occurred.