Court Opinion

ID: 9860500
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 23:23:41.405674+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:15:59.832618
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE BOWMAN, dissenting: I respectfully dissent. In a criminal case, the State must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the crime was perpetrated by the person accused. (People v. Urbana (1959), 18 Ill. 2d 81, 85.) Mere probabilities will not support a conviction. (People v. Jackson (1961), 23 Ill. 2d 360, 365.) Suspicious circumstances are not enough to exclude doubt. (People v. Sustak (1958), 15 Ill. 2d 115, 122.) Suspicious circumstances, although of probative value, cannot substitute for proof sufficient to support a conviction. In re Whittenburg (1976), 37 Ill. App. 3d 793, 795. After reviewing all of the evidence in a light most favorable to the prosecution (see People v. Hendricks (1990), 137 Ill. 2d 31, 62), I do not believe any rational trier of fact could find beyond a reasonable doubt that Nancy Smith was the person who set fire to the Kopy Kat restaurant. For purposes of analysis, I assume that the fire was caused, as shown by the State’s evidence, by someone igniting a flammable petroleum product poured over the length of the kitchen floor. As the majority points out, the evidence of defendant’s guilt is entirely circumstantial. Out of all the evidence, the majority focuses almost exclusively on the facts that defendant was the last person seen leaving the restaurant and the fire of incendiary origin was first observed shortly thereafter. However, mere presence at the scene of a crime is insufficient to establish guilt. (People v. Boyd (1959), 17 Ill. 2d 321, 327.) Although the evidence may have established a strong suspicion that defendant was somehow involved because she was near the scene of the crime, “ ‘suspicions and probabilities are not enough to convict.’ ” (People v. Mason (1991), 211 Ill. App. 3d 787, 790, quoting People v. Johnson (1976), 43 Ill. App. 3d 428, 431.) I believe it is necessary to examine the facts, as disclosed by the evidence, in their entirety. The undisputed evidence reveals that defendant was employed by the Kopy Kat restaurant as head waitress. On the evening of the fire, defendant and the two owners of the restaurant were catering a party in Ghana, Illinois, a distance of approximately 10 miles from the restaurant. The owners remained at the party in Ghana until midnight. Sometime prior to midnight, defendant left the party in Ghana and drove her car to the Kopy Kat, arriving there either shortly before or shortly after the restaurant’s 11 p.m. closing time. She parked her car in front of the restaurant, which is located on a main business thoroughfare. A Shell gas station is located across the street. Other businesses nearby include a lawyer’s office, a bank, and a late-night bar. The entire area is well lighted. On entering the restaurant, defendant proceeded to cash out the register. At closing, usually one of the owners cashed out the register, although defendant had previously done so in the owners’ absence. Defendant talked to some of the employees and cleaned off a dining table. The last person to see defendant inside the restaurant before the fire was Aimee Manis. One of the first persons to see defendant outside the restaurant before anyone noticed the fire was also Aimee Manis. Aimee was the State’s polestar witness for testimony which tended to establish that defendant probably started the fire. Aimee testified that she is age 18 and at the time of the fire had been employed as a Kopy Kat waitress for one month. On the day of the fire, she worked a 3 to 8 p.m. schedule. Other persons working that day were Mary Jergens, the waitress; Jody Harvey, the dishwasher; and Michael LaRush, the cook. After finishing her work shift, Aimee left the restaurant at 9:30 p.m. to drive around town with Judy Pontnack, a friend. Aimee and Judy returned to the restaurant at 10:30 p.m. to visit with Mary Jergens and other employees. Defendant arrived about 11:05 p.m. and parked her car directly in front of the restaurant. Mary Jergens had left the restaurant before defendant arrived, but Aimee did not see Mike or Judy leave. After leaving the restaurant, Aimee walked a distance of approximately one block and sat on a park bench. From there she saw Mike LaRush drive his car into the Shell station across the street from the restaurant. She then saw Jody Harvey directly across the street from her walking in a direction away from the restaurant. Aimee left the bench, walked to the Shell station, and used the pay phone to call her boyfriend at his place of employment. To get to the Shell station she had to cross the street in front of the restaurant. The only light on inside the restaurant was in the cooking area. She saw Nancy Smith standing near the light. Defendant’s car was parked in front of the restaurant. Aimee talked on the phone for four minutes and then walked back across the street towards the restaurant, passing within two to three feet of its large, dark picture windows. The time was 11:20 p.m. She did not recall if any lights were on. She saw no smoke or fire. Defendant’s car was still parked in front. Aimee continued walking to the corner which was one block away. While waiting for the traffic signal to change, she observed defendant, Nancy Smith, in her car, which was stopped and partially into