Court Opinion

ID: 9742189
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 21:08:11.597772+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:29.306862
License: Public Domain

CHIEF JUSTICE FREEMAN, specially concurring: I agree that the matter must be remanded to the circuit court for an evidentiary hearing concerning the nature of the relationship, if any, between the jury foreman and State’s Attorney Richard Devine. I write separately because I believe that the court’s discussion of waiver is unnecessarily confusing. Defendant concedes in his brief that his trial attorney did not specifically ask the circuit court to conduct the evidentiary hearing that he now seeks in this court. Defendant argues that notwithstanding this failure, the circuit court should have ordered the hearing sua sponte. He also asserts that if counsel’s failure to request an evidentiary hearing results in a procedural default of the issue in this court, then his trial attorney rendered him ineffective assistance of counsel with respect to this aspect of the proceedings. In the alternative, he asks this court to review the matter under Supreme Court Rule 615(a). In responding to this contention, the court states that: “[t]he State does not argue that defendant has waived his right to request an evidentiary hearing. Instead, it argues only that, under the facts presented, an evidentiary hearing is not warranted. Because the State does not argue that defendant has waived review of this issue and because we may review errors affecting substantial rights (see 134 Ill. 2d R. 615(a)), we find this to be an appropriate circumstance in which to relax the waiver rule and consider the issue on its merits. See People v. Hamilton, 179 Ill. 2d 319, 323 (1997) (explaining that waiver is a limitation on the parties, not on the court).” 188 Ill. 2d at 160-61. This treatment is problematic, in my view, because it conflates several distinct bases for reaching the merits. Specifically, it cannot be discerned from this analysis whether the court has chosen to (i) reach the merits because the State has not raised waiver, (ii) excuse the procedural default under our Rule 615(a), (iii) hold the matter not waived pursuant to our decision in Hamilton, or (iv) reach the merits under some combination of these aforementioned three considerations. The court notes that the State does not argue that defendant has waived this issue. Nevertheless, the court does not expressly hold that, by not making this argument, the State has opened the door for review of the claim on the merits. The court also notes that Rule 615(a) permits review of errors affecting substantial rights, but it does not offer any analysis as to how this error affects a substantial right such that the procedural default is excused. Notwithstanding the references to both the State’s failure to argue and to Rule 615(a), the court concludes its waiver analysis with the citation to Hamilton. Hamilton states the general proposition that a court of review may overlook a procedural default on two distinct bases. The first basis is that the waiver doctrine serves as a limitation on the parties and not the court; the second basis is that the court can choose to address arguments not raised in order to maintain a sound and uniform body of law. See Hamilton, 179 Ill. 2d at 323. Hamilton does not speak in terms of Rule 615(a) and therefore cannot serve as support for the court’s earlier reference to Rule 615(a). Nor does Hamilton support the inference that the court should consider the issue because the State has failed to argue waiver, unless the court is using the case as justification for considering the claim waived despite the State’s failure to so argue. I find the court’s waiver discussion confusing because the basis upon which the court has “relax[ed] the waiver rule” cannot be identified. 188 Ill. 2d at 161. If the court is reaching the issue based on the State’s failure to press the procedural default, then the court should expressly say so. Likewise, if the court is reaching the procedurally defaulted claim under Rule 615(a), the court should explicitly so state. I have previously cautioned against the nonchalant invocation of our plain error rule. Neither the term “Rule 615(a)” nor the term “plain error” has “talisman-like effect” to transform claims which have been otherwise procedurally defaulted into claims which are automatically subject to substantive review. See People v. Terrell, 185 Ill. 2d 467, 524 (1998) (Freeman, C.J., specially concurring, joined by McMorrow, J.). Rule 615(a) states that “[a]ny error, defect, irregularity, or variance which does not affect substantial rights shall be disregarded. Plain errors or defects affecting substantial rights may be noticed although they were not brought to the attention of the trial court.” 