People v. Washington

• Decision Date: 13 November 1990
• Docket Number: No. 1-87-1311,1-87-1311
• Citation: 568 N.E.2d 1279,154 Ill.Dec. 830,210 Ill.App.3d 147
• Parties: , 154 Ill.Dec. 830 The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. James WASHINGTON, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: United States Appellate Court of Illinois

Page 1279

568 N.E.2d 1279

210 Ill.App.3d 147, 154 Ill.Dec. 830

The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. James WASHINGTON, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 1-87-1311.

Appellate Court of Illinois First District, First Division.

Nov. 13, 1990.

Rehearing Denied March 27, 1991.

Randolph N. Stone, Public Defender of Cook County (Millicent Willis, Asst. Public Defender, of counsel), for defendant-appellant.

Richard M. Daley, State's Atty., County of Cook (Inge Fryklund, Joseph G. Howard, Judith C. Rice, Asst. State's Attys., of counsel), for plaintiff-appellee.

Justice CAMPBELL delivered the opinion of the court:

Defendant, James Washington, was charged by indictment with criminal sexual assault (Ill.Rev.Stat., 1985, ch. 38, par. 12-13-(a)(1)) and aggravated criminal sexual assault. (Ill.Rev.Stat., 1985, ch. 38, par. 12-14(a)(1).) Following a bench trial, the defendant was convicted of aggravated criminal sexual assault and sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment. On appeal, the defendant contends that: (1) he received ineffective assistance of counsel where disciplinary proceedings were simultaneously pending against his defense counsel; (2) he was not proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt where the victim's testimony was neither corroborated nor clear and convincing; and (3) the trial court considered improper factors in determining the defendant's guilt. For the following reasons, the judgment of the trial court is reversed and the cause is remanded for a new trial.

The record reveals the following. The victim testified that on May 29, 1986, she and her boyfriend paid defendant $30 to rent a room for 30 days in his apartment. The victim testified that, prior to that date, she had never met the defendant and, to the best of her knowledge, neither she nor her boyfriend, P.S., had seen the apartment prior to the rental. When P.S. entered into the rental agreement, defendant gave him one key to the apartment. Subsequently, the victim and P.S. had two keys made. The first night that they stayed in the apartment, the victim and P.S. slept on a queen size bed with only a box spring. The next day they went grocery shopping, placed the food they had purchased in the refrigerator and left the apartment. While away from the apartment, they drank four bottles of wine. Upon their return, they discovered that the burglar bars on the apartment door were locked and they could not get inside. When some of defendant's friends came to the door, Rick, who also lived in the apartment, let the friends in. At that time, the victim and P.S. also entered. Upon seeing the victim and P.S., defendant asked them to leave the apartment. Defendant and P.S. began fighting and defendant took the apartment key from him and tore his pants pocket with a knife while looking for money. Thereafter, defendant went into the kitchen to search the victim and upon completion of the search, she sat on the couch next to P.S. in the living room.

The victim further testified that she needed to use the bathroom and defendant followed her into the bathroom, and told her to take off her pants. When she refused, defendant hit her on the head with a wine bottle, and again ordered her to remove her pants. After a second refusal, he cut her on the left side of her back with the broken wine bottle. She then removed her pants and laid on the floor as instructed. Defendant removed his pants and proceeded to place his penis into her mouth, then her vagina, again in her mouth, and back in her vagina where he ejaculated. Defendant then pulled up his pants and returned to the living room. The victim followed him shortly thereafter and saw P.S. sitting on the living room floor surrounded by five people. These individuals began threatening him and the victim. Subsequently, defendant allowed them to leave the apartment. Once outside, the victim told P.S. about the sexual attack by defendant and about her injuries. They went to a "pay phone" and called the police. When the police arrived, they took the victim to Michael Reese Hospital for treatment. The victim testified that, while at the hospital, she gave her apartment key to P.S. in order for him to accompany the police back to defendant's apartment. She stated that she was not having a menstrual period on the day of the incident.

