{ "id": 2821284, "name": "People of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Charles Sanford, Defendant-Appellant", "name_abbreviation": "People v. Sanford", "decision_date": "1968-10-03", "docket_number": "Gen. No. 52,047", "first_page": "101", "last_page": "107", "citations": [ { "type": "official", "cite": "100 Ill. App. 2d 101" } ], "court": { "name_abbreviation": "Ill. App. Ct.", "id": 8837, "name": "Illinois Appellate Court" }, "jurisdiction": { "id": 29, "name_long": "Illinois", "name": "Ill." }, "cites_to": [ { "cite": "224 NE2d 634", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "year": 1967, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "79 Ill App2d 273", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 2565326 ], "year": 1967, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/79/0273-01" ] }, { "cite": "208 NE2d 595", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "year": 1965, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "60 Ill App2d 339", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 2604666 ], "year": 1965, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/60/0339-01" ] }, { "cite": "235 NE2d 400", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "year": 1968, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "91 Ill App2d 465", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 2820232 ], "year": 1968, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/91/0465-01" ] }, { "cite": "144 NE2d 803", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "year": 1957, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "14 Ill App2d 490", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 5174405 ], "year": 1957, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/14/0490-01" ] }, { "cite": "206 NE2d 821", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "year": 1965, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "57 Ill App2d 221", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 2598036 ], "year": 1965, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/57/0221-01" ] }, { "cite": "150 NE 263", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.", "year": 1925, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "319 Ill 359", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill.", "case_ids": [ 5156272 ], "year": 1925, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill/319/0359-01" ] }, { "cite": "201 NE2d 756", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "year": 1964, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "52 Ill App2d 177", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 5279938 ], "year": 1964, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/52/0177-01" ] }, { "cite": "221 NE2d 68", "category": "reporters:state_regional", "reporter": "N.E.2d", "year": 1966, "opinion_index": 0 }, { "cite": "74 Ill App2d 458", "category": "reporters:state", "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d", "case_ids": [ 2580672 ], "year": 1966, "opinion_index": 0, "case_paths": [ "/ill-app-2d/74/0458-01" ] } ], "analysis": { "cardinality": 567, "char_count": 9290, "ocr_confidence": 0.62, "pagerank": { "raw": 3.1013986107955526e-07, "percentile": 0.8593587888714748 }, "sha256": "70e92b171df12c282f48dbeaada345df906fd6831fbf001df8227251b3ad3eaa", "simhash": "1:aaa4f624f7858390", "word_count": 1603 }, "last_updated": "2023-07-14T20:54:23.825564+00:00", "provenance": { "date_added": "2019-08-29", "source": "Harvard", "batch": "2018" }, "casebody": { "judges": [], "parties": [ "People of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Charles Sanford, Defendant-Appellant." ], "opinions": [ { "text": "MR. PRESIDING JUSTICE DEMPSEY\ndelivered the opinion of the court.\nThe defendant, Charles Sanford, was convicted by a jury of the offenses of murder and arson. He was sentenced to the penitentiary for concurrent terms of not less than fifty nor more than seventy-five years.\nHe contends that the State committed reversible error in commenting in its closing argument on his failure to produce alibi witnesses and in turning over a police report to his counsel in the presence of the jury. He also contends that the minimum sentence is excessive and should be reduced.\nOn August 28,1965, Sanford was living with Ludia Bell Graves and her ten-year-old daughter at 4545 S. Wood-lawn Avenue, Chicago. The couple quarreled and Sanford struck Miss Graves in the face. She left her apartment and went to the fourth-floor apartment of Mr. and Mrs. Taylor.