Quick takes from today's Illinois Supreme Court opinions
Our panel of leading appellate attorneys review today’s Supreme Court opinions from Civil case Phoenix Insurance Company v. Rosen and Criminal cases People v. Mullins, People v. Martin and People v. Ziobro.
CIVIL
Phoenix Insurance Company v. Rosen
By Alyssa M. Reiter, Williams Montgomery & John Ltd. A provision in an underinsured-motorist policy allowing either party to reject an award over the statutory minimum for liability coverage does not violate public policy and is not unconscionable. Ms. Rosen was injured by an underinsured vehicle and made a claim under the underinsured-motorist provision of her Pheonix policy. The policy contained an arbitration agreement. However, the arbitration was binding only if the amount awarded did not exceed the minimum limit for bodily injury liability specified by the Illinois Safety Responsibility Law. If the amount exceeded that limit, either party could demand the right to a trial. Following arbitration, Rosen was awarded over $300,000 and Phoenix filed a complaint rejecting the award and demanding a jury trial. Rosen asserted in an affirmative defense that the “trial de novo” provision was invalid and unenforceable as against public policy. She also filed a counterclaim seeking to enforce the arbitration award. The trial court struck the affirmative defense and dismissed the counterclaim. On review, the appellate court reversed, holding that the trial de novo provision unfairly favored the insurer and violated public policy considerations favoring arbitration. The Supreme Court disagreed. It recognized the long tradition of upholding parties’ rights to freely contract. It noted that the power to declare a private contract invalid on public policy grounds should be exercised sparingly. The Court thoroughly analyzed conflicting case law, the applicable statute, and all of Rosen’s public policy arguments. It found that the provision did not violate public policy and that, although the provision did favor the insurer, it did not reach a level of substantive unconscionability.CRIMINAL
People v. Mullins
By Jay Wiegman, Office of the State Appellate Defender Prior to his jury trial on a charge of possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver, defendant Ira Mullins filed a motion in limine seeking to bar admission of his prior felony narcotics convictions for purposes of impeachment. The trial court withheld ruling until defendant testified. After his conviction, defendant appealed, and argued that the trial court abused its discretion in both delaying its ruling on his motion in limine and in allowing the admission of a prior conviction for impeachment purposes. The Appellate Court affirmed. The Supreme Court then vacated the First District's original order, and directed the Appellate Court to reconsider its decision in light of People v. Patrick, 233 Ill.2d 62 (2009), in which case it was held that, if a ruling is requested before trial on whether defendant’s prior convictions can be used to impeach his testimony, the court should make a ruling at that time, except in those rare instances where it lacks enough information to do so. The Appellate Court then reversed, holding that the trial court abused its discretion, and that the error substantially prejudiced the defendant. In the majority opinion written by Justice Freeman and joined by Justice Burke, the Illinois Supreme Court reversed the Appellate Court. The majority readily concluded that the trial court correctly determined that the prior conviction was admissible for impeachment purposes. As the State had acknowledged that the trial court erred by delaying its decision on whether to admit defendant's prior convictions until the time for his testimony, the only remaining question was how to determine whether the error was harmless or reversible. The Court observed that the State had contended that the Appellate Court misconstrued Patrick and failed to conduct an appropriate harmless-error analysis, but had instead improperly treated the trial court’s error as a de facto structural error which affected the integrity of the trial and required automatic reversal of defendant’s conviction without any showing of prejudice. Conversely, the defendant viewed Patrick as establishing that the proper analysis is whether the trial court’s error in delaying the ruling on defendant’s motion in limine was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. To resolve this question, the Court turned to its recent analysis of Patrick in People v. Averett, 237 Ill.2d 1 (2010). In Averett, the Court had discussed the defendant’s constitutional right to testify and how the trial court’s decision on the motion in limine impacts the defendant's decision and thus his entire trial strategy. Deferring this decision until defendant testifies is an abuse of discretion, and thus was treated in Patrick as a question of harmless-error. Because harmless error analysis was used, the error could not have been considered a structural error, and therefore automatic reversal would be inappropriate. The appropriate standard of review, therefore, was whether the trial court's error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. In Mullins, the majority determined that the error was harmless because, even were the trial court’s error removed, a retrial would end with the same result. There were two special concurrences, one by Chief Justice Kilbride, and one authored by Justice Garman and joined by Justices Thomas, Karmeier and Theis. Both special concurrences agreed with the result reached by the majority, but expressed different views as to the import and meaning of Patrick. Justice Garman expressed the view that "the more important it is to the defense theory of the case to have the defendant testify, the more harm is done by improperly deferring the ruling," while the Chief Justice believes that "the focus of our harmless-error inquiry under Patrick is not on the defendant’s need to testify but, rather, on the defendant’s ability to make an informed decision about whether to testify."People v. Martin
