People v. Wilkerson

• Decision Date: 20 November 1981
• Docket Number: 54394,Nos. 54393,s. 54393
• Citation: 57 Ill.Dec. 628,429 N.E.2d 526,87 Ill.2d 151
• Parties: , 57 Ill.Dec. 628, 28 A.L.R.4th 496 The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Appellant, v. Johnnie "Little Johnnie" WILKERSON, Appellee. The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Appellant, v. Johnnie B. WILKERSON, Appellee.
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court

Page 526

429 N.E.2d 526

87 Ill.2d 151, 57 Ill.Dec. 628, 28

A.L.R.4th 496

The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Appellant, v. Johnnie "Little Johnnie" WILKERSON, Appellee.

The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Appellant, v. Johnnie B. WILKERSON, Appellee.

Nos. 54393, 54394.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Nov. 20, 1981.

Tyrone Fahner, Atty. Gen., Chicago (Henry Lazaro, Erwin & Kirtley, Champaign, Robert J. Biderman, Deputy Director, and James K. Horstman, Staff Atty., State's Attys. Appellate Service Commission, Springfield, of counsel), for the People.

Daniel D. Yuhas, Deputy State Appellate Defender and Don L. Johnson, Asst. State Appellate Defender, Springfield, for appellee Johnnie "Little Johnnie" Wilkerson, Jr.

Marian Kurata, Urbana, for appellee Johnnie B. Wilkerson.

SIMON, Justice:

A Champaign County jury found the defendants, Johnnie "Little Johnnie" Wilkerson and Johnnie B. Wilkerson, guilty of attempted murder, armed violence and aggravated battery in the shooting of Ricky Jones, Terry Bolden and Lurlie Bolden. But the jury's verdict was tainted by both improper limitation of the cross-examination of a State's witness and confusing instructions. The appellate court reversed the convictions in unpublished orders (73 Ill.2d R. 23) and granted the defendants new trials (90 Ill.App.3d 1204, 49 Ill.Dec. 674, 418 N.E.2d 528; 89 Ill.App.3d 1206, 48 Ill.Dec. 874, 417 N.E.2d 276). This court granted leave to appeal under Rule 315 (73 Ill.2d R. 315), and we now affirm the appellate court.

The incident which gave rise to the convictions grew out of a tussle between two boys who were neighbors in a Champaign apartment complex. One boy was bitten; he complained to his mother, Vivian Turner, who took up the matter with the other boy's mother, Katie Bolden. An argument erupted, and a police officer was eventually called to quell the disturbance. After he left, tempers continued to flare, not only between the mothers but also between at least one of the defendants, who were Vivian Turner's brothers, and the victims, who were friends of or related to Katie Bolden.

When a fight broke out between Katie Bolden and Vivian Turner, Johnnie B. Wilkerson fired a shot into the air to break it up. Accounts of what followed differed. The State's witnesses said that Johnnie B. Wilkerson shot at them, hitting Lurlie and Terry Bolden, that he came into the Bolden apartment after them and shot Terry Bolden again, that he shot Ricky Jones in a struggle when Jones tried to grab Wilkerson's pistol, and that Little Johnnie Wilkerson came into the apartment and shot Jones as he lay on the floor. The victims claimed that everyone on their side of the dispute was unarmed.

Johnnie B. Wilkerson said that when he saw Katie Bolden running to attack Vivian Turner, he tried to grab Katie but was spun around. He saw Ricky Jones with something menacing in his hand, heard a shot and fired at Jones. Wilkerson then shot at Terry Bolden, who had come charging at him. Confused and wounded in the back, Wilkerson went into the Bolden apartment by mistake, only to have a shoot-out with the already wounded Terry Bolden, who followed him in. Wilkerson admitted Ricky Jones was shot in a struggle for the pistol.

Little Johnnie Wilkerson testified that he was behind the apartment building listening to a car radio when the shooting started. He said that he went into his sister's apartment and did not shoot anyone. Both Katie Bolden and Vivian Turner broke and ran when the shooting started.

On cross-examination of Katie Bolden, the defendants tried to impeach her by pointing out that her testimony could be biased. Several felony-theft and welfare-fraud charges were pending against her in Champaign County, and the defendants' aim was to convey to the jury that she might be trying to curry favor with the prosecutor of those charges by slanting her story in the Wilkerson case to suit the State. An offer of proof disclosed the charges, but Bolden denied receiving any promises of leniency. The prosecutor in her case, who at one time was the prosecutor in the Wilkerson case, told Bolden that after the Wilkerson case was completed, he "would be in touch with her. I would be in contact with her lawyer and try to work something out * * * to see what could be worked out." At the time of the Wilkerson trial, the prosecutor had not made up his mind what he was going to do with the pending charges against Katie Bolden. The trial court refused to allow the defendants to present this evidence to the jury.