\nThe next afternoon Sanford came looking for her. He inquired at the fourth-floor apartment of John Davenport but was told that she was not there. He then kicked and banged on the Taylors\u2019 door (about six feet away). Miss Graves was in the Taylor apartment, but no one answered the door. She heard Sanford say he would burn everyone up when he came back. About 20 minutes later she again heard his voice in the hallway and heard him say, \u201cAin\u2019t any need any of you all running because I\u2019m going to burn all of you . . . up.\u201d A fire started in the hall outside of the Taylor apartment.\nA resident of the building saw Sanford enter with a gasoline can. She asked where he was going and he answered \u201cto blow up some people.\u201d A maintenance man also saw Sanford enter the building carrying a red can marked \u201cgasoline.\u201d No one saw him spread the gasoline, but Mrs. John Davenport heard him say to her husband that he was going to burn the place down and saw him throw a match and a flame shoot up. He stayed in the building about ten minutes, then left empty-handed, first walking, then running down the street. After he left some boys yelled fire and the maintenance man called the fire department.\nThe fire killed John Davenport and injured two others, including Mrs. Davenport, who jumped from a fourth-floor window.\nSanford denied setting the fire. He claimed that on August 29th he looked for his \u201cwife\u201d with whom he had quarreled the previous day. He asked for her three times at the Davenport apartment but was unable to locate her. On the last effort, about 1:00 p. m., John Davenport told him that she was with her boyfriend. He then decided to have some fun and spent the remainder of the afternoon at a tavern. When he returned to his apartment, he was told of the fire and was arrested.\nDuring Sanford\u2019s cross-examination the State elicited the information that the owner and a barmaid were present in the tavern. Neither of these prospective witnesses was called by the defense and in his closing argument, the prosecutor said:\n\u201cHe said he was drinking in the tavern, a man and a woman were in there, and he was in there the day before, he doesn\u2019t bring anybody in from there.\u201d\nThe defendant contends that this remark was improper because the witnesses were equally accessible to both sides. He cites People v. Smith, 74 Ill App2d 458, 221 NE2d 68 (1966) wherein it was stated:\n\u201cIt is now well settled that the failure of a defendant to call as witnesses those persons who are aware of facts material to the question of his guilt or innocence creates no presumption of law that, if the witnesses were called, adverse testimony would result, unless \u2018it is manifest that it is within the power of the accused to produce such witnesses and that such witnesses are not accessible to the prosecution.\u2019 \u201d\nIn the Smith case the implications in the State\u2019s argument were seriously provocative. The case is not comparable to the present one.\nThe prosecutor did not argue that the defendant failed to call the tavern owner and barmaid as witnesses because their testimony would have been adverse to him. He merely said that they had not been brought in to testify. Further, the witnesses were not equally available to both sides. There is nothing in the record to indicate that the State knew prior to the defendant\u2019s testimony that he would claim an alibi or whom he would name as witnesses to support his story that he was in another place at the time of the crime. The defendant knew who they were and could have had them on hand, the State could not. After the witnesses were named, the trial would have had to be recessed, perhaps to some other day, for the State to have subpoenaed them.\nThe applicable rule is the one stated by this court in People v. Gray, 52 Ill App2d 177, 201 NE2d 756 (1964):\n\u201cWhere the defendant injects into the case his activities with potential witnesses during a particular period of time ostensibly for the purpose of establishing an alibi for the time of the commission of the crime charged, his failure to produce such witnesses is a proper subject of comment on the part of the State.\u201d\nSee also People v. Swift, 319 Ill 359, 150 NE 263 (1925) ; People v. Gray, 57 Ill App2d 221, 206 NE2d 821 (1965); People v. Lenihan, 14 Ill App2d 490, 144 NE2d 803 (1957). The prosecutor\u2019s comment on the failure to produce the alibi witnesses was innocuous.