People v. Bona

2018 IL App (2d) 160581

118 N.E.3d 1272

427 Ill.Dec. 601

The PEOPLE of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.Stephen S. BONA, Defendant-Appellant.

No. 2-16-0581

Appellate Court of Illinois, Second District.

Opinion Filed December 10, 2018

Stephen L. Richards, of Chicago, for appellant.

Robert B. Berlin, State’s Attorney, of Wheaton (Lisa Anne Hoffman and Edward R. Psenicka, Assistant State’s Attorneys, of counsel), for the People.

JUSTICE ZENOFF delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.

¶ 1 Following a jury trial in the circuit court of Du Page County, defendant, Stephen S. Bona, was convicted of two counts of threatening a public official, in violation of section 12-9 of the Criminal Code of 2012 (Code) ( 720 ILCS 5/12-9(a) (West 2012) ). Defendant appeals his conviction, challenging (1) whether the statute is constitutional, (2) the sufficiency of the evidence presented against him, (3) the admissibility of certain evidence, and (4) allegedly improper comments during closing argument. We affirm.

¶ 2 I. BACKGROUND

¶ 3 At defendant's trial, Kathleen Murphy, a legislative assistant to State Representative Jeanne Ives, testified that on the morning of March 22, 2013, she was listening to voicemails that came into Ives's office over the previous two days. One of the calls was from a man who "sounded like somebody was reading from a script." Murphy testified that the man compared himself and his partner and the good things they had done to Representative Ives and her husband and how "awful" they were. Murphy stated that the man called Representative Ives the "C-word." Murphy said that she deleted the voicemail due to its offensive nature, as was her standard practice. The next voicemail in succession sounded like it was from the same person. That voicemail was preserved and played for the jury:

"Your Tea Party brethren, Sara[h] Palin, put up a map that included the names, locations, faces of Democratic candidates, and put them in the cross-hairs of a gun. Perhaps we should do the same for you. We know where you live. There is no longer an assault weapons ban. Perhaps you should think about that before you speak the next time, you stupid fucking bitch."

¶ 4 Murphy testified that she had been trained to contact the police in situations that created uncertainty or worry in her mind. She phoned the police to report the second voicemail, and then notified Representative Ives.

¶ 5 Officer Robert Krolikowski testified that he was a 23-year veteran of the Wheaton Police Department. On the morning of March 22, 2013, he responded to the call from Representative Ives's office. He spoke with Murphy, who expressed concern about the contents of the voicemail. Officer Krolikowski listened to the voicemail and made a recording of the call. He noted in his report that the previous voicemail was from a similar-sounding person and that Murphy did not characterize the first voicemail as threatening. Krolikowski later alerted his superiors about the case. He turned over the recording and the information he had gathered to the investigation division.

¶ 6 Representative Ives testified. She began her term as the state representative for the 42nd District in January 2013. On February 25, 2013, she appeared on a Catholic radio program called Marriage Monday that airs in the Chicago area. A recording of the radio interview was played for the jury. Among other topics, Representative Ives discussed the then-pending gay-marriage bill, to which she expressed her opposition:

"They are trying to redefine marriage. It's a completely disordered relationship. And when you have a disordered relationship, you don't ever get order out of that.

* * *

They're not just trying to redefine marriage; they're trying to redefine society. They're trying to weasel their way into acceptability so they can then start to push their agenda down into the schools because this gives them some sort of legitimacy.

* * *

To not have a mother and a father is really a disordered state for a child to grow up in, and it really makes that child an object of desire rather than the result of a matrimony [sic ]."

Representative Ives testified that she received both positive and negative feedback about her comments. Regarding the negative feedback, she testified: "I was getting hate mail, e-mails, phone calls, I had to shut down my Facebook page, just nasty words, nasty statements over the one minute in the radio program where I spoke about [gay marriage]."

