Court Opinion

ID: 9733003
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 16:49:25.015601+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:37.331582
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE FREEMAN, concurring: I concur in the court’s decision. I write separately only to express my reason for no longer adhering to the rationale of the dissent which I authored in People v. Mitchell, 189 Ill. 2d 312, 362 (2000) (Freeman, J., dissenting, joined by Harrison, C.J., and McMorrow, J.). In the wake of Mitchell, this court issued a series of opinions in which the law as set forth in Mitchell was applied. See People v. Moore, 189 Ill. 2d 521 (2000); People v. Jones, 191 Ill. 2d 194 (2000); People v. Holman, 191 Ill. 2d 204 (2000); People v. Jones, 191 Ill. 2d 354 (2000). I dissented in these cases, not only because I disagreed. with Mitchell, but because I believed that the court unfairly denied those defendants the opportunity to re-brief the matter in light of the new principles set forth in Mitchell. Notwithstanding my dissents, our psychotropic drug jurisprudence remains the same today as it was on the day Mitchell was announced. The present case necessitates this court to once again revisit the area of psychotropic drugs. The conclusion reached today is consistent with Mitchell and all of the aforementioned decisions which postdated Mitchell. Those of us who, in the past, have disagreed with that conclusion have voiced our dissent. I, having done so, now believe that it is my obligation to accept the law as pronounced by the court. In my dissent in Mitchell, I emphasized the need for the consistent application of legal principles and rules in similar cases: “The law of this court cannot be seen by the bar and the public to be one that is constantly ‘in flux,’ changing from opinion to opinion, particularly in capital cases.” Mitchell, 189 Ill. 2d at 395 (Freeman, J., dissenting, joined by Harrison, C.J., and McMorrow, J.). A year has passed since the announcement of Mitchell. During that time, the law announced in Mitchell has not changed. The only change that has occurred is that three members of the court who joined in the majority have left, and three new justices have taken their place. In light of this fact, I believe that my continued opposition in this area does little good and goes against the very principles of stare decisis that I cited in my original dissent. Not one circumstance has changed in our psychotropic drug jurisprudence since the court announced Mitchell, except for the fact of the above-noted change in court personnel. As I noted in my dissent in Mitchell, “this type of ‘circumstance’ does not rise to the level necessary to overturn the doctrine of stare decisis.” Mitchell, 189 Ill. 2d at 398 (Freeman, J., dissenting, joined by Harrison, C.J., and McMorrow, J.). In this situation, I believe that the words of Justice Ryan, quoted in my dissent in Mitchell, are particularly apt: “ ‘[i]f the law were to change with each change in the makeup of the court, then the concept that ours is a government of law and not of men would be nothing more than a pious cliche.’ ” Mitchell, 189 Ill. 2d at 366 (Freeman, J., dissenting, joined by Harrison, C.J., and McMorrow J.), quoting People v. Lewis, 88 Ill. 2d 129, 167 (1981) (Ryan, J, concurring). For this reason, although I authored the dissent in Mitchell, I concur in the opinion and judgment of the court in this case.