People v. Henry

347 N.E.2d 447, 37 Ill. App. 3d 813, 1976 Ill. App. LEXIS 2261
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedApril 5, 1976
DocketNo. 61124
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 347 N.E.2d 447 (People v. Henry) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Court of Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Henry, 347 N.E.2d 447, 37 Ill. App. 3d 813, 1976 Ill. App. LEXIS 2261 (Ill. Ct. App. 1976).

Opinion

Mr. JUSTICE BURKE

delivered the opinion of the court:

William Earl Henry was found guilty of burglary in violation of section 19 — 1 of the Criminal Code (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1973, ch. 38, par. 19 — 1) in a jury trial and was sentenced to a period of two to six years in the State penitentiary. The defendant appeals contending that: (1) the court erred in denying the defendant’s motion to suppress his alleged confession because the confession was neither voluntarily given nor a product of a knowing and intelligent waiver of the defendant’s right to counsel; and (2) the State failed to prove the defendant guilty of burglary beyond a reasonable doubt.

Officer Werner of the Chicago Heights Police Department, the arresting officer, testified that at approximately 2:30 a.m. on March 29, 1972, he received a radio message in his patrol car that the silent alarm system at the Nagle Pumps Company had been activated. Officer Werner and his partner, Officer Duff, proceeded to Nagle Pumps, located at 1249 Center Avenue in Chicago Heights, Illinois. Officer Elmer Boudreau of the Chicago Heights Police Department also proceeded there after receiving a similar radio message. After arriving at Nagle Pumps, Officer Werner observed some movement from within the building. He proceeded to the front of the building and heard a shot fired. The shot was a warning shot fired by Officer Boudreau, already on the scene, who had observed a person fleeing from the shrubbery in front of the building. That person, later identified as Johnny Edwards, was apprehended and placed under arrest by Officer Boudreau.

Upon arriving at the front of the building, Officer Werner testified that he observed a second person “rolling” out of a front window into the nearby bushes. Werner ordered the person out of the shrubbery and placed him under arrest. The person placed under arrest by Werner was later identified at trial as the defendant, William Earl Henry.

After the defendant was placed in the squad car, Werner returned to the front window from which he had observed the defendant exit. The window was open, Werner testified, the putty was out, and there were scratch marks on the window frame and lock. There was a glove and a large screwdriver outside the window and a crowbar on the desk just inside the window. Officer Boudreau testified that this window was approximately three feet long and three feet wide. Both he and Officer Werner crawled through that window to enter the building. Boudreau testified that he believed the window was large enough for him to “roll” through it, but he and Werner had crawled through it when entering. Inside the building, Officer Werner testified, desks were disarranged, papers were thrown about and a typewriter was found on the floor in the hallway. Boudreau testified that the desks had been “ransacked” and papers thrown about.

Officer McLaughlin, an investigator for the Chicago Heights Police Department, testified that he went to Nagle Pumps to investigate the incident about 2:50 that morning. He observed paint chipped from the frame of the window Werner and Boudreau had previously observed and saw a screwdriver and a black glove just outside the window and a pry bar on the desk inside the window. Fingerprint tests on the screwdriver and pry bar proved inconclusive, McLaughlin testified.

The defendant testified that he was in the vicinity of Nagle Pumps with Johnny Edwards for a crap game with two other persons the defendant referred to as Jake and. his fiancee. The four left the game and drove around for a half hour or so. Jake and his fiancee got into an argument, so the defendant and Johnny Edwards got out of the car and started walking back toward where the defendant’s wife’s car was parked. As they were walking past Nagle Pumps, the defendant testified, a police car with no lights on approached. Edwards stopped, but the defendant kept walking. The defendant heard a shot fired and stepped to the side of the building. Although the defendant testified he was not in any bushes, he testified that an officer ordered him to come out of the bushes. He was then placed under arrest and transported to the Chicago Heights Police Station.

Officer McLaughlin testified that he first interviewed the defendant at approximately 5:10 that morning at the Chicago Heights Police Station. It was stipulated by the defense that the defendant had been advised of his Miranda rights. At this time the defendant denied any involvement in a burglary at Nagle Pumps. At approximately 2:15 p.m. Officer McLaughlin again interviewed the defendant in the presence of a detective named Rutger and Joyce Segneri, a police stenographer. At this time the defendant made a statement in their presence which the stenographer took down. The defendant stated that when he was driving past Nagle Pumps he suggested “checking it out to see if there was a petty cash box.” The statement continued that he and Johnny parked the car, pried open a window with a screwdriver, entered and looked around for a cash box, which they did not find. Seeing lights on the street, they exited the building, when they were placed under arrest. The stenographer who took the statement verified it at trial.

The defendant admitted at trial that he had made this statement to the police. However, he stated that the statement was in fact false, and that he had only made the statement because the officers present told him that he had better cooperate or he would never be able to get back his wife’s car they had just impounded because the storage charge they would impose would be higher than he could pay. The defendant did not sign the statement.

Officer McLaughlin, who had done all the talking when the defendant made his confession, denied making any threat. He stated that while he had advised the defendant that the defendant’s wife’s car had been found, he said he did not tell the defendant that the car would be returned if the defendant would make a statement. Officer McLaughlin denied making any promises or using any coercion in any way to elicit the statement. It was stipulated by the defense that Officer Rutger, who was also present when the defendant’s confession was taken, would testify substantially the same as Officer McLaughlin.

After the trial began, the defendant moved to suppress his confession. After hearing the testimony concerning the circumstances surrounding the confession, the court denied the defendant’s motion. The court, in commenting on its reasons for denying the defendant’s motion, stated that it was primarily a “matter of credibility of the witnesses.” The defendant’s confession was thereafter entered into evidence. After the close of all the evidence, the jury returned a verdict of guilty.

The defendant’s first contention is that it was error for the court to admit the defendant’s confession into evidence. The defendant’s basic argument is that the statement was not voluntarily given, but was a product of a threat to withhold his wife’s car unless the defendant cooperated. While a statement made to police by a suspect, in order to be admissible, must be made voluntarily and must not be a product of any compulsion or inducement, a reviewing court will not overturn a trial court’s determination that the statement was made voluntarily unless the determination was against the manifest weight of the evidence. (People v. Nemke, 46 Ill. 2d 49, 263 N.E.2d 97; People v. Hester, 39 Ill.

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Related

People v. Johnson
376 N.E.2d 381 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1978)
People v. Jayne
368 N.E.2d 422 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1977)

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Bluebook (online)
347 N.E.2d 447, 37 Ill. App. 3d 813, 1976 Ill. App. LEXIS 2261, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-henry-illappct-1976.