People v. Allen

486 N.E.2d 873, 109 Ill. 2d 177, 93 Ill. Dec. 340, 1985 Ill. LEXIS 312
Illinois Supreme Court·Decided November 21, 1985·No. 59163·Published·Cited by 27 cases

Opinion

JUSTICE RYAN

delivered the opinion of the court:

This case involves the unusual problem of an incorrect transcript of proceedings caused by a court reporter’s error in transcribing the stenographic notes taken at trial. The defendant, Diane Allen, was charged in the circuit court of Cook County with murder (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1979, ch. 38, par. 9—1(a)(3)), conspiracy to commit armed robbery (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1979, ch. 38, par. 8—2), and attempted armed robbery (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1979, ch. 38, par. 8—4(a)). Following a jury trial, the defendant was found guilty of conspiracy and attempted armed robbery but not guilty of murder. The conspiracy conviction was merged with the attempt conviction, and the defendant was sentenced to eight years in prison.

The appellate court reversed the attempted-armed-robbery conviction and remanded for a new trial on that issue, finding that the trial judge misstated the law when reading the attempted-armed-robbery instruction to the jury. The appellate court also directed the circuit court, on remand, to enter judgment and impose sentence on defendant’s conspiracy conviction, noting that both convictions may stand where, as in this case, the object of the conspiracy was broader than the specific crime committed. 116 Ill. App. 3d 996.

The common law record contained a written attempted-armed-robbery instruction, marked given, which correctly stated:

“To sustain the charge of attempt, the State must prove the following propositions:
* * *
Third: That the defendant did not act under compulsion.”

However, the transcript of proceedings, page 608, indicated that the trial judge, in reading the instruction to the jury, stated:

“To sustain the charge of attempt, the State must prove the following propositions:
* * *
Third: That the defendant, or one for whose conduct she is legally responsible, did not act under compulsion.” (Emphasis added.)

After the appellate court reversed the attempted-armed-robbery conviction, the State filed a motion in the appellate court for leave to supplement the record and also filed a petition for rehearing. The State contended, in its motion for leave to supplement the record, that the transcript of proceedings was inaccurate in that the trial judge did not include the words “or one for whose conduct she is legally responsible” when reading the instruction to the jury as to the third proposition of the attempted-armed-robbery instruction. The appellate court denied the motion for leave to supplement the record and denied the petition for rehearing. The State’s petition for leave to appeal to this court was granted pursuant to our Rule 315 (94 Ill. 2d R. 315).

After leave to appeal was granted, the State filed a motion in this court requesting leave to supplement the record, or, in the alternative, to have the cause remanded to the trial court for the limited purpose of conducting a hearing pursuant to our Rule 329 (87 Ill. 2d R. 329). Rule 329 provides for amendment of the record on appeal and states in part:

“Any controversy as to whether the record accurately discloses what occurred in the trial court shall be submitted to and settled by that court and the record made to conform to the truth.”

We granted the State’s motion, in part, by remanding the cause to the circuit court of Cook County for the limited purpose of conducting an evidentiary hearing, pursuant to Rule 329, to determine whether page 608 of the transcript of proceedings (i.e., the attempted-armed-rob- • bery instruction) was an accurate version of the trial court proceedings.

The only witness to testify at the Rule 329 hearing was the court reporter, Debra Bailey, who took the relevant portions of- the defendant’s trial. Bailey testified that as the trial judge read the jury instructions to the jury, she recorded the proceedings by means of “machine shorthand” or stenographic notes. Bailey’s stenographic notes of the trial proceedings were introduced into evidence at the hearing. Bailey was then requested to read from her notes the portion of the proceedings wherein the trial judge read the attempted-armed-robbery instruction to the jury. Reading directly from her stenographic notes, Bailey stated that the trial judge instructed the jury:

“A. To sustain the charge of attempt the State must prove the following propositions. *** And third, that the defendant did not act under compulsion.”

Bailey further testified that her stenographic notes of the judge’s reading of the third proposition of the attempted-armed-robbery instruction did not contain the words “or one for whose conduct she is legally responsible,” and that those words should not have been included in the third proposition of the attempted-armed-robbery instruction contained at page 608 of the official transcript.

Bailey explained, during cross-examination, that the mistake in the original transcript of proceedings was caused by her reliance on a set of jury instructions given to her by the State’s Attorney’s office. Bailey testified that when she began to transcribe her stenographic notes she noticed a discrepancy between her notes and the set of instructions given to her by the State’s Attorney’s office. Bailey did not compare the set of instructions given to her to the set of jury instructions, marked given by the trial judge, contained in the common law record of this case. Suffice it to say, the two sets were not identical. Bailey testified that when she noticed the discrepancy she assumed that she had missed something the trial judge had said and thus added the additional language contained in the written set of instructions given to her by the State’s Attorney’s office. It was also brought out during cross-examination that there were discrepancies between Bailey’s stenographic notes and the portions of the transcript of proceedings pertaining to the judge’s reading of the murder instruction and proposition two of the attempted-armed-robbery instruction. In each instance, however, the version recorded in the stenographic notes was identical to the written instruction marked “given” contained in the common law record.

The circuit judge, after hearing Bailey’s testimony and the arguments of counsel, ruled that the evidence supported the proposed correction. The State’s motion to correct the record was granted and the judge ordered page 608 of the transcript of proceedings to be amended by striking the words “or one for whose conduct she is legally responsible” from the third proposition of the attempted-armed-robbery instruction.

It is well established that a party may not prove an inaccuracy in the record merely by presenting oral testimony. (Hartgraves v. Don Cartage Co. (1976), 63 Ill. 2d 425, 428; Pinkstaff v. Pennsylvania R.R. Co. (1960), 20 Ill. 2d 193, 202.) Rather, the inaccuracy must “be proved by the production of some note or memorandum from the records or quasi-records of the court, or by the judge’s minutes, or by the papers on file in the cause.” (People v.

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People v. Allen, 486 N.E.2d 873, 109 Ill. 2d 177, 93 Ill. Dec. 340, 1985 Ill. LEXIS 312 (Ill. 1985).

486 N.E.2d 873 (People v. Allen) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

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