P.S.'s testimony was very similar to the testimony given by the victim. However, P.S. also testified that his friend Cordell told him about the availability of defendant's apartment and that P.S., Cordell and defendant went to look at the apartment. P.S. stated that the bed that he and the victim slept on was "a little less than full size." P.S. further testified that on the next day, when he and defendant were fighting, defendant tried to stab him with a "paring knife." P.S. testified that the victim went to use the bathroom and defendant followed her into the bathroom and told his friends to keep P.S. in the living room. P.S. heard "pounding and scuffling" noises on the door and walls of the bathroom. Defendant was sweating when he came out of the bathroom and the victim came out shortly thereafter. P.S. also testified that when he and the victim left defendant's apartment, her head and hands were bleeding and she had a large spot of blood on the back of her blouse. They called the police and the victim was taken to Michael Reese Hospital. While at the hospital, the victim gave P.S. her key to defendant's apartment. When the police and P.S. arrived at defendant's apartment, P.S. gave the key to the police, who opened the door and subsequently arrested defendant.

The parties stipulated that, if Dr. Gordon of Michael Reese Hospital, were called to testify, he would state that when he examined the victim at the hospital, he noticed a .3 centimeter puncture wound on the left side of her back and a swollen laceration on her head. He would further testify that he took oral and vaginal smears from the victim which he gave to an evidence technician. It was also stipulated that Dr. Gordon would testify that when he examined the victim, she was found to be in the late state of her menstrual cycle and upon the taking of a blood sample, her blood alcohol level was 293 milligrams. It was further stipulated that if Mary Ann Caporusso, a Microanalyst for the Chicago Police Department, were called to testify, she would state that upon performing a test on the oral and vaginal smears, the oral smear tested negative for spermatozoa and semen and the vaginal smear tested positive for spermatozoa.

Defendant testified that he was a recovering alcoholic and he did not know the victim until he met her on May 30, 1986, at Alco drugstore with P.S. He stated that the victim followed him out of the store and asked him if he wanted a date. Defendant responded that he did not have enough money, but others at his apartment might want to put together a package deal. The victim then accompanied him to his apartment where they started drinking and the victim began "talking in riddles." Thereafter, P.S. came to the apartment and angrily took the victim to the bedroom where they started fighting. Defendant went into the bedroom, "broke up" the fight, and noticed that the victim had blood on her face. P.S. and the victim left the apartment and defendant discovered that his door key and wallet were missing. Defendant denied that he had rented a room to the victim and P.S. and that they had spent the night in his apartment. Defendant further denied having sexual intercourse with the victim because she was drunk and could not set a price. Defendant testified that he receives disability insurance because his left hand has been paralyzed for three years and, as a result of the paralysis, he does not have any strength in the left hand. Defendant also testified that after he had gone to bed on the night in question, the police entered his apartment with a key and searched the apartment. The police did not recover any broken bottles and they did not discover any blood.

Detective Robert Utter testified that he was assigned to investigate the rape of the victim. When he returned to the apartment with P.S. to arrest defendant he did not find any broken glass on the bathroom floor and he observed defendant take out his keys and wallet when he put on his trousers. Detective Utter further testified that defendant resisted the arrest and, because of defendant's strength, it took both him and another officer to handcuff defendant.

Defendant initially argues that he was denied his sixth amendment right to the effective assistance of counsel where defense counsel was subject to pending disciplinary proceedings for professional misconduct while he was acting as defendant's counsel. Defendant asserts that defense counsel's alleged incompetence was shown by his inadequate preparation for trial as evidenced by his: (1) failure to question the victim about sexual relations with another on the night of May 30, 1986; (2) failure to introduce medical records documenting defendant's disability; and (3) conducting rambling cross-examinations indicating his failure to conduct a pre-trial investigation.

The purpose of the constitutional requirement that a defendant is entitled to the effective assistance of counsel is to insure that the defendant will receive a fair trial. (Strickland v. Washington (1984), 466 U.S. 668, 104 S.Ct. 2052, 80 L.Ed.2d 674.) Moreover, the benchmark for determining an ineffective assistance of counsel claim is whether counsel's performance so undermined the proper functioning of the adversarial process that the trial cannot be relied upon as having produced a just result. (People v. Cunningham (1989), 191 Ill.App.3d 332, 337, 138 Ill.Dec. 598, 547 N.E.2d 765.) In order for a defendant to succeed on an ineffective assistance of counsel claim, he must show that counsel's performance was so deficient that it fell below an objective standard of reasonableness and that the performance prejudiced the...