a right-hand turn at the intersection, approximately three to four feet from Aimee. The car’s dome light was on and defendant was “messing with something on the seat in front of her.” Aimee did not know what Nancy was doing, but her car was stopped while the traffic light in front of her was green. Aimee stated that Nancy saw her standing at the corner. Aimee did not wave at Nancy nor did Nancy wave at Aimee. This was not unusual to Aimee. In an earlier statement to investigators, Aimee stated that defendant never waved at her and defendant did not like her too well. Aimee’s testimony was impeached with interview statements she made to investigators shortly after the fire. In these statements Aimee stated that Mary left the restaurant at 11:10 and the remaining customers left between 11:15 and 11:20. Aimee left the restaurant as soon as defendant entered and started counting money in the cash register. She saw Judy leave the restaurant by the front door after she, Aimee, left the Shell station and was walking back towards the restaurant. She did not see defendant inside the restaurant then. The time was 11:20. With regard to the lights inside the restaurant, she did not know if the lights were kept on after closing. When she first walked by the restaurant, she saw defendant walking near the waitress station which leads to the kitchen and hallway back to the coolers. A friend called her at 12:30 a.m. and told her the Kopy Kat had burned down. Aimee stated that she was not a friend of defendant and that defendant was not nice to her. Tom Miller, chief of police of the City of Oregon, testified that at 11 p.m. on the night of the fire he was working surveillance of the Shell gas station and was seated in his car approximately one block away where he had a view of the front of the Kopy Kat restaurant. The business area near the restaurant is extremely well lighted. At approximately 11:15 p.m., for a total of three minutes, he watched as Mike LaRush came out the front door of the restaurant, ran to his car, which was parked down around the corner, talked to a passerby, and drove off. Miller changed surveillance locations at 11:17 or 11:18 by moving his car one-half block away. He did not see anyone else leave the restaurant. At approximately 11:20, Miller chased a speeding car. Approximately five or six minutes later, while driving back to the area of the restaurant, he observed smoke and saw the roof of the Kopy Kat’s back kitchen area in flames. He called to report the fire about 11:30 or 11:31. The time of Miller’s call was confirmed by testimony of the police radio operator who received and made a record of Miller’s call. Miller estimated 14 or 15 minutes passed from the time he saw LaRush leave the restaurant until he reported the fire. Miller could not say if defendant’s car was parked in front of the restaurant during his surveillance, but that a number of cars were parked up and down the street in front of the restaurant at that time. Mike LaRush testified that he worked..from 5 p.m. until closing as a cook and helper. Just before closing, he swept and mopped the kitchen floor. Nancy Smith arrived just before closing and helped Aimee close out the register. He had seen Nancy close out the register on prior occasions. One of his duties was to turn off all the appliances in the kitchen and dishwashing room behind the kitchen and check that the back doors were closed. He did not remember if he checked that the doors were locked that night. The night of the fire, he had a “funny feeling” because the owners, or Grandma, another employee, who usually double check that the appliances were turned off, were not there that evening. He left the restaurant shortly after 11 p.m. Mary Jergens, a Kopy Kat waitress, testified that on the night of the fire she departed the restaurant at 10:55 or 11 p.m. with her boyfriend. Earlier, about 9 or 10 p.m., she noticed an odor of burnt rubber or something hot in the area of the kitchen. Mary inquired of other employees if they smelled the burning odor, but they did not. Mary could not recall seeing defendant in the restaurant that evening. Kopy Kat employee Jody Harvey testified that defendant entered the restaurant prior to 11 p.m. Her car was parked in front of the restaurant. There were two customers inside as Nancy checked out the register. Jody talked to defendant and made the following observations. She appeared to have been drinking but was not intoxicated. Otherwise, she appeared normal. While defendant was checking out the register, Jody made sure the back door was locked. He locked one of the three doors and made sure the lights were off. Only defendant and Judy Pontnack were in the restaurant at the time he left. It took him two minutes to walk to his nearby home. While walking home, he observed defendant drive by in the direction of Ghana, Illinois. Twenty or thirty minutes after leaving the restaurant, he heard fire engines and observed fire in the vicinity of the Kopy Kat restaurant. Judy Pontnack testified that, on the night of the fire, she was with her friend Aimee and was having dinner at the Kopy Kat. She observed defendant enter the restaurant about closing time and proceed to check out the cash register and clean off a table. Aimee and Judy were present when defendant arrived and Mike LaRush was just leaving the restaurant. Aimee and Jody left and only Judy and defendant remained. Judy left at 11:08 p.m. Defendant’s