People v. Redden

295 N.E.2d 23, 10 Ill. App. 3d 889, 1973 Ill. App. LEXIS 2734
CourtAppellate Court of Illinois
DecidedApril 4, 1973
Docket72-131
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 295 N.E.2d 23 (People v. Redden) 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. Redden, 295 N.E.2d 23, 10 Ill. App. 3d 889, 1973 Ill. App. LEXIS 2734 (Ill. Ct. App. 1973).

Opinion

Mr. PRESIDING JUSTICE ALLOY

delivered the opinion of the court:

Defendant WHliam Redden appeals from a sentence imposed upon him for aggravated battery foHowing a jury trial in the circuit court of Will County, where the jury found him guilty. He was sentenced to a term of not less than one nor more than six years in the Illinois State Penitentiary.

It appears from the record that defendant William Redden picked up Brian Hoag, the 18-month-old son of his fiancee whom he later married. The child was at the grandmothers house. Defendant was to take care of the child during the day and was with him from 10:00 A.M. until 2:45 P.M. on August 9, 1971, when he brought Brian back to the grandmother’s house.

The grandmother testified-that when Brian was returned to her she noticed that he had blisters on his lips but she noticed nothing else unusual about him and that he was walking. She also stated that about 3:30 P.M. she bathed Brian’s face and put vaseline on the blisters, gave him a glass of juice and put him to bed. It appears that after they arrived at the house, defendant and Brian went out in the back yard and played with kittens briefly and then, when defendant got ready to leave, Brian and the grandmother walked over to the car with defendant to say good-by. It appears that about 6:30 P.M. when Brian awoke from his nap, the grandmother undressed him and gave him a bath, and it was then for the first time that she noticed that there were bruises and burns on his body and that his genital area was badly swollen. She took the boy to St. Joseph’s Hospital where he was examined by. Dr. Fahrner. The doctor testified that he examined Brian between 8:30 and 9:00 P.M. on August 9, 1971, and found blisters on the lips, multiple bruises and burns on the body, and extreme swelling in the genital area. The swelling of the penis and scrotum was approximately to three times the normal size. The doctor stated that the injuries in the genital area could be as new as an hour and a half and probably not more than six hours old. It was the doctor’s opinion that the injuries were the result of multiple blows and that the child would have been in great pain and would not have been able to walk because of the pain. It was estimated by the doctor that the maximum swelling would have occurred between one and a half hour and up to three hours after the injury was inflicted.

Defendant was arrested without a warrant at his home on Monday night, August 9, 1971. He was then taken to the county police station and advised of his constitutional rights and questioned from 12:20 A.M. until about 4:00 A.M. by two officers. Defendant’s mother and father were at the police station during the entire period but were not allowed to talk with their son. At 4:00 A.M. an officer told them they should go home because defendant was going to be kept in custody overnight and that they should return the next day at 1:30 when defendant would be taken before a magistrate.

The following day, after defendant was again advised of his constitutional rights, the questioning was resumed at 12:30 P.M. by two different police officers. During the interrogation, one police officer, Officer Sicinski, came into the room and asked defendant if he would go to John Reid & Associates in Chicago to take a polygraph or “lie detector” test. The officer told him that his willingness to take the lie detector test would give an indication of his guilt or innocence. At that point, defendant stated that he wanted to talk to his attorney and have him advise defendant whether or not he should go. The officer told him that if he wanted to talk to his attorney, “that was fine,” he could talk to him and take the advice of his attorney. The officer also stated that if defendant voluntarily agreed to go with him he would be released at once and could return of his own volition the next morning for transportation to the lie detector office but that if he did not want to volunteer to go up to the John Reid office he would be held in jail as charged. Defendant agreed to go to Chicago and was released to return to his home.

Defendant returned to the courthouse the next day where the officer asked him if he was still willing to go to Chicago for the lie detector test and he replied that he was. The officer then drove him to the office at which the lie detector test was to be conducted and left him with a Mr. Hunter, a man who was not a police officer, but in the private business of conducting polygraph tests. Defendant was advised and reminded immediately prior to the tests in Chicago of his constitutional rights. Defendant then went into another room with Mr. Hunter, and out of the presence of the police officer, and was interrogated for about an hour. Defendant made an oral confession that he had beaten the child and repeated this confession to Officer Sicinski.

Defendant stated he struck the child in an effort to get the child to call him “daddy” or “Bill” and became angered when the child did not talk to him or acknowledge him. He said that he slapped the child and struck him about the face and body, burned him with a match and kicked him once in the groin area. On each of the three days prior to the beginning of an interrogation, defendant was read his Miranda rights and he said he thought he understood his rights, although on the written waiver in response to the statement that he would be furnished an attorney if he could not afford one, he wrote in the space indicating whether he understood, “Yes, I think.”

A motion to suppress the confession was made by defendant which was denied by the court. The oral confession that defendant had caused the injuries to the child was admitted in evidence at the trial. Defendant testified at the trial that the first night he was in the pohce station he was told that the child was on the critical list and was not expected to live; that defendant had never been in jail before and was frightened and had not gotten any sleep while in jail. He said thereafter, before his confession, that he was told that the child was off the critical list. He stated, also, that he had no recollection of injuring the child and confessed because everyone told him he must have done it since no one else was with the child at the time.

On appeal in this court, defendant raises two issues. First, that it was reversible error to deny defendant’s motion to suppress the confession, since defendant asserts that the confession occurred after he had been arrested without a warrant and interrogated for two days before being brought before a judge and after his request to consult with an attorney was ignored by the police. The second contention is that the prosecution failed to prove defendant’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

It appears from the record that the oral confession made by the defendant to Mr. Hunter and thereafter again to Officer Sicinski, was not the product of an in-custody interrogation since defendant voluntarily appeared for the polygraph test after he had been released. He had been fully advised of his constitutional rights a number of times. Defendant had the opportunity to consult with counsel prior to his interrogation. As indicated in Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, 86 S.Ct.

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Related

People v. Lindsey
392 N.E.2d 278 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1979)
People v. Walden
357 N.E.2d 232 (Appellate Court of Illinois, 1976)
State v. Cullison
215 N.W.2d 309 (Supreme Court of Iowa, 1974)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
295 N.E.2d 23, 10 Ill. App. 3d 889, 1973 Ill. App. LEXIS 2734, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-redden-illappct-1973.