People v. Hudson

• Decision Date: 29 December 1987
• Docket Number: No. 85-3587,85-3587
• Citation: 122 Ill.Dec. 24,526 N.E.2d 164,171 Ill.App.3d 1029
• Parties: , 122 Ill.Dec. 24 PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Renaldo HUDSON, Defendant-Appellant. . Nunc Pro Tunc
• Court: United States Appellate Court of Illinois

Page 164

526 N.E.2d 164

171 Ill.App.3d 1029, 122 Ill.Dec. 24

PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Renaldo HUDSON, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 85-3587.

Appellate Court of Illinois,

First District, Second Division.

Nunc Pro Tunc Dec. 29, 1987.

Paul P. Biebel, Jr., Public Defender of Cook County (Karen A. Popek, Asst. Public Defender, of counsel), for defendant-appellant.

Richard M. Daley, State's Atty., Cook County (Thomas V. Gainer, Jr., and Theodore Fotios Burtzos, Asst. State's Attys., of counsel), for plaintiff-appellee.

Justice HARTMAN delivered the opinion of the court:

Defendant, Renaldo Hudson, was tried by a jury on three counts of murder, one count of home invasion, and one count each of armed robbery and aggravated arson, all in relation to the stabbing death of Folke Peterson. The jury was unable to reach a unanimous verdict, and a mistrial was declared over defendant's objection.

Defendant thereafter moved to dismiss the charges against him and to bar a retrial or, in the alternative, to bar a death sentencing hearing were he to be convicted of murder upon retrial, on the ground that either retrial or a death penalty hearing would violate his federal and state constitutional rights against double jeopardy. The motion was denied.

Notice of an interlocutory appeal pursuant to Supreme Court Rule 604(f) (107 Ill.2d R. 604(f)) was timely filed on October 15, 1985.

The issues presented for review include whether: (1) instances of prosecutorial conduct during the trial, were designed to cause a mistrial; (2) retrial of defendant is barred by the double jeopardy clauses of the federal and state constitutions; and (3) those clauses bar a death penalty hearing if defendant is convicted of murder at a second trial.

The evidence at trial revealed that the 71 year old murder victim had lived on South Kingston Avenue, and defendant lived with his father and aunt at the same address, but in a different apartment. On June 7, 1983, at approximately 7 a.m., defendant reported a fire in the victim's apartment to the fire department, which immediately responded together with police. Inside the smoke filled apartment police found the victim's sooty and mutilated body lying on a partially burned bed. He had been cut and stabbed about 60 times, which wounds caused his death.

During the investigation, defendant's aunt, Leola Wilson, took Detective Katherine Reardon to her apartment one floor above the victim's apartment. Inside, the aunt revealed a brown plaid bag, a silver tray, a radio, and several other items, which were the victim's property. Defendant's fingerprints were found on the silver tray and radio. The aunt also found defendant's bloodstained jacket behind the sofa-bed, rolled up in a brown paper bag. Police asked defendant to accompany them to the police station for questioning. He went voluntarily.

At the police station, defendant was read and waived his Miranda rights. He told police that he and his aunt smelled smoke coming from the victim's apartment. He pounded on the victim's door and, when no one answered, he called the fire department. Confronted with the brown plaid bag and the other items, defendant told police that he had bought them from some people and they belonged to him. When told that they belonged to the victim and of his aunt's involvement, defendant confessed.

He told the officers that he often helped his father do janitorial work in that building. On June 6, 1983, he planned to tie up and rob the victim, obtained a rope, knocked on the door at about 7 p.m., and was allowed to enter to fix a light bulb. He grabbed the victim by the neck in a choke hold. The victim had a knife and cut defendant's pinky finger. Defendant took away the knife, stabbed the victim in the stomach, neck and shoulder. The victim laid down on a bed. Defendant asked him for money and was given four blood soaked bills. Defendant washed off the blood and asked for more. The victim told him that he had more money in a gold jewelry box on his dresser. Defendant searched for it unsuccessfully for three hours, and then sat next to the victim, watched T.V. and waited for him to die, which eventuated a little after 3:30 a.m.

Defendant, deciding to make the whole thing look like a burglary, ransacked the apartment and scattered papers and pillow foam all over. He took the victim's brown plaid bag, filled it with several items, left at about 5 a.m. to see his father off to work, returned to the victim's apartment, set it on fire and returned upstairs. His aunt smelled smoke and, after it persisted, he knocked on the victim's door and later called the fire department.

