People v. DeJesus

• Decision Date: 03 May 1979
• Docket Number: No. 77-601,77-601
• Citation: 389 N.E.2d 260,27 Ill.Dec. 448,71 Ill.App.3d 235
• Parties: , 27 Ill.Dec. 448 PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Wilfredo DeJESUS, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: United States Appellate Court of Illinois

Page 260

389 N.E.2d 260

71 Ill.App.3d 235, 27 Ill.Dec. 448

PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Wilfredo DeJESUS, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 77-601.

Appellate Court of Illinois, Second District.

May 3, 1979.

Mary Robinson, Deputy States Appellate Defender, Michael Mulder and Mark Schuster, Asst. States Appellate Defenders, Elgin, for defendant-appellant.

Dennis P. Ryan, States Atty., Waukegan, Phyllis J. Perko, Barbara A. Preiner, States Attys. Appellate Serv. Comm., Elgin, for plaintiff-appellee.

WOODWARD, Justice:

Defendant, Wilfredo DeJesus, was charged by information with aggravated battery and cruelty to children. The incidents allegedly occurred on December 2 and 3, 1976, and involved defendant's two-year-old daughter. Defendant was found guilty of both charges in a jury trial, and he was sentenced to one to eight years in the penitentiary. On appeal he contends he was denied a fair trial because (1) physicians testifying for the state gave as the diagnosis of the child's injuries, "the battered child syndrome"; and (2) certain alleged hearsay was admitted.

Defendant urges that testimony diagnosing his daughter's injuries as "the battered child syndrome" coupled with an explanation of that term served to raise hostility in the jury and to suggest that defendant was guilty of prior offenses not charged. The testimony of a physician regarding his diagnosis of an injury is generally made through words which are terms of art. The use of such terms of art and their explanation by the physician do not necessarily indicate any wrongdoing by a particular defendant, but are merely descriptive of the nature of the injuries observed by the physician. (People v. Jackson (1971), 18 Cal.App.3d 504, 95 Cal.Rptr. 919.) Other evidence must still be produced to show that the defendant was the cause of the injuries complained of. Because such a diagnosis does not state that the defendant battered the child, there is no inconsistency with a defense that the injuries were caused by another person, such as defendant attempted to show at trial in the present cause.

Defendant complains of two separate instances in which alleged hearsay was improperly admitted. The first is the testimony of a state's witness who was present at a prior juvenile court proceeding regarding the custody of defendant's children. The witness in the present cause related what some of defendant's testimony was in the prior proceeding, and defendant urges that because his own testimony in the prior proceeding was made through an interpreter, the interpreter must be called as a witness to avoid a hearsay problem. The interpretation of testimony of a witness made in a foreign language, by an interpreter who is sworn in court and translates the testimony to the court, does not violate the hearsay rule because both the original witness and the interpreter are under oath and are subject to cross...