Court Opinion

ID: 9527880
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 03:35:18.638284+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:26:15.566949
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE JONES, dissenting: In true Horatio Alger fashion, the plaintiff has left his home — and his peers — to seek his fortune elsewhere. With gossamer threads of justification, the majority has draped about the necks of the citizens and taxpayers of Madison County yet another case that has no connection whatsoever with Madison County. In my judgment the people of Madison County are being ill-used by the very judicial system that was designed to serve them. They must now shoulder the burden for this case with which they have no concern or interest whatsoever. More importantly, their own cases must languish markedly, untried and untended, while cases such as this one shoulder theirs aside'. The plaintiff in this case is not a mere vagabond litigant who wanders about willy-nilly, wavering in indecision between this jurisdiction or that. Rather he has taken in deliberate fashion what has become a well-worn path carved by plaintiffs en route to filing their cases in Madison County. As with most of the alien cases filed in Madison County, it appears that the “factors favoring the plaintiff” were generated after, or at least in contemplation of, the filing of the case in that county. The majority devotes considerable effort to the comparison of distances involved in the travel of witnesses and parties to the possible trial sites and concludes, in effect, that, as long as you are in your car and traveling, it is little burden to go the extra distance that would be involved in traveling to the plaintiff’s chosen place of trial. To give credence to its result, the majority sets forth in a table the relative time-lapse-to-trial figures for the three counties involved for the year 1983. However, close examination of the figures contained in the statistical report of the Administrative Office for that and subsequent years reveals the comparison to be meaningless and irrelevant to the issue of court congestion. A more complete table yields a far greater insight: [[Image here]] The 1984 Annual Report of the Administrative Office of Illinois Courts has now been published. Although the statistics for the year 1985 are not yet published, they are a part of the records and reports of the Court Administrative Office and are available upon inquiry. Because of the very small number of cases tried in Franklin and Marion counties for the years in question, the creation of an average time-lapse for the time-to-trial for law jury cases produces only an aberration, not a figure that is meaningful for determining the extent of court congestion. The trial load in Franklin and Marion counties is such that any attorney wanting his case tried could have it tried by so moving. There is no wait to be attributable to congestion. It is thus seen that any comparison of the “delay” in the three counties is meaningless. Only in Madison County is the delay to be attributed to court docket congestion. The figures of 37.2 months for 1983, 35.2 months for 1984 and 37.8 months for 1985 reflect genuine delay that results from congestion. The result here is the more unfortunate because the litigation over forum non conveniens issues do not reach, or even touch upon, the merits of the case. It is merely litigation regarding the place where the litigation will occur. It is a great waste of time, money, and judicial and court resources. If this were an isolated case, it would not be an affront to any part of the court system. Unfortunately, it is anything but an isolated case — it is one of a burdensome many. For the foregoing reasons, and the reasoning and citations contained in my dissent in Bland v. Norfolk & Western Ry. Co. (1986), 140 Ill. App. 3d 862, 489 N.E. 2d 435,1 respectfully dissent.