Supreme Court Quick Takes

The Illinois Supreme Court handed down one opinion on Friday, June 1. The court determined that the appellate court lacked jurisdiction to review a circuit court clerk’s imposition of fines that were not ordered by the circuit court.

People v. Vara

By Kerry J. Bryson, Office of the State Appellate Defender

Following his conviction of child pornography, defendant Ricardo Vara was sentenced to a three-year prison term and ordered to pay various fines by the court. Subsequently, the circuit clerk recorded those fines in an electronic accounts receivable record. The clerk also recorded other mandatory fines that had not been imposed by the judge. On appeal, Vara challenged the clerk’s imposition of those additional fines, arguing that while they were mandatory, they were void because the clerk lacked the authority to impose fines. The appellate court agreed and vacated the fines in question.

The Illinois Supreme Court handed down one opinion today in People v. Pepitone. At issue in this case was whether Section 11-9.4-1(b) of the Criminal Code of 2012, which prohibits sexual predators or child sex offenders to knowingly be present in any public park building or on real property comprising any public park, is facially violative of substantive due process. Jay Wiegman of the Office of the State Appellate Defender reviews the court's ruling.

People v. Pepitone

Section 11-9.4-1(b) of the Criminal Code of 2012 prohibits “sexual predators” and “child sex offenders” from being knowingly present in any public park building or on real property comprising any public park. 720 ILCS 5/11 9.4 1(b) (West 2016). In People v. Pepitone, 2018 IL 122034, the Illinois Supreme Court considered whether this statute was facially violative of substantive due process and determined that it was not. 

The defendant in Pepitone, who had been convicted in 1999 of predatory criminal sexual assault of a child and sentenced to a six-year prison term, was arrested in 2013 while walking his dog in a public park in Bolingbrook. A jury found him guilty of being a child sex offender in a public park, and he was sentenced to 24 months’ conditional discharge, 100 hours of public service, and $400 in fines and costs. 

The Illinois Supreme Court handed down two opinions today, Friday, Feb. 16. The court considered whether the Cook County Circuit Court erroneously entered a finding of a good-faith settlement agreement under the Joint Tortfeasor Act in a personal injury action arising out of a car accident in Antonicelli v. Rodriguez. In People ex rel. Hartrich v. 2010 Harley-Davidson, the court addresses the application of the excessive fines clause of the Eighth Amendment to the civil forfeiture of personal property. Leading appellate attorneys Karen DeGrand and Joanne Driscoll summarize the cases below.

The Illinois Supreme Court handed down four opinions on Friday, Jan. 19, including the highly-anticipated Bogenberger v. Pi Kappa Alpha Corp., in which the court considered who can be held liable for a fraternity pledge's alcohol-related death during an initiation ritual. The court also addressed the deadline to timely file a motion to quash service in a residential mortgage foreclosure action in Bank of New York Mellon v. Laskowski, reversed and remanded the appellate court's decision to overturn a defendant's first degree murder conviction in People v. Carey, and determined whether the one-act, one-crime rule prohibits multiple convictions arising out of the defendant's single act of gun possession in People v. Coats. Leading appellate attorneys review these cases below.

Bogenberger v. Pi Kappa Alpha Corporation, Inc.

By Karen Kies DeGrand, Donohue Brown Mathewson & Smyth LLC
 
Here the Illinois Supreme Court addressed the civil liability ramifications of excessive alcohol consumption at a fraternity pledging event. The court addressed whether the national organizations of a fraternity, a local chapter of the fraternity, its officers, pledge board members and active members, along with non-member sorority women, owed a legal duty to a prospective pledge who died from alcohol poisoning during a pledge event. The court ruled that all but the national entities owed a duty on the allegations of the complaint.