People v. Rodriguez

2018 IL App (1st) 141379 -B

106 N.E.3d 436

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

v.Sebastian RODRIGUEZ, Defendant–Appellant.

No. 1–14–1379

Appellate Court of Illinois, First District, FIRST DIVISION.

June 4, 2018

Michael J. Pelletier, Patricia Mysza, and Philip D. Payne, of State Appellate Defender’s Office, of Chicago, for appellant.

Kimberly M. Foxx, State’s Attorney, of Chicago (Alan J. Spellberg, Mary P. Needham, Noah Montague, and Sari London, Assistant State’s Attorneys, of counsel), for the People.

PRESIDING JUSTICE PIERCE delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.

¶ 1 This case is before us on remand from a supervisory order of our supreme court. Fifteen-year-old Sebastian Rodriguez was charged with first degree murder in connection with the shooting of thirteen-year-old Sameere Conn on October 1, 2008. At the time of the offense, 15–year–old defendants charged with first degree murder were automatically excluded from juvenile court jurisdiction. Sebastian was tried, convicted, and sentenced as an adult in criminal court. After a jury found Sebastian guilty of murder, the circuit court sentenced him to 50 years in prison: 25 years for the murder and 25 additional years pursuant to a then-mandatory firearm enhancement.

¶ 2 In this direct appeal, Sebastian argued that (1) the circuit court erroneously denied his motion to suppress evidence found during a search of his home, (2) expert testimony identifying a revolver found in his home as the murder weapon was improperly admitted without a hearing to determine if it was based on generally accepted scientific methodologies, and (3) a 50–year sentence for an offender who was 15 years old at the time of his offense was unconstitutional.

¶ 3 Shortly after Sebastian filed his notice of appeal, the Illinois legislature raised the age of automatic transfer from juvenile court to criminal court for defendants charged with first degree murder from 15 to 16 years of age (see Pub. Act 99–258, § 5 (eff. Jan. 1, 2016) (amending section 5–130(1)(a) of the Juvenile Court Act of 1987 (Juvenile Court Act) ( 705 ILCS 405/5–130(1)(a) ) ) ). The legislature also adopted additional sentencing guidelines for defendants who were under the age of 18 at the time of their offenses and who were tried as adults, including making firearm enhancements discretionary, rather than mandatory (see Pub. Act 99–69, § 10 (eff. Jan. 1, 2016) (adding 730 ILCS 5/5–4.5–105); Pub. Act 99–258, § 15 (eff. Jan. 1, 2016) (adding 730 ILCS 5/5–4.5–105) ). In supplemental briefing, Sebastian argued that these amendments should apply to his case, pending on appeal.

¶ 4 In our initial opinion, issued on May 8, 2017, we agreed with Sebastian that the amendment increasing the minimum age for mandatory transfer to criminal court applied to cases, like his, that were pending on appeal when the amendment took effect. We affirmed the jury's guilty verdict for first degree murder, vacated Sebastian's sentence, and remanded this matter to the juvenile court for resentencing. The State sought review of that decision by the Illinois Supreme Court. Six months later, our supreme court decided, in People v. Hunter , 2017 IL 121306, ¶¶ 36, 43, 422 Ill.Dec. 791, 104 N.E.3d 358, that the amendment to the automatic transfer provision applied only to cases that were pending in the circuit court when the amendment took effect, but not to those cases pending on appeal. Accordingly, on January 18, 2018, the supreme court issued a supervisory order in which it denied the State's petition for leave to appeal but directed us to vacate our earlier judgment and reconsider this case in light of Hunter . People v. Rodriguez , No. 122467, 419 Ill.Dec. 797, 94 N.E.3d 666 (Ill. Jan. 18, 2018) (supervisory order).

¶ 5 There is no question that the holding in Hunter applies in this case and that therefore our initial ruling that the amendment to the automatic transfer provision applies to Sebastian must be vacated. Hunter also holds that the amended sentencing guidelines apply only to sentencing hearings held after those amendments took effect. Hunter , 2017 IL 121306, ¶¶ 54–56, 422 Ill.Dec. 791, 104 N.E.3d 358. Although juvenile defendants who receive new sentencing hearings on remand must be sentenced in accordance with the amended guidelines, contrary to Sebastian's position, the new guidelines provide no independent basis for remand and resentencing.

¶ 6 There is no reason to revisit most of the issues raised in this appeal and decided in our initial opinion, as they are not impacted by Hunter. We will restate those aspects of our initial opinion here since our previous judgment is now vacated.

