People v. Wilson

• Decision Date: 13 January 1981
• Docket Number: No. 79-2078,79-2078
• Citation: 92 Ill.App.3d 370,415 N.E.2d 1315
• Parties: , 48 Ill.Dec. 31 PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Kathleen WILSON, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: United States Appellate Court of Illinois

Page 1315

415 N.E.2d 1315

92 Ill.App.3d 370, 48 Ill.Dec. 31

PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Kathleen WILSON, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 79-2078.

Appellate Court of Illinois, First District, Second Division.

Jan. 13, 1981.

Gerald A. Goldman, Chartered, Chicago (Gerald A. Goldman, Chicago, of counsel), for defendant-appellant.

Bernard Carey, State's Atty. of Cook County, Chicago (Marcia B. Orr, Myra J. Brown and Michael K. Demetrio, Asst. State's Attys., Chicago, of counsel), for plaintiff-appellee.

PERLIN, Justice:

Defendant, Kathleen Wilson, was indicted for the murder of her four month old son, Reginald Wilson. (Ill.Rev.Stat. 1977, ch. 38, par. 9-1.) Following a jury trial defendant was found guilty as charged and was sentenced to serve 20 years in the Illinois Department of Corrections. From that judgment defendant now appeals, presenting the following issues for review: (1) whether the trial court properly admitted into evidence a court reporter statement which defendant did not sign; (2) whether certain remarks of the prosecutors during closing argument constituted reversible error; and (3) whether autopsy slides revealing prior injuries to the deceased were properly admitted into evidence. For the reasons hereinafter set forth we affirm the judgment of the circuit court of Cook County.

Chicago police officer Joseph Barrett testified that on January 6, 1978 between 12 and 12:30 p. m. he and his partner, Joseph Bamberger, went to defendant's home in the course of an investigation into the death of her four month old son Reginald. The officers found defendant, whom Barrett identified in court, Reginal Silar, ¹ who was defendant's common law husband and father of the victim, and several young children. Investigator Barrett informed defendant and Silar that the officers were investigating the death of Reginald Wilson and advised them of their Miranda rights. The officers asked defendant and Silar to accompany them to Area 3 Homicide where they were questioned separately. After again advising defendant of her Miranda rights, Barrett confronted her with the results of the autopsy performed on the body of Reginald Wilson and asked her if she knew what had happened to her baby. Defendant denied knowing how her child had been injured. Barrett left the interview room and returned about 45 minutes later (4 p. m.) with investigator Bamberger and Reginal Silar. Silar informed defendant that he (Silar) had told Bamberger what had happened to the baby: "I told him that you hit him." In response to Silar's accusation, defendant said that a couple of mornings earlier she had struck the child on the left side of the head.

Officer William Melaniphy testified that on January 5, 1978 he and his partner Thomas Quinn went to defendant's home and were admitted by Silar. Defendant was lying asleep on the front room couch. Even by grabbing defendant and shaking her, neither Silar nor Melaniphy was able to awaken her. The officers left without speaking to her.

Assistant state's attorney David Weiner testified that on January 6, 1978 he interviewed both Reginal Silar and defendant, whom he identified in court. Weiner advised defendant of her Miranda rights and then took a 20-25 minute oral statement from her. In that statement defendant said that about 1 a. m., on January 3, 1978, she was awakened by her baby's crying. Although she had been drinking earlier in the day, she said she was alert when she woke up. Defendant went into Reginald's room, checked his diaper and then went to get a feeding bottle. When she returned, the child was still crying. Defendant told Weiner that she then struck the baby twice in the head with a partially closed fist. She demonstrated this to Weiner. The child quieted down and she gave him the bottle. Two days later she found that Reginald was not breathing normally. She called for an ambulance and tried to give Reginald artificial respiration. Because of his familiarity with the autopsy report, which indicated that Reginald had on some earlier occasion suffered broken ribs and a broken arm, Weiner asked defendant if Reginald had been injured the previous October. Defendant said that on October 1, 1977, when Reginald was approximately one month old, he rolled off the side of a bed onto the floor and broke his arm. She did not realize that he had been hurt until he became irritable. She and Reginal Silar then took the child to a hospital.

