Court Opinion

ID: 9745169
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 22:39:54.283695+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:57.228358
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE GREEN, dissenting: I agree with the majority that "section 122 — 1 of the Act constitutes part of a comprehensive statutory scheme addressing postconviction attacks on convictions.” 292 111. App. 3d at 188. As far as the merits of such petitions are concerned, the clear scheme is that a party appearing pro se need only get over a threshold of presenting a petition that is not "frivolous or patently without merit” and presents the "gist” of a claim for relief. If that is done, the petitioner is entitled to counsel who can prepare a more sophisticated postconviction petition before a determination is made as to whether the petitioner is entitled to an evidentiary hearing. Thomas was a capital case where the death penalty had been imposed, the defendant had counsel, and the rule referred to by the majority in this case concerned the caliber of draft required under those circumstances. 292 Ill. App. 3d at 188, quoting Thomas, 164 Ill. 2d at 416, 697 N.E.2d at 987. Here, defendant’s motion was prepared and presented pro se. Following the scheme of postconviction attacks on convictions, the pro se defendant should be held to a lesser standard only in presenting his motion for late filing. The standard of Gaultney and Lemons would seem to be more nearly appropriate than that of Thomas. In any event, we should not hold a pro se petitioner moving to file a late postconviction petition to the language of a lawyer or even to that of an educated person. No word in a statute should be deemed meaningless. Collins v. Board of Trustees of the Firemen’s Annuity & Benefit Fund, 155 Ill. 2d 103, 111, 610 N.E.2d 1250, 1253 (1993); Harris v. Manor Healthcare Corp., 111 Ill. 2d 350, 362-63, 489 N.E.2d 1374, 1379 (1986). In using the word "culpable” as an antecedent to the word "negligence” in section 122 — 1 of the Act, the General Assembly must have intended to refer to a type of negligence that is quite severe. Three circumstances patent on the face of the record or set forth in defendant’s motion for late filing strongly negate any negligence on the part of defendant as being "culpable.” The first circumstance concerned a substantial shortening by the legislature of the time in which defendant had to bring his postconviction petition. This occurred on July 1, 1995, while defendant was incarcerated. At the time the supreme court denied defendant’s petition for leave to appeal on April 5, 1995, section 122 — 1 of the Act provided that, in counting the period for filing a postconviction petition, the method that set a "later” date controlled. 725 ILCS 5/122 — 1 (West 1992). Under that scheme, defendant had until April 26, 1996, to file his petition. He beat that deadline by filing on March 13, 1996. However, section 122 — 1 of the Act was subsequently amended to change the word "later” to the word "sooner” (725 ILCS 5/122 — 1 (West 1992) (amended by Pub. Act 88 — 678, § 15, eff. July 1, 1995 (1994 Ill. Laws 2712, 2732)), thus drastically changing the time frame in which defendant had to file because the six-month period of section 122 — 1 expired on October 5, 1995. I do not know when we can charge defendant with knowledge of the shortened time period he had to file, but we certainly cannot charge him with notice before that enactment took effect on July 1, 1995. As stated by the majority, defendant indicated in his motion, in unlawyerlike language, that six months before late September 1995 he sent trial transcripts to a Chicago attorney seeking her help, but she sent the documents back to him in late September 1995 telling him her firm had too much pro bono work to do to help him. As the period of six months before late September 1995 would have been late March 1995, at that time defendant had almost another year before filing was required. We cannot properly charge defendant with culpable negligence in doing nothing before late March 1995 to meet the deadline then almost a year away. Defendant also stated in his motion for late filing that he assumed the Chicago attorney was going to help him because she did not write back to say she could not. This may be unrealistic thinking, but we should not deem such an assumption to be culpable negligence. Notably, when that lawyer did write back in late September 1995, she in no way warned defendant that his deadline for filing was soon approaching. I conclude defendant’s motion fully indicated that any negligence on defendant’s part in not preparing and presenting a postconviction petition before late September 1995 was not "culpable.” According to defendant’s motion, after the letter from the Chicago attorney was written on September 23, 1995, the prison was free from "lockdown” for only 49 days before he filed his motion and petition on March 13, 1996, and none of those free days occurred in February or March 1996. Although the standard required of a pro se defendant seeking to advance his petition beyond the first stage is not very high, we have no assurance defendant knew that was so. Nothing in the letter from the Chicago attorney told defendant that drafting a pro se petition was something he could do. Moreover, such drafting is more difficult than writing a letter. In Lemons, this court stated: "The Act requires that the allegations in the petition for post-conviction relief be supported by affidavit, the record, or other evidence. (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1991, ch. 38, pars. 122 — 1,122—2.) However, the sole extent of defendant’s allegations regarding her coercion claim is that her trial counsel 'coerced defendant into accepting a fifteen[-]year sentence where the possibility existed that she could of [sic] received a lesser sentence if taken to trial.’ ” Lemons, 242 Ill. App. 3d at 945, 603 N.E.2d at 1237. Reasonable access but not unrestricted access of a prisoner to a law library has been held to be a constitutional right if the prisoner has no right to or opportunity for an attorney. Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817, 828, 52 L. Ed. 2d 72, 83, 97 S. Ct. 1491, 1498 (1977); People v. Banks, 161 Ill. 2d 119, 139-40, 641 N.E.2d 331, 341 (1994). One of the reasons for that rule must be that a close relationship exists between the availability of a library and the ability of a prisoner to draft pro se documents for initiating requests for postconviction relief. Moreover, many prisoners are unable to draft even simple documents seeking relief without the aid of more sophisticated prisoners referred to as "jailhouse lawyers.” Defendant’s documents here were apparently drafted by such a person or by defendant at his direction. The prison library offers a place where the prisoner and his "jailhouse” lawyer can meet and work in a way not available during a "lockdown.” Accordingly, I conclude that, with the evidence of the "lock-downs,” defendant made a sufficient showing that his failure to prepare a postconviction petition between late September 1995 and up to just before his filing on March 13, 1996, was not due to culpable negligence on his part. As I deem the defendant here made sufficient allegations to negate culpable negligence on his part, I dissent from the decision to affirm the circuit court’s summary denial of defendant’s motion for late filing. In a case that came before this court on appeal from denial of a motion to file a late postconviction petition, the circuit court had also tentatively ruled on the question of whether the postconviction petition was "frivolous or patently without merit.” Under those circumstances, if we should hold that the filing should be permitted, we could then pass on the question of whether the petition should be permitted to pass to the second stage of the statutory scheme. Under the holding of the majority, such a procedure would make no difference here, but had our decision been to reverse, multiple appeals might have been avoided. The circuit court’s ruling on both the motion for late filing and the merits of the postconviction petition should be encouraged.