Court Opinion

ID: 9726884
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 13:11:24.368892+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:31.748642
License: Public Domain

PRESIDING JUSTICE KARNS, dissenting: I agree with the trial court’s assessment of counsel’s representation of defendant at trial. Under our decision in People v. Scott (1981), 94 Ill. App. 3d 159, 418 N.E.2d 805, performance of retained counsel is to be judged by the same standard as appointed counsel, a standard required, we felt, under the Supreme Court’s decision in Cuyler v. Sullivan (1980), 446 U.S. 335, 64 L. Ed. 2d 333, 100 S. Ct. 1708. It seems to me that the trial court was in a better position to assess counsel’s performance. (People v. Callaham (1978), 60 Ill. App. 3d 1020, 1026, 377 N.E.2d 171, 177.) The majority opinion has detailed those shortcomings and they need not be repeated here. I am also troubled by the manner in which this case was presented to the jury by the prosecution. It has been often stated that a defendant is not entitled to a perfect trial. He is, however, entitled to a fair trial conducted in accordance with the basic rules of criminal procedure, and the prosecution has a duty to present its case in accordance with these rules regardless of the performance of defense counsel and his failure to object to the introduction of incompetent and highly prejudicial evidence. This is particularly true here where defendant was tried with Young, who was tried in absentia, quite possibly improperly, and where the evidence of Young’s guilt was overwhelming. I do not consider the evidence of defendant’s guilt so overwhelming as to pass these matters off as harmless error. Debbie Clinton, who the jury was improperly told had pleaded guilty to a related charge after the prosecution had improperly asked defendant on cross-examination if he planned to call her as a witness, was allowed to plead guilty to a reduced charge of possession and sentenced to a 30 months’ probation. Properly tried, defendant might well have been convicted of an offense which permitted probation as a possible penalty. Here the prosecution introduced evidence in its case in chief which tended to show that defendant had committed several distinct and unrelated crimes. This evidence may have become competent in rebuttal as tending to prove defendant’s propensity to commit the crime charged if defendant later interposed the defense of entrapment (People v. Price (1974), 17 Ill. App. 3d 911, 309 N.E.2d 56); however, defendant may not have done so. He may have defended solely on his lack of accountability for Young’s conduct in arranging and selling the cocaine. The record is replete with improper leading questions and the admission of improper hearsay evidence, which the prosecution witnesses recounted in narrative fashion. Several of these instances involved conversations between the prosecution witnesses and Young and Clinton when it was never established that defendant was present. The witnesses were asked questions which allowed them to give their impression as to defendant’s guilt. One other matter must be noted. I consider it highly improper for a trained police officer, assigned to a special narcotics enforcement group, to respond to a question requiring only a yes or no answer, that he was advised by other agents that defendant was involved in other narcotics transactions “which we have not discussed.” Nothing defense counsel could have done could have removed the damaging effect of such improper testimony.