The defendants should have been permitted on cross-examination to develop matters that would reasonably show the bias, motive or willingness of the State's witnesses to testify, and this included the fact that Katie Bolden was charged with a crime. (People v. Barr (1972), 51 Ill.2d 50, 51, 280 N.E.2d 708.) The widest latitude should have been given to the defendants to show bias. (People v. Mason (1963), 28 Ill.2d 396, 403, 192 N.E.2d 835.) Defense counsel should have been allowed to present the theory that the witness was not credible because she was being rewarded for her testimony, and should have been allowed to expose to the jury the underlying charges so that the jurors could consider their effect, if any, on the reliability of the witness.

The trial court's decision to keep this evidence from the jury was not justified as an exercise of sound discretion. People v. Eddington (1979), 77 Ill.2d 41, 31 Ill.Dec. 808, 394 N.E.2d 1185, on which the State places heavy reliance, is unlike this case. In Eddington the witness had already given similar testimony in the case before the pending charges had arisen. Because the pending charges were from a different county, the prosecutor had little influence over their disposition. In Eddington it was proper to keep the matters from the jury because the pending charges could not reasonably have affected the bias, motive or willingness of the State's witness to testify. (77 Ill.2d 41, 46, 31 Ill.Dec. 808, 394 N.E.2d 1185.) But that is not the situation here. The Bolden charges were explicitly being held until the Wilkerson trial was completed, and a jury could reasonably infer that Bolden was influenced by those charges to give testimony favorable to the State, despite her protests to the contrary. The trial court should have permitted the whole matter to be presented to the jury.

The error in limiting the defendants' cross-examination was not harmless. The prejudice which ensues from a denial of the constitutional right of confrontation was described in Alford v. United States (1931), 282 U.S. 687, 692, 51 S.Ct. 218, 219, 75 L.Ed. 624, 628:

"Prejudice ensues from a denial of the opportunity to place the witness in his proper setting and put the weight of his testimony and his credibility to a test, without which the jury cannot fairly appraise them. * * * In this respect a summary denial of the right of cross-examination is distinguishable from the erroneous admission of harmless testimony."

(See also Davis v. Alaska (1974), 415 U.S. 308, 318, 94 S.Ct. 1105, 1111, 39 L.Ed.2d 347, 355; Smith v. Illinois (1968), 390 U.S. 129, 132, 88 S.Ct. 748, 750, 19 L.Ed.2d 956, 959.) The test for harmless constitutional error is whether the error was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. (Chapman v. California (1967), 386 U.S. 18, 87 S.Ct. 824, 17 L.Ed.2d 705.) Three approaches for measuring error under Chapman have been noted: (1) focusing on the error to determine whether it might have contributed to the conviction (e.g., Fahy v. Connecticut (1963), 375 U.S. 85, 84 S.Ct. 229, 11 L.Ed.2d 171); (2) examining the other evidence in the case to see if overwhelming evidence supports the conviction (e.g., Milton v. Wainwright (1972), 407 U.S. 371, 92 S.Ct. 2174, 33 L.Ed.2d 1); (3) determining whether the evidence is cumulative or merely duplicates properly admitted evidence (e.g., Harrington v. California (1969), 395 U.S. 250, 89 S.Ct. 1726, 23 L.Ed.2d 284). (People v. Collins (1980), 85 Ill.App.3d 1056, 1060, 41 Ill.Dec. 373, 407 N.E.2d 871; State v. McKenzie (1980) Mont., 608 P.2d 428, 458.) None of these ways of viewing the issue lead to the conclusion that the error in this case was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt.

First, the error could have contributed to the guilty verdicts. Had the jury heard the excluded impeachment evidence and chosen to disbelieve Katie Bolden, the verdict might well have been different. She was the linchpin of the State's case; she was the one who started the fight that led to the shooting.

Second, the other evidence in the case was not overwhelming. The prosecution and defense accounts sharply varied and each was supported by testimony of participants and bystanders. Because credibility was the key to the case, this error cannot simply be dismissed as harmless.

Finally, the impeachment evidence was not merely corroborative. The State points out that Katie Bolden's testimony was dubious, even without the attempted...