People v. Reed

2024 IL App (1st) 210798-U
Procedural entryThis page is a short order in People v. Reed. Read the opinion of the Court — 243 N.E.3d 257
Appellate Court of Illinois·Decided May 28, 2024·No. 1-21-0798·Unpublished

Opinion

2024 IL App (1st) 210798-U

No. 1-21-0798

Order filed May 28, 2024.

First Division

NOTICE: This order was filed under Supreme Court Rule 23 and is not precedent except in the limited circumstances allowed under Rule 23(e)(1). ______________________________________________________________________________

IN THE APPELLATE COURT OF ILLINOIS FIRST DISTRICT

______________________________________________________________________________

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, ) Appeal from the ) Circuit Court of Plaintiff-Appellee, ) Cook County ) v. ) No. 09 CR 02212 02 ) DWAYNE REED, ) The Honorable ) Stanley L. Hill, Defendant-Appellant. ) Judge Presiding.

______________________________________________________________________________

JUSTICE LAVIN delivered the judgment of the court. Presiding Justice Fitzgerald Smith and Justice Coghlan concurred in the judgment.

ORDER

¶1 Held: Defendant failed to show that the trial judge’s failure to recuse himself during postconviction proceedings resulted in plain error. In addition, the evidence set forth at the evidentiary hearing on defendant’s petition supported the finding that trial counsel was not ineffective.

¶2 Defendant Dwayne Reed appeals from the trial court’s order dismissing his

postconviction petition following an evidentiary hearing under the Post-Conviction Hearing Act

(Act) (725 ILCS 5/122-1 et seq. (West 2020)). On appeal, defendant asserts that the trial judge No. 1-21-0798

possessed pertinent knowledge outside the record and, thus, Illinois Supreme Court Rule 63 (eff.

Feb. 2, 2017), required the judge to recuse himself from the postconviction proceedings. 1

Defendant also challenges the court’s determination that trial counsel properly informed him that

he would be required to serve 85% of his sentence for aggravated kidnaping and did not lead him

to reject plea offers based on erroneous or incomplete information. For the following reasons, we

affirm the trial court’s judgment.

¶3 I. Background

¶4 Defendant was charged with offenses that occurred on March 11, 2008. Specifically, he

was charged with armed robbery (720 ILCS 5/18-2(A)(2) (West 2008)), aggravated unlawful

restraint (720 ILCS 5/10-3.1 (West 2008)), aggravated kidnaping based on the concealment of

his identity (720 ILCS 5/10-2(a)(4) (West 2008)), and, pertinent to this dispute, aggravated

kidnaping based on his possession of a firearm during the offense (720 ILCS 5/10-2(a)(6) (West

2008)). While both aggravated kidnaping charges were Class X felonies, the latter charge

required that a 15-year firearm enhancement be added to any sentence. 720 ILCS 5/10-2(b)

(West 2012). Thus, defendant was facing a minimum sentence of 21 years for that offense. See

730 ILCS 5/5-4.5-25 (West 2012) (setting forth a Class X sentencing range of 6 to 30 years in

prison). Additionally, defendant could not receive more than 4.5 days of good conduct credit per

month to offset any sentence for aggravated kidnaping. 730 ILCS 5/3-6 3(a)(2)(ii) (2008). Stated

differently, he would be required to serve at least 85% of that sentence.

¶5 A. Plea Negotiations

¶6 Before trial, defendant was represented by private attorney Ezra Hemphill, who was later

joined by John Benson. This case originally came before the Honorable Thomas M. Tucker but

1 Supreme Court Rule 63 was repealed on January 1, 2023. 2 No. 1-21-0798

was later transferred to the Honorable Stanley L. Hill. Although plea conferences occurred

before both judges (Ill. S. Ct. R. 402 (eff. July 1, 2012)), no plea agreement was reached. No

contemporaneous record was made of any plea offer either.

¶7 B. Trial

¶8 The evidence at trial generally showed that at about 8:30 p.m. on March 11, 2008, Bianca

Muniz was closing the currency exchange where she worked. After she had manually locked the

front door, two men pried it open. She could see only one man’s face, as the other wore a hood.

According to Muniz, one man pointed a small gun at her head and directed her to the back,

where she was forced to lay face down on the ground while her hands and ankles were tied with

duct tape. Muniz, a non-smoker, noted the scent of cigarette smoke. When the men eventually

left, Muniz freed herself and called the police. A large amount of cash was missing, and the

police later recovered a partially burnt cigarette from the floor. DNA from the cigarette matched

defendant’s DNA profile. Following trial, the court found defendant guilty of all charges.

¶9 At sentencing, the trial court informed defendant that he would be statutorily required to

serve 85% of any sentence for aggravated kidnaping. Sentences for other counts would be served

at 50%. The court then imposed four concurrent 25-year sentences. Subsequently, the court

found that aggravated unlawful restraint merged into aggravated kidnaping and vacated the

conviction for the former offense. In addition, the court later reduced defendant’s remaining

sentences to 22 years in prison.

¶ 10 C. Direct Appeal

¶ 11 On direct appeal, we rejected defendant’s assertion that his convictions for aggravated

robbery and aggravated kidnaping while in possession of a firearm had to be reduced to simple

robbery and kidnaping. People v. Reed, 2016 IL App (1st) 142174-U. We agreed, however, that

3 No. 1-21-0798

the conviction for aggravated kidnaping based on the concealment of his identity was required to

be vacated under the one-act, one-crime doctrine. Id.

¶ 12 D. Postconviction Petition

¶ 13 In March 2018, defendant filed a pro se postconviction petition alleging that trial counsel

was ineffective for telling him he would have to serve 50% of his sentence and for not informing

him that he would actually have to serve at least 85%. Defendant alleged that this failing

impacted his decision to reject plea offers made before trial.

¶ 14 According to the petition, Judge Tucker said he would impose a 10-year sentence,

without a firearm enhancement, to be served at 50%, if defendant proceeded to a bench trial. In

addition, no “deal or issue” as to aggravated kidnaping was raised before Judge Tucker. Before

Judge Hill, the State offered defendant a 25-year-sentence to be served at 50%. Judge Hill

himself offered defendant a 22-year sentence to be served at 50%. But see People v. Donelson,

2011 IL App (1st) 092594, ¶ 14 (stating that the trial court is not party to a plea agreement). We

note that the petition did not specify which counts the aforementioned plea offers applied to, but

did allege that Hemphill said Judge Hill would not come off the 15-year firearm enhancement for

armed robbery. The petition further alleged that the only issue discussed at the plea conferences

was whether he would be required to serve a 15-year firearm enhancement for armed robbery.

Conversely, no one mentioned that he would be required to serve 85% of any sentence. Had he

known, he would have accepted Judge Hill’s offer or the State’s offer.

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