Court Opinion

ID: 9518636
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 00:57:51.123021+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:29:41.049090
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE HARRISON, dissenting: I believe the prosecutor’s comments regarding defendant’s ability to call Lee Jacobs and have him assert his fifth amendment right against self-incrimination constituted reversible error. I disagree with the majority’s conclusion that the evidence adduced in the instant case was “so overwhelming” that a conviction would have resulted even had the fallacious statements not been made. Given the evidence that Jacobs might actually have been the person to whom the controlled substances belonged, the erroneous inference that defendant could have called Jacobs to assert the privilege and thus bolster defendant’s innocence by refusing to incriminate himself created substantial prejudice. Defendant was entitled to have his guilt or innocence determined by the jury without prejudicial comment or argument. People v. Popely (1976), 36 Ill. App. 3d 828, 836, 345 N.E.2d 125,131. Further, to view these remarks as harmless error is to sanction the prosecution’s boldfaced misstatement of the law. This I refuse to do, especially where no curative instruction was given the jury to clarify the misperceptions caused by these comments. Although the jury was instructed on the purposes of argument, if error of this nature were deemed so easily cured, the prosecution could improperly advise the jury and argue harmless error in any case. (See People v. Eddington (1984), 129 Ill. App. 3d 745, 776-77, 473 N.E.2d 103, 125.) For these reasons, I respectfully dissent.