¶ 7 There are two issues that we did not previously reach that we must now decide and that have been fully briefed by the parties both in their original briefs and in supplemental briefs filed after our supreme court remanded this case for our reconsideration in light of Hunter . Those issues are whether defendant's 50–year sentence violates the eighth amendment and the proportionate penalties clause. We now hold, in accord with several other panels of this district, that defendant's 50–year sentence, pursuant to which he will not be eligible for release until the age of 65, is not a de facto life sentence and therefore consideration of the "distinctive attributes of youth" articulated by the United States Supreme Court in Miller v. Alabama , 567 U.S. 460, 471–72, 132 S.Ct. 2455, 183 L.Ed.2d 407 (2012), and Montgomery v. Louisiana , 577 U.S. ––––, ––––, 136 S.Ct. 718, 733, 193 L.Ed.2d 599 (2016), was not required. In addition, defendant's sentence does not violate the proportionate penalties clause. We therefore affirm the judgment and sentence on the charge of first degree murder.

¶ 8 I. BACKGROUND

¶ 9 A. Pretrial Proceedings

¶ 10 Nine days after Sameere Conn's death, Chicago police obtained a warrant to search Sebastian Rodriguez's home for evidence related to the shooting. In the complaint for the search warrant, Detective Ricky Bean identified two eyewitnesses who testified before a grand jury that they knew Sebastian and saw him, dressed in a hooded sweatshirt, fire shots into the convenience store where Sameere was killed, as well as a third eyewitness who identified Sebastian as the individual he saw looking through the glass window of the store's door just before shots were fired through that window. According to the complaint, officers also learned from two other witnesses that Sebastian was known to possess a "kill list" of potential victims that included Sameere. Finally, the complaint alleged that, in connection with prior arrests, Sebastian had given the address 10744 South Hoxie Avenue in Chicago as his home address.

¶ 11 Finding this sufficient to establish probable cause, the circuit court issued a warrant to search Sebastian's home for "[o]ne dark colored or grey hooded sweat shirt, [o]ne document containing a list of individual names, [a]nd one handgun." Officers executed the warrant on October 11, 2008, retrieving a revolver from under a floorboard in the bathroom and a number of hooded sweatshirts from elsewhere in the home.

¶ 12 Sebastian was charged by grand jury indictment with first degree murder.

¶ 13 In his motion to suppress filed on April 26, 2010, Sebastian argued that the evidence recovered during the October 11, 2008, search should be excluded because, even if officers had probable cause to arrest him, they had no reason to believe that specific evidence would be found in his home 10 days after the shooting.

¶ 14 Although an evidentiary hearing was held on Sebastian's motion to suppress, the testimony offered related only to the scope of the search and the manner in which it was conducted, issues that are not raised in this appeal. The circuit court denied Sebastian's motion, explaining that, in its view, when officers have "a strong identification of a suspected shooter and that person's home," then "it is not beyond logic, nor * * * beyond the law, to have probable cause to see if in that person's place of residence, the place they call home, the place in which they keep their items, that there might be evidence of the crime there."

¶ 15 On May 9, 2013, Sebastian moved for an evidentiary hearing, pursuant to Frye v. United States , 293 F. 1013 (D.C. Cir. 1923), on the admissibility of expert testimony he expected the State to introduce linking the gun found in his home to a bullet recovered from the scene of the crime. Although he acknowledged that such testimony had historically been admitted by courts, he insisted a Frye hearing was needed because the reliability of the methodologies employed by ballistics experts had recently been questioned in the scientific community.

¶ 16 The circuit court disagreed and denied Sebastian's motion. Noting that it was aware of no published opinion of any court concluding that firearm identification evidence was not generally accepted in the scientific community, the court concluded that Sebastian's concerns went to the weight and not to the admissibility of the evidence.

¶ 17 B. Trial

¶ 18 A four-day trial in this case began on February 4, 2014. Because Sebastian does not contest the sufficiency of the evidence to support his conviction, we include only a brief summary of the trial testimony, with a fuller recitation of the firearms identification testimony, to provide context for the evidentiary issues raised on appeal.

¶ 19 At approximately 8 p.m. on October 1, 2008, Sameere walked home from nearby Trumball Park after a football game with a group of his friends from school. Sameere and two other boys stopped to purchase snacks at Hook's Finer Foods, a convenience store located at 106th Street and Bensley Avenue in Chicago, while two other friends waited outside. A handful of people were in the store at the time: the cashier, the owner of the building, and a few customers, including an individual known as "Tone" or "Tony," who was known to frequent the store. Sameere...