134 Ill. 2d R. 615(a). This court has consistently interpreted Rule 615(a) to allow a court of review to consider substantively an error that has not been properly preserved when (i) the evidence is closely balanced or (ii) the purported error is of such magnitude as to deny defendant a fair and impartial trial. People v. Vargas, 174 Ill. 2d 355, 363 (1996). As to errors affecting substantial rights, this court has observed that “before plain error can be considered as a means of circumventing the general waiver rule, it must be plainly apparent from the record that an error affecting substantial rights was committed.” People v. Precup, 73 Ill. 2d 7, 17 (1978). Short of a conclusion that an asserted error is a plain one, the plain error doctrine offers no basis to excuse a procedural default. People v. Keene, 169 Ill. 2d 1, 17 (1995). The court today states that it “may review errors affecting substantial rights” (188 Ill. 2d at 161), but' how the error at issue here is one which affects substantial rights such that the procedural default can be excused is not set out within the context of the court’s waiver discussion. Instead, the court cites to a case, Hamilton, that has nothing to do with our plain error rule. If the court wants to utilize Hamilton to reach the substantive merits of the claim, then it should do so without injecting the plain error rule into its analysis. The considerations which underscore the holding in Hamilton are very different from those which attend to Rule 615(a), and the court should be careful so as not to suggest that the concepts are interchangeable, when, in fact, they are not. In my view, the fact that the State has not argued that waiver precludes this court’s review of the issues suggests that we need not consider the procedural bar that might otherwise exist in this case. See People v. O’Neal, 104 Ill. 2d 399, 407 (1984) (noting that principles of waiver apply to the State as well as to defendants in criminal cases); People v. Holloway, 86 Ill. 2d 78, 91 (1981) (same). If the State does not take the position that a waiver has even occurred in this case, then the court would not be obliged to “relax the waiver rule.” In other words, the court would be justified reaching the merits of the claim directly. Nevertheless, if the court wishes to resolve this issue as it was framed by defendant in his brief, i.e., that the claim has been procedurally defaulted, then the court should do so in a straightforward analysis. Defendant concedes, and the record establishes, that defense counsel did not ask the court to hold the evidentiary hearing defendant now requests this court to order on direct review. The issue has, therefore, been procedurally defaulted. This court, however, can reach the matter if the error constitutes plain error under Rule 615(a). Keene, 169 Ill. 2d at 10; People v. Enoch, 122 Ill. 2d 176, 190 (1988). As I stated previously, without a conclusion that an asserted error is a plain one, the plain error doctrine offers no basis to excuse a procedural default. Keene, 169 Ill. 2d at 17. A defendant’s right to a fair and impartial jury is the “constitutional cornerstone of our judicial system.” People v. Gaston, 125 Ill. App. 3d 7, 11 (1984). As the appellate court in Gaston stated, “[t]his right should be guarded zealously; neither a trial judge’s inadvertent omissions nor a juror’s failure to divulge possibly pertinent information nor a trial attorney’s laxness can be allowed to impair this fundamental right.” Gaston, 125 Ill. App. 3d at 11. In addition, although the United States Supreme Court has recognized that due process does not require a new trial every time a juror is in “a potentially compromising situation,” due process does require both a jury capable and willing to decide the case on only the basis of the evidence before it, and a “trial judge ever watchful to prevent prejudicial occurrences and to determine the effect of such occurrences when they happen. Such determinations may properly be made at a [post-conviction] hearing.” Smith v. Phillips, 455 U.S. 209, 217, 71 L. Ed. 2d 78, 86, 102 S. Ct. 940, 946 (1982). In this case, the trial judge believed that the letter, in and of itself, did not establish that any relationship existed between the juror and State’s Attorney Devine and that a new trial was not necessary. The letter is a part of the record on review. The letter does not show conclusively that the two men do not have a friendship. Given both our state decisional law on this subject and that of the United States Supreme Court, in addition to the ambiguous tone of the letter in question, the trial judge should have ordered some type of adjudicative proceeding with respect to this issue, notwithstanding defense counsel’s failure to specifically request one. The right to an impartial trial guarantees defendants the preservation of the opportunity to prove actual bias. See Smith, 455 U.S. at 216, 71 L. Ed. 2d at 86, 102 S. Ct. at 945, quoting Dennis v. United States, 339 U.S. 162, 171-72, 94 L. Ed. 734, 742, 70 S. Ct. 519, 523 (1950). The forum in which the trial judge made his finding — a hearing on the reconsideration of motions for a new trial and for judgment n.o.v. — did not provide defendant with an opportunity for any meaningful inquiry into the relationship in question in order to show bias. Without some evaluation of the juror, whether by affidavit or testimony, the trial judge was unable to conclusively determine whether that juror was in fact so biased that a new trial would be necessary. The lack of this opportunity adversely impacts upon defendant’s right to a fair and impartial jury. For these reasons, the second prong of our plain error rule would justify the court’s excusai of the procedural default in this case. I believe that the court should clearly express the basis upon which it is addressing defendant’s contention of error. To do otherwise serves only to muddy this area of our jurisprudence. In all other respects, I join in the court’s decision today. JUSTICE McMORROW joins in this special concurrence.