People v. Mansoori

2024 IL App (1st) 232351
Appellate Court of Illinois·Decided April 25, 2024·No. 1-23-2351·Published·Cited by 9 cases

Opinion

2024 IL App (1st) 232351

No. 1-23-2351B

Opinion filed April 25, 2024 Third Division

IN THE

APPELLATE COURT OF ILLINOIS FIRST DISTRICT

) Appeal from the

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, ) Circuit Court of ) Cook County.

Plaintiff-Appellee, )

) Nos. 19 CR 12258

v. ) 19 CR 12259 ) 19 CR 13576

CHRISTOPHER MANSOORI, )

) Honorable

Defendant-Appellant. ) Michael J. Hogan, ) Judge, presiding.

JUSTICE LAMPKIN delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.

Justice R. Van Tine concurred in the judgment and opinion.

Presiding Justice Reyes dissented, with opinion.

OPINION

¶1 Public Act 101-652 (eff. Jan. 1, 2023), commonly known as the Pretrial Fairness Act, amended article 110 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of 1963 (Code) (725 ILCS 5/art. 110 (West 2022)) and effected sweeping changes to the laws governing pretrial release and detention. See Rowe v. Raoul, 2023 IL 129248, ¶ 4 & n.1 (noting neither “(SAFE-T) Act” nor “Pretrial Fairness Act” are “official” names but common shorthand for sequence of public acts). The circumstances

under which the State may file a petition for pretrial detention continue to be a subject of significant debate among the appellate districts and even among divisions in the First District. This case, which arises from defendant Christopher Mansoori’s appeal of the trial court’s order of detention pursuant to section 110-6.1 of the Code (725 ILCS 5/110-6.1 (West 2022)), introduces a new wrinkle to that debate in the form of the State filing a petition for detention against an individual who is already detained––a scenario for which the Code prescribes a different procedure. ¶2 For the reasons that follow, we reverse the judgment of the trial court and remand for additional proceedings consistent with this opinion. ¶3 I. BACKGROUND ¶4 On September 5, 2019, the State charged defendant with two separate indictments under case numbers 19 CR 12258 and 19 CR 12259. Each indictment alleged two counts of domestic battery 1 against the same person that took place on April 22, 2019, and June 7, 2019, respectively. On October 7, 2019, the State subsequently charged defendant in a third indictment under case number 19 CR 13576, alleging two counts of armed violence, two counts of possession of a controlled substance, and two counts of aggravated unlawful use of a weapon, all of which occurred on August 2, 2019. Defendant was arrested on August 2, 2019. Details in the record are sparse, but defendant was released on bail in early August 2019, with a bail amount of $150,000- D. His bail was revoked in September 2019, after a hearing where the State claimed that defendant used a third party to attempt contact with the complaining witness in his domestic battery cases.2 Defendant has remained detained since then.

Due to a prior domestic battery conviction, these charges are a Class 4 felony. See 720 1

ILCS 5/12-3.2(b) (West 2018).

2 The record does not contain any filings or transcripts from this time period.

¶5 On October 10, 2023, defendant filed a pro se “Motion for Bond Review and/or Reduction of Bail” that was captioned to encompass all three of defendant’s cases. That motion invoked the prior version of section 110-6(f) of the Code, which governed the time frame in which a defendant must be tried for certain offenses following the revocation of bail. See 725 ILCS 5/110-6(f) (West 2020). In response, the State filed three petitions for pretrial detention, one for each case number. On October 16, 2023, the trial court held a hearing on defendant’s motion and the three petitions for detention. As article 110 of the Code contemplates, the State made a factual proffer. ¶6 The State first claimed that, on one occasion, defendant allegedly struck his girlfriend about the body and stomped on her legs. On the other occasion, defendant allegedly struck his girlfriend in the head and pulled her hair. The State provided no other details for these offenses. ¶7 At the time of defendant’s arrest on August 2, 2019, an order of protection involving an unspecified person, presumably defendant’s girlfriend, had been issued but not served. The State did not recount the circumstances of defendant’s arrest, but apparently his car played some role, as a search of defendant’s car yielded an AR-15 rifle, for which defendant did not have a Firearm Owner’s Identification card, and 19.5 grams of suspected cocaine. The State claimed that defendant was released on bond but was returned to custody because he was attempting to “contact the victim or harass the victim” through a third party. The State provided no details. ¶8 Regarding prior criminal history, the State claimed that defendant had misdemeanor convictions for domestic battery in 2011, assault in 2009, resisting a peace officer in 2007, and telephone harassment in 2015. Defendant also had four failures to appear. ¶9 Based on those facts, the State argued that the proof was evident or the presumption great that defendant committed the charged offenses, that defendant poses a threat to the safety of the community, and that defendant should be detained.

¶ 10 Defendant, representing himself pro se, proffered that the complaining witness lives in another state and that he had no contact with her for 40 days leading up to his arrest. Defendant also claimed that he had no felony convictions, and his written motion claimed that his failures to appear were the result of misunderstandings about his court dates or issues with transportation and were not willful. ¶ 11 In its oral ruling, the trial court found that proof was evident or the presumption was great that defendant committed the charged offenses and that defendant poses a real and present threat to the safety of any person or persons or the community based on specific articulable facts “in that defendant committed multiple acts of violence against another and has a prior history of violence and has an arrest for guns or drugs on a separate case as has been pointed out here.” ¶ 12 The trial court then stated, “the Court finds that there [is] no condition or combination of conditions *** that can mitigate that risk.” It made specific mention of the fact that, “[a]lthough the defendant indicates that the complaining witness in at least one of the cases is no longer in the State of Illinois, that does not mean that they can’t be in the State of Illinois and, therefore, this defendant is to remain detained on these three cases.” ¶ 13 The trial court’s written orders for each case were virtually identical and contained little detail. Regarding whether the proof was evident or the presumption great, the order said, “Domestic battery bodily harm” or “armed violence/drugs and 2 domestic battery cases.” In the space to address whether defendant poses a real and present threat to the safety of any person, the trial court wrote, “2 Domestic Battery and weapons/drug case AR 15 + coc[aine].” In the space provided for whether any conditions can mitigate the threat posed by defendant, despite the requirements of section 110-6.1(h)(1) (725 ILCS 5/110-6.1(h)(1) (West 2022)), the trial court wrote, “See above.”

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People v. Mansoori, 2024 IL App (1st) 232351 (Ill. Ct. App. 2024).

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