\nThe defendant next contends that the State committed reversible error in turning over a police report to his counsel in the presence of the jury. He claims that he had to use the report or appear to be hiding something from the jury.\nThe defendant fails to note that his counsel asked to see the report. During the cross-examination of a police officer, his counsel asked if the officer had made a report of his investigation. When the officer answered in the affirmative, the attorney asked if he could see it. The prosecutor said he could and gave him the report. As he did, the prosecutor described his action for the purpose of the record.\nOutside of the prosecutor\u2019s designation at the time of transfer, there was no reference by the State to the police report during the trial. The State did not refer to it in examining or cross-examining the witness and did not mention it in its closing argument. Thus, under the circumstances of this case, the defendant suffered no prejudice from receiving the police report in the jury\u2019s presence. See People v. Bickham, 91 Ill App2d 465, 235 NE2d 400 (1968).\nThe defendant\u2019s final contention is that the minimum sentence of fifty years is excessive. He contends that a lower minimum sentence would be a greater inducement toward rehabilitation and toward the exercise of the parole board\u2019s discretion.\nIn People v. Valentine, 60 Ill App2d 339, 208 NE2d 595 (1965), this court was asked to reduce the life imprisonment sentence of a leading participant in a particularly brutal rape of an eleven-year-old girl. In that case we said:\n\u201cWe believe that the power to reduce sentences should be used with caution and that a sentence imposed by the trial judge, who sees the defendant and is in a far better position to appraise him and to evaluate the likelihood of his rehabilitation than a reviewing court, should not be reduced unless there are substantial reasons for doing so. The penalty decided upon by the trial court, if within statutory limits, should not be changed merely because of judicial clemency or just because the reviewing court would have imposed a different one if it had been in the trial court\u2019s position.\u201d\nLikewise, in People v. Caldwell, 79 Ill App2d 273, 224 NE2d 634 (1967), this court declined to reduce a minimum sentence of fifty years (maximum of one hundred years) of a defendant who killed a woman in cold blood. We held that the sentence imposed was not improper in view of the \u201cnature of the crime and the record before us.\u201d Moreover, in Caldwell we noted that all minimum sentences beyond twenty years are reduced to twenty for the purpose of parole eligibility. Ill Rev Stats 1967, c 38, \u00a7 123-2 (3). Assuming maximum credit for good behavior, a defendant who receives a minimum sentence of twenty years or more becomes eligible for parole in eleven years and three months.\nThis case, like Valentine and Caldwell, is inappropriate for reduction of the sentence. The sentence imposed reflects the serious nature of the crimes of murder and arson and the defendant\u2019s criminal record. After several convictions for disorderly conduct and petty larceny he was convicted of burglary and sentenced for three to ten years, of rape and sentenced for five years, and of battery and sentenced for one year. He testified that he was out of prison only forty-six days when he committed the crime of arson which resulted in death and injury to innocent persons. In view of these considerations, the fifty-year minimum sentence was not excessive.\nThe convictions are affirmed.\nAffirmed.\nSCHWARTZ and SULLIVAN, JJ., concur.", "type": "majority", "author": "MR. PRESIDING JUSTICE DEMPSEY" } ], "attorneys": [ "Gerald W. Getty, Public Defender of Cook County, of Chicago (Theodore A. Gottfried and James J. Doherty, Assistant Public Defenders, of counsel), for appellant.", "John J. Stamos, State\u2019s Attorney of Cook County, of Chicago (Elmer C. Kissane and Edward Stasukaitis, Assistant State\u2019s Attorneys, of counsel), for appellee." ], "corrections": "", "head_matter": "People of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Charles Sanford, Defendant-Appellant.\nGen. No. 52,047.\nFirst District, Third Division.\nOctober 3, 1968.\nGerald W. Getty, Public Defender of Cook County, of Chicago (Theodore A. Gottfried and James J. Doherty, Assistant Public Defenders, of counsel), for appellant.\nJohn J. Stamos, State\u2019s Attorney of Cook County, of Chicago (Elmer C. Kissane and Edward Stasukaitis, Assistant State\u2019s Attorneys, of counsel), for appellee." }, "file_name": "0101-01", "first_page_order": 107, "last_page_order": 113 }