Court Opinion

ID: 9718155
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:17:54.202486+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:57.655451
License: Public Domain

Supplemental Opinion on Denial of Petition for Rehearing. The nature of the Petition for Rehearing suggests the propriety of further comment. The jury was strongly and adequately instructed by the trial court upon the presumption of innocence, the prosecution’s burden of proof, that the jury should not single out any particular instruction to the exclusion of others, and that in the giving of any instruction the court was not indicating any opinion as to the facts or the innocence or guilt of the defendant. Indeed in one instruction, the court used the phrase “if any such offense was committed.” We further note that defendant’s given Instruction No. 15 contained the language “that the defendant was not in the place where the crime was committed, but elsewhere.” Defendant’s given Instruction No. 13 contains the language “you have a reasonable doubt that the defendant was present at the scene of the crime and participating in the same when the crime was committed.” Two other instructions tendered by the defendant used like or similar language in reference to the crime and were refused by the trial court. If the seeds of misunderstanding on the part of the jury was engendered by People’s Instruction No. 11, it seems abundantly clear that they were fertilized by the defendant’s tendered instructions, given instructions and theory of defense. “He was then satisfied that the error alleged was not substantial and did not prejudice his case before the jury. . . .” People v. Keagle, 7 Ill2d 408, 414, 131 NE2d 74, 78.