People v. Kegley

590 N.E.2d 922, 227 Ill. App. 3d 48, 169 Ill. Dec. 3, 1992 Ill. App. LEXIS 467
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedMarch 30, 1992
Docket2-90-0263
StatusPublished
Cited by16 cases

This text of 590 N.E.2d 922 (People v. Kegley) 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. Kegley, 590 N.E.2d 922, 227 Ill. App. 3d 48, 169 Ill. Dec. 3, 1992 Ill. App. LEXIS 467 (Ill. Ct. App. 1992).

Opinion

JUSTICE NICKELS

delivered the opinion of the court:

After a jury trial, defendant, Robert Kegley, was found guilty of home invasion and attempted kidnapping, and the lesser included offenses of criminal trespass to residence, battery and unlawful restraint. Defendant admitted the events that led to his convictions, but asserted defenses of intoxication and insanity induced by such intoxication. After finding defendant’s prior conviction of rape and the victim’s physical impairment to be factors in aggravation warranting an extended sentence (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1989, ch. 38, pars. 1005 — 8—2, 1005 — 5—3.2), the court sentenced defendant to 60 years’ imprisonment on his conviction of home invasion and 10 years’ imprisonment on his conviction of attempted kidnapping, with the sentences to run concurrently. Defendant appeals, asserting that the trial court abused its discretion in: (1) excluding certain evidence, which prevented defendant from effectively cross-examining and challenging the credibility of a key State witness; (2) refusing pattern jury instructions as confusing; (3) charging the jury to “keep deliberating” and in sequestering the jury at 1:30 a.m. after almost five hours of deliberations, thereby coercing a guilty verdict or allowing the opportunity for jury misconduct; and (4) imposing an extended sentence. We affirm.

Initially we note that this is defendant’s second appeal. (People v. Kegley (1988), 175 Ill. App. 3d 335.) However, the facts were not necessary to our prior determination of defendant’s first appeal. Therefore, to resolve the issues raised on this appeal, we must fully set out the facts leading to defendant’s indictment and his second trial.

In the early morning hours of March 25, 1986, Sandra Dyer (victim) was awakened by noises at the back door of her second-floor apartment, which she occupied alone. Although she had locked and deadbolted both the front and back doors to her apartment, when she heard footsteps she used the phone next to her bed to call the police. She was still on the phone with the police when she saw defendant, whom she had never seen before, at her bedroom door and screamed. Defendant entered her bedroom and, after hitting her with what apparently was a beer bottle, grabbed her around the neck in a choke hold and said “[y]ou told them, didn’t you[?]” The police dispatcher’s recording of the victim’s call reflected this statement, and one of the victim’s neighbors, Mia Torrez, overheard that comment through the thin adjoining bedroom wall.

Defendant pulled the victim around the apartment while repeatedly asking for her car keys and telling her that they had to get out of there. Despite this close proximity, the victim failed to detect any odor of alcohol on defendant’s breath. Although the victim told defendant that she had a broken back, he responded “[l]ike hell you do.” Eventually, after striking the victim’s head against the wall and punching her in the face, defendant fled with the victim’s car keys as the police arrived. The victim hid in her locked bathroom until the police entered her apartment.

Police officers responding to the victim’s call saw defendant leave the victim’s apartment by the front door, taking the steps two or three at a time and falling to all fours at the foot of the apartment stairs. With his gun drawn, an officer approached defendant and told him to stop, to which defendant responded by telling the officer to shoot, rolling to his feet, and running away. Defendant fell two more times, each time telling the officer to shoot when the officer approached and told defendant to stop. Eventually, the officers tackled defendant and subdued him.

One of the officers noticed the smell of alcohol on defendant’s breath, but defendant walked on his own without stumbling or staggering. A second officer did not notice any smell of alcohol, but did note that defendant walked without problem. Neither of the officers believed defendant was intoxicated. A third officer also failed to notice any indication of alcohol on defendant’s breath. However, a fourth officer, who was involved with defendant’s handling at the police station after his arrest, noticed a slight smell of alcohol, although defendant neither slurred his speech nor mumbled. A blood sample taken from defendant six hours after the break-in tested with an alcohol level of .124.

Defendant’s brother refused to allow defendant to visit his home two days before the break-in on March 23, 1986, because defendant was drunk and not in any shape to be around his nieces and nephews. At home with his father on March 24, 1986, defendant could not sit still, paced and was not himself. A friend, with whom defendant frequently drank, shared a 12-pack of beer with defendant on the 24th. However, defendant’s friend passed out before defendant left. Finally, a bar owner and his wife both testified that defendant had been in their bar drinking on March 24 but that he was not intoxicated.

After his apprehension, defendant told the officers that they had the wrong man and that he had been trying to help the victim. He also indicated that he knew James Sibiski, who was the victim’s neighbor and known by the nickname of “Wiener,” and that Sibiski would be upset when he learned of defendant’s arrest and the events leading to it. Both Sibiski and his roommate, Mia Torrez, overheard some of these comments. For two years, Sibiski was defendant’s foreman at a concrete company and routinely drove defendant to work.

After his arrest, electrical tape matching that found on a railing leading to the victim’s back door was recovered from defendant in addition to a syringe, a bag containing powder containing cocaine, a pipe containing residue of cannabis, and a vial of liquid. Defendant threw himself against the bars and walls of his cell, yelling, spitting and cursing at officers at the police station.

In mid-July 1985, nine months before the incident giving rise to the charges against defendant, the victim and a girlfriend had been abducted at knife point in their car from the parking lot of a bar. Neither girl saw their abductor, who forced them to keep their heads down during a high-speed car chase with the police, which ended in a car crash. The abductor escaped and was never apprehended, although a palm print was lifted from the window of the girls’ car. As a result of the crash, the victim suffered a fractured vertebra in her spine, which required surgery. The abduction was a matter of some notoriety in the local papers.

On March 26, 1986, Sibiski met with police without mentioning any involvement of defendant in the 1985 abduction. However, on April 2 Sibiski told police that several days after the 1985 abduction defendant had admitted abducting the victim and her girlfriend, who was Sibiski’s ex-wife. Although Sibiski told Mia Torrez of defendant’s involvement in the abduction, neither Sibiski nor Torrez, who was a friend of the victim, ever told the victim or police that defendant was the abductor.

Sibiski also told police that defendant had not been at work the two days following the abduction and that on one occasion after the abduction defendant had accompanied Sibiski to his apartment on a lunch break. When the victim came into view, defendant hid his face and ducked down into the car.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
590 N.E.2d 922, 227 Ill. App. 3d 48, 169 Ill. Dec. 3, 1992 Ill. App. LEXIS 467, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-kegley-illappct-1992.