During the time defendant gave his statement he was not handcuffed and acted normally. Thereafter, an assistant state's attorney went to the police station and took his oral statement, later reduced to writing. After speaking with his aunt for about 10 minutes, defendant gave a court reporter statement and was formally arrested.

Defendant presented the affirmative defense of insanity in his case-in-chief through the testimony of five lay witnesses: defendant's father, Willie Hudson; his brother, Glenn Hudson; his aunts, Willa Hudson and Leola Wilson; and assistant public defender John McNamara. The first four witnesses set forth evidence of defendant's childhood and adolescence and his mental condition near the time of the offense. Defendant was frequently depressed and withdrawn, preferring to stay by himself rather than playing with other children, although at other times he seemed hyperactive. After being shot at age 15 by a brother, defendant suffered from headaches and insomnia and appeared to experience deeper periods of depression as well as periods of extreme excitability, hyperactivity and inattention. He frequently did not make sense after the shooting.

In the winter of 1981, defendant several times reported hearing voices; he had seen a ghost fly over the trailer in which he lived. In the late winter and spring of 1983, defendant appeared to be more depressed and withdrawn than usual; he also had periods of extreme hyperactivity and anger. During the two weeks immediately prior to the murder, including the afternoon before the stabbing, defendant was especially hyperactive, running in and out of the house, unable to sleep much or carry on a conversation, and generally "acting strange." He was unable to concentrate or be attentive for any period of time, and complained about headaches and his inability to sleep.

The defense also presented the expert psychiatric testimony of Drs. Helen Morrison and Marvin Ziporyn. Based on her personal examination of defendant in June 1984, the police reports and photographs in the case, hospital records, reports by other psychiatrists and psychologists who had examined him and the interviews of relatives, Dr. Morrison concluded that on June 7, 1983, defendant was suffering from the mental diseases of major mood disorder, severe depression, a psychosis by which he was not in contact with reality, and a borderline personality disorder. Based on such information, the psychotropic drugs he was taking for the treatment of psychosis while awaiting trial and his two attempts at suicide while in jail, Dr. Morrison also concluded that defendant was not malingering. In her opinion, due to the mental disease or defect which she had described, defendant was unable either to appreciate the criminality of his conduct or to conform his conduct to the requirements of the law on June 7, 1983.

Based on his two personal interviews of defendant, one of which occurred shortly after his suicide attempt, and on substantially the same psychiatric, psychological, medical and police reports which Dr. Morrison had considered, Dr. Marvin Ziporyn concluded that on June 7, 1983, defendant was suffering from a mental disease, namely, a major affective disorder of the bipolar, manic-depressive type. In his opinion, on June 7, 1983, although having substantial capacity to appreciate the criminality of his conduct, defendant was mentally ill and unable to conform his conduct to the requirements of the law.

John McNamara testified for defendant, as an assistant public defender who initially represented him. He interviewed defendant on the day of his preliminary hearing and observed that he had no facial expression, his eyes were blank and staring, he did not gesticulate, he spoke in a monotone, and he was "a complete blank." McNamara had difficulty in communicating with defendant in regard to telling him who he was and why he was there. McNamara noticed a notation in his arrest report: "This subject is to be kept under observation!" Defendant was placed in a mental problem jail unit and kept under observation. Two doctors who examined defendant after his suicide attempts said that he was malingering. The defense rested.

The State presented two expert witnesses and two lay witnesses to rebut the insanity defense. Dr. Werner Tuteur testified that defendant had no prior history of hospitalization for mental problems. Defendant told him he had never heard voices and had not seriously intended to commit suicide. Defendant had an anti-social personality, not a mental disease, and could conform his conduct to the requirements of the law. Dr. Albert Stipes testified that defendant had a history of anti-social behavior. His ability to plan the crime, lie to his aunt, and dispose of the evidence was inconsistent with a mental disease. His claim of amnesia during the murder was also inconsistent with a mental disease. Defendant had taken amphetamines twice per week since he was 14, which could cause excitability, rapid speech, insomnia, loss of appetite, and quite possibly depression. Defendant had smoked ten marijuana cigarettes on the date of the murder. Dr. Stipes concluded that defendant could appreciate the criminality of his act and was able to control his behavior at the time of the murder.

Assistant State's...