Court Opinion

ID: 9728184
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 14:01:31.114576+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:46.628788
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE FREEMAN, specially concurring: I agree with the majority’s resolution of defendant’s contention regarding his pretrial motion to suppress. 235 Ill. 2d at 126-32. I also agree that this cause must be remanded for a new trial, based upon the prejudice suffered by defendant due to the State’s discovery violation during trial. 235 Ill. 2d at 111-23. I am troubled, however, that the bulk of the majority’s opinion is devoted to directing the course of defendant’s trial on remand. As the majority acknowledges, the theory of the defense may change on retrial (235 Ill. 2d at 121), meaning that it is unclear at this point whether defendant will be convicted, much less be sentenced to death. Accordingly, the discussions regarding evidentiary rulings and death penalty sentencing issues as “claims of error that are likely to arise again on remand” (235 Ill. 2d at 123) seem to me both premature and inadvisable. I therefore do not join in the sections of the majority opinion which discuss the qualifications of expert witnesses (235 Ill. 2d at 124-26), the admission of other-crimes evidence (235 Ill. 2d at 132-39), the admission of toxicology evidence (235 Ill. 2d at 139-46), whether there should be a separate hearing for a sentence enhancing factor (235 Ill. 2d at 146-50), jury instructions (235 Ill. 2d at 150-51), additional claims of trial error (235 Ill. 2d at 151-52), death penalty eligibility phase error (235 Ill. 2d at 152), death penalty sentencing phase error (235 Ill. 2d at 152-53), and other sentencing issues (235 Ill. 2d at 153). I express no opinion on the issues raised in those portions of the opinion. JUSTICE BURKE joins in this special concurrence.