car was then parked in front of the restaurant. Judy arrived home at 11:10 p.m. She recalls looking at a clock when she entered the house. Ten minutes after arriving home, she smelled smoke and heard sirens. The police department dispatcher testified that a business routine punch card indicated that the Kopy Kat restaurant fire was reported at 11:31 p.m. and the fire department was notified at 11:32 p.m. The owner of the roller rink where Aimee’s boyfriend worked testified that at 11:10 p.m. Aimee telephoned the business establishment and asked to speak to her boyfriend. To support a guilty verdict, a rational person would have to totally ignore a number of realities of life and inferences arising from the uncontroverted evidentiary facts. First of all, arson is ordinarily a crime of stealth, i.e., an act of proceeding furtively, secretly, or imperceptibly. In light of all the evidence, not only is the element of stealth totally lacking, but the opposite is reflected. The prosecution’s evidentiary theory as to the cause of the fire was that the person who started the fire did so by pouring a petroleum liquid over the length of the kitchen floor and then setting it afire. Any such incendiary fire would be immediately visible through the large front picture windows of the restaurant to any person walking or driving by. This is particularly true if one accepts the majority’s factual premise that the inside of the restaurant was dark when Aimee walked past after leaving the Shell station. The rational person would also have to believe that, after pouring the flammable liquid on the floor and igniting it or arranging to ignite it, defendant left the restaurant; entered her car, which was parked in front in a well-lighted and well-travelled area; and drove away, only to stop her car in an intersection approximately a block away, a few feet from Aimee, a co-worker at the restaurant. Finally, a rational person would have to believe that the defendant was willing, for some unexplained reason, to eliminate her own job, as a result of burning down the restaurant. Although the State is not required to prove a motive to support a guilty verdict, the rational fact finder would have to ignore the total absence of any conceivable motive defendant would have to start the fire. The presence or absence of motive is important and probative in circumstantial evidence criminal prosecutions. People v. Hendricks (1986), 145 Ill. App. 3d 71, 104, rev’d on other grounds (1990), 137 Ill. 2d 31. The majority notes that the close time frame between defendant’s presence at the restaurant and the start of the fire dispels concern that some interloper gained access and started the fire. Dispelling concern does not relieve the State of its responsibility to prove that Nancy Smith, and no other person, started the fire. If a conviction is to be sustained, it must rest on the strength of the State’s case and not on the weakness of the defendant’s. People v. Lewis (1968), 97 Ill. App. 2d 255, 261. The majority notes that the case before us is similar to that of People v. Hanes (1990), 204 Ill. App. 3d 35. I disagree. In Hanes, the defendant had a motive. He was physically handicapped and wanted his girlfriend to take care of him. After living with him for six years, the girlfriend broke up with defendant against his wishes. Plus, there was additional incriminating evidence in Hanes. One week before her apartment was set on fire, defendant told his former girlfriend he was going to get even with her. On the night of the fire, defendant was observed in the immediate area of the apartment. He had possession of a radio which the evidence showed had been taken from the girlfriend’s apartment the day of the fire, although defendant had no consent to enter the apartment or to take the radio. He also made admissions, telling the police, “I fucked up again and I’m going to go to jail for a long time this time,” and telling a friend shortly after the fire that “it’s burning up” as he tried to sell the radio. Hanes, 204 Ill. App. 3d at 37-38. Although the evidence here may have established a strong suspicion that Nancy Smith was somehow involved in the fire because she was near the scene of the crime shortly before it occurred, “ ‘suspicions and probabilities are not enough to convict.’ ” (People v. Mason (1991), 211 Ill. App. 3d 787, 790, quoting Johnson, 43 Ill. App. 3d at 431.) A conviction will not be set aside unless the evidence is so unsatisfactory as to justify a reasonable doubt of defendant’s guilt. (People v. Sutherland (1992), 155 Ill. 2d 1, 17; People v. Campbell (1992), 146 Ill. 2d 363, 375.) I find that the totality of the evidence in the record before us, even when viewed in a light most favorable to the State, fails to reach that level of satisfaction necessary to allow the conclusion that defendant was proved guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. The decision of the majority emasculates any commonsense meaning of our constitutionally enshrined phrase “proof beyond a reasonable doubt.” To twist the facts before us into the definition of “proof beyond a reasonable doubt” is to hurl a barbed spear into the beating heart of a definition which for so long in our history has protected the innocent against the awesome powers of the State to charge and convict its citizens of crimes. Accordingly, I would reverse the finding of the trial court which sustained the jury’s verdict.