Court Opinion

ID: 9727679
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 13:47:18.275427+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:41.322197
License: Public Domain

PRESIDING JUSTICE SULLIVAN, dissenting: I respectfully dissent. In my judgment, the State proved by clear and convincing evidence that there was an independent basis for the eyewitnesses’ in-court identifications of defendant. In January 1983, defendant was arrested in his home without a warrant for a series of armed robberies of pharmacies on the northwest side of Chicago. On the day of his arrest, Ralph Herbst and Lester Jameson, who had been robbed at their pharmacies in March and May 1982, respectively, identified defendant in lineups.2 Defendant moved to quash his arrest and suppress the evidence derived therefrom. Following a pretrial hearing, the court granted defendant’s motion, whereupon it became incumbent upon the State to prove by clear and convincing evidence that there was an independent basis for the eyewitnesses’ in-court identifications. An in-court identification need not be suppressed as the fruit of an unlawful arrest when the witness’ independent recollections of an offender preceded the unlawful arrest and thus were untainted by a constitutional violation. (United States v. Crews (1980), 445 U.S. 463, 473, 63 L. Ed. 2d 537, 547, 100 S. Ct. 1244, 1251.) In ascertaining whether there is an independent origin for an in-court identification, a court should consider several factors, including: (1) the opportunity of the witness to view the offender at the time of the crime; (2) the witness’ degree of attention at that time; (3) the existence of any discrepancy between any pretrial description and the defendant’s actual appearance; (4) the lapse of time between the crime and the confrontations; (5) any identification of another person prior to the identification of the defendant; and (6) the failure to identify the defendant on a prior occasion. 445 U.S. at 473 n.18, 63 L. Ed. 2d at 547 n.18, 100 S. Ct. at 1251 n.18. Applying these factors to the evidence in the record, it appears that the in-court identifications of defendant by both armed robbery victims were properly admitted into evidence. First, each victim had an excellent opportunity to view the offender at close range for five minutes. Second, each eyewitness carefully observed the offender’s face during the robbery. Third, the descriptions that both victims provided to the police sufficiently conformed to the defendant’s actual appearance. Herbst described the offender with the shotgun as a white male, 30 to 35 years old, between 5 feet 9 inches and 5 feet 10 inches tall, weighing 170 to 180 pounds, with a blonde mustache, unusual cup-shaped ears and a drawn face. Herbst testified that in court defendant appeared to be 5 feet 8 inches tall, 170 to 180 pounds and slim. Jameson described the offender as a white male, 35 to 40 years old, approximately 5 feet 9 inches tall, weighing 160 pounds, with a light blonde mustache and a receding hairline. Jameson stated that in court defendant appeared to be “a little bit taller” than he, perhaps 5 feet 10 inches to 5 feet 11 inches tall, and that his mustache seemed to be heavier. The parties stipulated that defendant was 27 years old at the time of the robberies, and defendant testified that he was about 6 feet tall and weighed 153 pounds. Although the witnesses’ descriptions of the offender did not perfectly match defendant’s actual appearance, the discrepancies in their descriptions do not compel the conclusion that they lacked an independent basis for their in-court identifications. (See People v. Payne (1981), 102 Ill. App. 3d 950, 958, 429 N.E.2d 1344, affd in part and rev’d in part on other grounds (1983), 98 Ill. 2d 45, 456 N.E.2d 44 (where the descriptions of two offenders included discrepancies of four to eight years in age, two to four inches in height and 45 pounds in weight).) We note that because of his receding hairline defendant may have looked older than he was. Moreover, defendant may have weighed more in 1982 than when he was tried in 1984. Furthermore, both witnesses accurately described his blonde mustache and Herbst noticed his unusual cup-shaped ears and drawn face. In denying defendant’s motion to suppress the witnesses’ in-court identifications, the very able trial judge found that the descriptions of defendant were “very accurate” and contained only insignificant differences in age, height and weight. In finding defendant guilty, he stated that the witnesses’ identifications of the offender were “substantially identical” and closely corresponded to defendant’s appearance in court. However, in attempting to demonstrate that there was no independent basis for the in-court identifications of the defendant, the majority focuses on the fact that the prosecutor showed the lineup photographs to Herbst and Jameson “immediately before” trial. The opinion suggests that the photographs were shown to them after the court had granted defendant’s motion to quash and suppress. The record indicates otherwise. The witnesses viewed the lineup photographs “for a few seconds” on the morning of the day on which trial commenced, before defendant’s motion was heard and granted. There is nothing improper in the prosecutor’s reviewing this evidence at that time with his witnesses. I agree with the majority that the prosecutor should not have confirmed Lester Jameson’s identification of defendant’s lineup photographs prior to trial.3 Notwithstanding this conduct, which the trial court criticized, the trial court found that there was an independent basis for Jameson’s in-court identification of defendant. I believe that this finding is amply supported by the record. Fourth, while there was a substantial lapse of time between the commission of the crimes and the out-of-court identifications of defendant (10 months in the case of one robbery and lxk months in the other), similar intervals have not been deemed to be fatal to an in-court identification. See People v. Philson (1979), 71 Ill. App. 3d 513, 516-18, 389 N.E.2d 1223 (where there was a 14-month delay between the date of the crime and the date on which the eyewitnesses identified defendant in photographs of a lineup). Fifth and sixth, there is no evidence in this record that either victim identified any other person as the offender and neither victim failed to identify defendant on any prior occasion. From the foregoing, I agree with the trial court that the eyewitnesses’ in-court identifications of defendant were based upon their opportunity to observe the offender during the robberies and were not the result of exploiting defendant’s illegal arrest. The identifications were based upon circumstances sufficiently distinguishable from the arrest so as to be purged of any taint resulting therefrom. Accordingly, I dissent from the decision to remand this cause for a new trial. I concur, however, in the majority’s finding that defendant was proved guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.  Although the majority opinion correctly notes that there was no testimony that either witness identified defendant in a lineup, an examination of the excerpts from the record appended to that opinion leaves no doubt that they did. Investigator Schalk testified that defendant was charged with the pharmacy robberies after he was viewed in lineups held on January 14, 1983, the date of his arrest. In his motion for a new trial, defendant stated that “[he] was placed in numerous line-ups and was identified by the only two (2) witnesses the prosecution relied upon to obtain the conviction in the above case.” Those two witnesses were Ralph Herbst and Lester Jame-son. The majority’s refusal to acknowledge the obvious, that the witnesses had to have identified defendant before trial, is inexplicable. Why would defense counsel move to quash defendant’s arrest, including lineup identifications, unless such identifications had been made?   It is noted that there was no such confirmation of Herbst’s identification.