¶ 7 According to Representative Ives, on the morning of March 22, 2013, she was in Springfield when she received a call from Murphy. Murphy informed Representative Ives of the voicemail that had prompted her to call the police. Representative Ives listened to the voicemail and described how she felt at the time:

"I felt threatened and I was frightened. I was—I am sitting in Springfield. My kids are at school. They walk home from school. This person, who I do not know, says he knows where I live and there is no longer an assault weapons ban and I better watch what I say. I mean, it is very frightening to know that somebody is targeting your home where your children live and I was afraid. I was just—it was—I—all I could do was make sure my kids were safe and worry about them. It was—I was afraid."

¶ 8 Officer Jason Scott testified that he was assigned to work the case after Officer Krolikowski's initial contact and report. He contacted defendant using the caller identification information Officer Krolikowski had collected at Representative Ives's office. Defendant confirmed that he had left a message for Representative Ives, but he denied making any threats. Defendant agreed to meet with Officer Scott at the Wheaton Police Department later that evening. At the police station, defendant explained that he had left two messages. He told Officer Scott that he first collected his thoughts on a computer and then called Representative Ives's number. He intended to leave only one message but was cut off from the system during his dictation. This necessitated the second call and message. He claimed that, during the calls, he indicated that he thought that Representative Ives's views were flawed and that she should repent as a Christian. Defendant explained his comment about knowing where Representative Ives lived as meaning that he knew only generally where she lived, based on a map posted on the Internet, but did not know her actual address. Officer Scott played the recording of the message for defendant, who confirmed that it was his voice on the recording. Officer Scott placed defendant under arrest at that time.

¶ 9 Defendant testified that he met his husband, Michael Bradley, on New Year's Eve, 1991. They committed to each other as a couple shortly thereafter and had been together ever since. In June 2011, they entered into a civil union in Kane County on the same day that civil unions became legal in Illinois. They married in November 2013, following the United States Supreme Court decision that legalized gay marriage nationwide. See Obergefell v. Hodges , 576 U.S. ––––, ––––, 135 S.Ct. 2584, 2604-05, 192 L.Ed.2d 609 (2015).

¶ 10 Defendant testified that in March 2013 he was acutely aware of the public debate and the pending gay-marriage bill in the Illinois legislature. He kept abreast of the status of the bill by subscribing to certain news groups. During that period, he received an e-mail from one of the news groups directing him to an article in the Huffington Post. The article highlighted Representative Ives's comments from the radio interview and included a hyperlink to excerpted recordings of the interview. Defendant listened to the excerpts and then went to the radio station's website to listen to the entire interview. He testified that he felt offended by the comments. He characterized the "disordered" comment as a "dog whistle" that harkened back to a time when gay people were classified as mentally ill and put into hospitals. He said that the term "weasel" was insulting because it implied that gay people were "distrustful and unworthy" vermin. Defendant testified that he was most insulted by the comment that a child was an "object of desire" in a gay marriage.

¶ 11 Defendant testified that he never intended to harm or frighten Representative Ives. After hearing her comments, he conducted further research. He found an op-ed written by Representative Ives in the Chicago Tribune where she expressed displeasure with House Speaker Michael Madigan over the legislative process involving a concealed-carry bill. He located a second article in which Representative Ives wrote that she believed that "Second Amendment rights are a defense against tyranny." Defendant testified that he disagreed with her views on gun control and did not think that they were supported by the text of the second amendment or historical documents. He said that he let the information "sit for a day or two" before he decided to call her and let her know what he thought.

¶ 12 On the evening of Wednesday, March 20, 2013, he organized his thoughts by typing them into a Microsoft Word document on his laptop. Once he was satisfied with the precise wording, he called Representative Ives's office, reached her voicemail system, and read the document word-for-word. Defendant testified that he talked about his 21-year relationship with Bradley and how they had been responsible citizens who paid more than their fair share of taxes. They cared for an elderly neighbor and helped other neighbors who were facing foreclosure. He said that he and Bradley had raised four German shepherds and rescued one abandoned cat. He testified that he made mention of the hatred that he and Bradley had faced as a couple, including from his own family. He said that he told Representative Ives that her comments on homosexual relationships were offensive and based in hate and ignorance. He said that he assumed that she was a Christian, because she was from Wheaton, and that there was nothing in...