At the conclusion of the oral interview, defendant agreed to give a written court reporter statement. The court reporter, John Akouris, arrived about one hour after Weiner had completed the oral interview. Defense counsel objected to Weiner reading the statement to the jury on the grounds that Weiner did not take or transcribe the statement and that defendant did not sign it. These objections were overruled and Weiner read the statement (People's Exhibit No. 1) to the jury.

In her statement defendant said that she had given birth to Reginald Wilson on September 6, 1977. She admitted that she had told Weiner earlier she had struck her child about 1 a. m. Tuesday morning, January 3, 1978 but added that it was accidental. Defendant said she had been drinking and was taking medication the night when her baby's crying awakened her. She was not fully conscious when she went in to check on Reginald. Defendant said she examined his diaper, then walked into the bathroom to prepare his bottle. When she returned, Reginald was still crying and she struck him on the left side of the head with a partially closed fist. She said it was unintentional. Reginald continued to cry and defendant hit him again on the left side of the head. The baby calmed down and defendant gave him his bottle. She burped him and then went back to bed. Defendant said that Reginal Silar was out buying cigarettes at that time and her older children were asleep. Defendant said she had no reason to strike Reginald other than the fact that he was crying. Earlier in the day defendant had consumed two glasses of Calvert gin and Coke.

Two days after she had struck her child on January 3, 1978, defendant heard him cry out. "It was a strange kind of cry, and somehow I think I knew that there was something the matter with him. I went into the room and he wasn't breathing." This was the first time since she had hit her baby on January 3 that she noticed anything wrong with him. Defendant tried to revive her baby, and Silar called an ambulance which transported them to Englewood Hospital. There a nurse told defendant her child had died. No one but defendant had struck Reginald on January 3.

Defendant said that on October 1, 1977 when Reginald was about a month old, she picked him up to change his diaper. She laid him on a bed, face down, but he kept turning over. She left him alone momentarily to get a washcloth and when she returned she discovered that Reginald had fallen off the bed and onto the floor. She did not immediately notice anything wrong with Reginald but later in the day she took him first to Englewood Hospital, then to Mary Thompson Hospital. Defendant denied that she was drunk on October 1, 1977, or that she had grabbed her baby by the arm. When Weiner asked defendant how her baby could have fractured his ribs, which defendant said she first knew about when Weiner told her, she said her five year old daughter had on two different occasions dropped the baby when she was playing with him. According to defendant, the baby was dropped from a height of approximately three feet. At this point in taking defendant's written statement, Weiner was informed that defense counsel, William Starke, was on the phone and wanted to speak with him immediately. After speaking with counsel, Weiner terminated the interview with defendant. The written statement was not shown to or signed by defendant.

Dr. Mitra Kalelkar testified that on January 6, 1978 she performed an autopsy on Reginald Wilson. The baby weighed 10 pounds. The external examination revealed no visible signs of trauma. In her internal examination, Dr. Kalelkar observed healed rib fractures (calluses) on both sides of Reginald's chest and identified People's Exhibits Nos. 2 and 3 as slides of the fractured ribs. The tenth rib on the left side had been broken and the seventh and eighth ribs on the right side.

In her internal examination of the baby's skull, Dr. Kalelkar observed evidence of subgaleal (inner scalp) hemorrhaging in the left parietal region. In the same region she discovered a "T" shaped fracture of the skull, three inches in length and one-half inch in the stem. Examination of the intracranial cavity showed a large amount of partially clotted blood in the subdural space. The pathologist identified People's Exhibit No. 4 as a photograph of the inside wall of the skull (calvarium). Microscopic examination of the brain tissue revealed three layers of bleeding of the dura, the covering of the brain which divides it into two hemispheres. The topmost layer of bleeding was indicative of very recent bleeding, 24 to 48 hours old. The second layer of blood was approximately one week old. The blood cells in this layer had already split and the blood cells were liquified. Finally, there was a third layer of clotted blood indicative of more remote bleeding, at least a month old. The fracture itself was 24 to 48 hours old. In Dr. Kalelkar's opinion, Reginald Wilson died of cranial cerebral injuries, more specifically, a fractured skull and bleeding within the meninges of the brain. Death would not have been instantaneous. Dr. Kalelkar testified that a blow from a partially closed fist could have caused the injuries resulting in Reginald's death. She testified further that an x-ray of Reginald's left upper arm revealed a partially healed broken left humerus. She also expressed the opinion that a month old baby could not roll over from its back onto its stomach or the reverse.

On cross-examination Dr. Kalelkar said...