{
  "id": 1599833,
  "name": "Juanita Trammell, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Roosevelt Trammell, Defendant-Appellee",
  "name_abbreviation": "Trammell v. Trammell",
  "decision_date": "1968-12-11",
  "docket_number": "Gen. No. 52,920",
  "first_page": "230",
  "last_page": "233",
  "citations": [
    {
      "type": "official",
      "cite": "103 Ill. App. 2d 230"
    }
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  "court": {
    "name_abbreviation": "Ill. App. Ct.",
    "id": 8837,
    "name": "Illinois Appellate Court"
  },
  "jurisdiction": {
    "id": 29,
    "name_long": "Illinois",
    "name": "Ill."
  },
  "cites_to": [
    {
      "cite": "240 NE2d 246",
      "category": "reporters:state_regional",
      "reporter": "N.E.2d",
      "opinion_index": 0
    },
    {
      "cite": "98 Ill App2d 180",
      "category": "reporters:state",
      "reporter": "Ill. App. 2d",
      "case_ids": [
        2649192
      ],
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  "last_updated": "2023-07-14T18:47:33.766444+00:00",
  "provenance": {
    "date_added": "2019-08-29",
    "source": "Harvard",
    "batch": "2018"
  },
  "casebody": {
    "judges": [
      "McCORMICK, P. J. and DRUCKER, J., concur."
    ],
    "parties": [
      "Juanita Trammell, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Roosevelt Trammell, Defendant-Appellee."
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "MR. JUSTICE ENGLISH\ndelivered the opinion of the court.\nPlaintiff appeals from a decree in favor of defendant in a divorce action. The complaint alleged acts of extreme and repeated cruelty which were denied in defendant\u2019s answer.\nAt the trial, plaintiff was the first witness. She testified that on February 18, 1967, defendant struck and choked her, leaving bruises, and on April 5, 1967, defendant, without cause, beat her and knocked her into the bedroom and choked her, causing pain and suffering. There was no cross-examination by defendant\u2019s counsel. The trial judge, however, questioned plaintiff regarding physical abuse by defendant prior to the date of their marriage in 1966. The plaintiff, in answer to the judge\u2019s examination, testified that defendant first physically mistreated her in 1958, six months after the birth of a child to plaintiff and defendant; and that defendant had also beaten her in 1964 and 1965. The record then shows the following:\nTHE COURT: \u201cYet, in 1966, after all of these beatings you still married him?\u201d\nTHE WITNESS: \u201cYes, I did.\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cNow, you have complained that he beat you on February 18th and April 5th?\u201d\nTHE WITNESS: \u201cYes.\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cIn 1967 ?\u201d\nTHE WITNESS: \u201cYes.\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cFinding for the defendant.\u201d\nMISS WILLIAMS (Attorney for plaintiff): \u201cMay it please the Court, may I say this before you make a finding? Give me a basis for this finding, because\u2014\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cI don\u2019t need a basis.\u201d\nMISS WILLIAMS: \u201cMay I say this ?\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cThis woman comes in Court and asks for a divorce. If you are afraid of him, then, why did you marry him ?\u201d\nMISS WILLIAMS: \u201cMay we proceed on the\ngrounds of\u2014we have another ground of adultery.\u201d THE COURT: \u201cCounsel, you rested. You proceeded on physical cruelty. This woman is not entitled to relief from this Court. I will stand on that record.\u201d\nMISS WILLIAMS: \u201cI have a letter from her psychiatrist saying that this woman is in need of medical attention because of the abuses she received in the house. May we have leave to amend ?\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cNo leave to amend or nothing. This woman will not get relief in this Court. Go and appoint a guardian for her.\u201d\nA few days later, at a hearing on plaintiff\u2019s motion to vacate, this colloquy took place:\nTHE COURT: \u201cAll the relief you are seeking, you can get by methods available to you. If he is going to molest anybody, he can be arrested and be put in jail. . . . She wants this Court to be a Police Court. If he isn\u2019t supporting the child, you should go and file a complaint, and there is a procedure, whereby she is entitled to it in the regular Court.\u201d\nMISS WILLIAMS: \u201cI am aware of that. May I answer this? When Your Honor says she wants this Court to act as a Police Court, it is not so. She wanted a divorce; she did not want her husband to be given a license to beat her.\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cShe didn\u2019t have the grounds for a divorce. Nobody has license to beat anybody.\u201d\nMISS WILLIAMS: \u201cHe has.\u201d\nTHE COURT: \u201cI would have him arrested every time he raised a finger at me.\u201d\nMISS WILLIAMS: \u201cWhat I am trying to do is prevent a murder out there, that is what will happen.\u201d THE COURT: \u201cAll she has to do is have him arrested and go to Court and testify. They will put him in jail. It happens everyday.\u201d\nThere were other plaintiff\u2019s witnesses ready to testify to the alleged acts of cruelty, and it should go without saying that acts of cruelty prior to the marriage could not estop plaintiff from seeking a divorce for acts of cruelty occurring after the marriage. Nor is the court\u2019s suggestion of police court proceedings a reasonable alternative for divorce, if at trial it develops that grounds for divorce exist and that is the relief requested.\nIn this court no brief was filed by defendant, and his counsel has been allowed to withdraw. In consenting thereto, defendant advised us \u201cthat the Appellate Court can take its natural course.\u201d\nWe need not elaborate on the clearly erroneous character of the peremptory action taken by the trial judge. See this court\u2019s opinion in Jamal v. Jamal, 98 Ill App2d 180, 182-185, 240 NE2d 246, in which we held that this sort of a \u201chearing\u201d was so unconscionable as to be violative of due process.\nThe decree is reversed and the cause is remanded for a trial of the issues presented by the complaint and answer.\nReversed and remanded.\nMcCORMICK, P. J. and DRUCKER, J., concur.",
        "type": "majority",
        "author": "MR. JUSTICE ENGLISH"
      }
    ],
    "attorneys": [
      "Jean F. Williams, of Chicago, for appellant.",
      "No brief filed for appellee."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "Juanita Trammell, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Roosevelt Trammell, Defendant-Appellee.\nGen. No. 52,920.\nFirst District, Fourth Division.\nDecember 11, 1968.\nJean F. Williams, of Chicago, for appellant.\nNo brief filed for appellee."
  },
  "file_name": "0230-01",
  "first_page_order": 236,
  "last_page_order": 239
}