By Jay Wiegman, Office of the State Appellate Defender On Christmas night in 2004, Aaron Martin drove his car over the center line and struck a car travelling in the oncoming lane. The driver and passenger of that car died. Testing showed that Martin had a trace amount of methamphetamine in his system. In the trial court, defense counsel argued that the State had to prove that defendant’s driving with “any amount” of methamphetamine in his urine – in this case a minimal amount – proximately caused the victims’ deaths. The State argued that it need only prove that defendant’s act of driving caused the deaths because the underlying DUI violation was a strict liability offense. The trial judge concluded that the statute did not require a causal connection between defendant’s impairment and the motor vehicle accident, but rather that if the deaths were caused by a motor vehicle accident, then the DUI violation under 11-501(a)(6) was automatically elevated to aggravated DUI. Following a jury trial, the defendant was convicted of aggravated unlawful driving while under the influence. On appeal, the Third District held that the State was required to prove some relationship or connection between the presence of methamphetamine in defendant’s urine while operating a motor vehicle and the deaths that resulted from the motor vehicle accident, and that such proof had not been presented in this case. The Illinois Supreme Court reversed the Appellate Court and reinstated defendant's conviction for aggravated DUI. The Supreme Court found that, unlike with alcohol, the impairment caused by methamphetamine is not measurable, and there is no legal fiction that allows a person to drive as long as his blood/drug content is within certain parameters. Rather, the consumption of any amount of methamphetamine is illegal, and the Legislature has made it illegal to drive with any amount of methamphetamine in the body. It was therefore unnecessary for the State to prove that Martin suffered from any degree of impairment that caused the accident.People v. Ziobro
By Jay Wiegman, Office of the State Appellate Defender Supreme Court Rule 504 requires that, when issuing a traffic citation, the officer set a first appearance between 14 and 60 days after the arrest date. Unless exempted by SCR 505, Rule 504 further sets forth that, where a defendant at his first appearance pleads not guilty to an alleged traffic offense punishable by fine only, he should be granted a bench trial on that date or a jury trial within a reasonable time thereafter. People v. Ziobro involved the question of whether a DUI case could be dismissed with prejudice if the arresting officer set a first appearance date more than 60 days after the arrest. In these consolidated Will County cases, several defendants were issued citations for DUI and other traffic violations. The first appearance dates listed on their citations were beyond the period set forth in Supreme Court Rule 504. At least 10 days before their first appearances, several of the defendants filed jury trial demands. At their first appearance, these defendants announced themselves ready for trial and, when the State indicated it was not ready for trial, the defendants filed motions to dismiss, which were granted with prejudice. The Third District Appellate Court, with Justice Schmidt dissenting, upheld the dismissal with prejudice of those cases in which the defendant filed a timely jury trial demand, announced ready for trial, and filed a motion to dismiss when the State failed to proceed to trial on that date. The Illinois Supreme Court reversed, and remanded the cases for a determination as to whether the defendants were prejudiced by the delay. Based on Village of Park Forest v. Fagan, 64 Ill. 2d 264 (1976), the Court stated that the time limitation in Rule 504 is directory. This time limitation is violated only when there is no showing that it would have been impracticable to comply with the time limitation. And because the time limitation contained in Rule 504 is directory, no specific consequence is triggered by the failure to comply with the rule. Dismissal is, therefore, not automatic in these cases. Because the Supreme Court found this issue dispositive of the case, it did not consider whether the trial court had the authority to dismiss the cases with prejudice. And, notably, this will not be an issue in the future because, effective January 1, a statutory amendment (Public Act 96--694) prohibited dismissal of misdemeanor DUI charges for violations of Rule 504 or Rule 505. Because this is a procedural rule, it applies retroactively, as well, and thus, on remand, the circuit courts have no discretion to dismiss for these rule violations.Filed under: