{
  "id": 2645173,
  "name": "People of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. George J. Sibley, Defendant-Appellant",
  "name_abbreviation": "People v. Sibley",
  "decision_date": "1968-03-07",
  "docket_number": "Gen. No. 51,764",
  "first_page": "38",
  "last_page": "43",
  "citations": [
    {
      "type": "official",
      "cite": "93 Ill. App. 2d 38"
    }
  ],
  "court": {
    "name_abbreviation": "Ill. App. Ct.",
    "id": 8837,
    "name": "Illinois Appellate Court"
  },
  "jurisdiction": {
    "id": 29,
    "name_long": "Illinois",
    "name": "Ill."
  },
  "cites_to": [
    {
      "cite": "190 NE2d 819",
      "category": "reporters:state_regional",
      "reporter": "N.E.2d",
      "year": 1963,
      "opinion_index": 0
    },
    {
      "cite": "28 Ill2d 77",
      "category": "reporters:state",
      "reporter": "Ill. 2d",
      "case_ids": [
        5362346
      ],
      "year": 1963,
      "opinion_index": 0,
      "case_paths": [
        "/ill-2d/28/0077-01"
      ]
    }
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  "last_updated": "2023-07-14T21:30:43.606130+00:00",
  "provenance": {
    "date_added": "2019-08-29",
    "source": "Harvard",
    "batch": "2018"
  },
  "casebody": {
    "judges": [],
    "parties": [
      "People of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. George J. Sibley, Defendant-Appellant."
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "MR. PRESIDING JUSTICE DEMPSEY\ndelivered the opinion of the court.\nA jury found George Sibley guilty of armed robbery and he was sentenced to the penitentiary for a term of fifteen to twenty-five years.\nOn appeal he contends that reversible error was committed by the trial judge in limiting the cross-examination of a State\u2019s witness concerning the circumstances of his identification, and that the closing argument of the assistant State\u2019s attorney deprived him of a fair trial.\nMrs. Katherine Axelrod was returning home about 9:00 p. m. when she noticed a woman walking behind her. The woman followed her into the entrance of her apartment building, pulled out a gun, grabbed her, demanded her money and keys and struck her on the head with the gun. After learning that a babysitter was attending her children, the robber (who turned out to be a man dressed in women\u2019s clothing) accompanied her to her second-floor apartment. Mrs. Axelrod twice managed to mouth the words \u201ccall the police\u201d as she paid the sitter and said good-by to her. Linda Arnold, the sitter, a girl in eighth grade, lived across the street from the Axelrods. She went home and called the police who responded at once.\nIn the apartment the robber took some more money, made Mrs. Axelrod lie facedownward on a bed, threatened to shoot her children if her cries awakened them, tied a scarf around her mouth and her hands behind her back. He took off his white shoes and put on her blue ones. He picked up a pair of scissors and was about to cut her hair when there was a knock on the front door. He told her to be still and went to the rear of the apartment; but she got up, went to the front door and, upon hearing that the police were there, told them through the door that the robber was going out the back way and was dressed like a woman.\nA policeman ran around the building, saw a woman walking away from the rear steps and told her to stop. She started to run and he caught her after a block and a half chase. As he seized her, her wig came off and the officer, realizing that it was a man, drew his gun. After a struggle he subdued the defendant, handcuffed and searched him. Sibley was wearing women\u2019s undergarments and the officer found a gun in his girdle. He had on a pair of ladies\u2019 blue shoes and had in his possession a pair of scissors and one five-dollar bill and nine singles.\nSibley was taken back to the building. Neighbors and policemen had gathered in the hallway and Mrs. Axelrod identified him. She also identified her blue shoes, the pair of scissors and the gun which had been used to rob her. The money found on Sibley corresponded in denomination and amount to that which had been taken from her.\nLinda Arnold had directed the police to the Axelrod apartment and she saw Sibley when the police brought him back to the building. She recognized him as the same person she had seen in the apartment.\nThe arresting officer testified on cross-examination that there was a lineup of some type in the hallway when Mrs. Axelrod identified the defendant but that he did not know who was in it. He was again asked:\nDefendant\u2019s Attorney: \u201cWho was in this lineup\nat that time, Officer ?\u201d\nAssistant State\u2019s\nAttorney: \u201cObject, asked and an-\nswered.\u201d\nDefendant\u2019s Attorney: \u201cHe was present, Judge, I\nthink \u2014 \u201d\nState\u2019s Attorney: \u201cHe said he didn\u2019t know.\u201d\nThe Court: \u201cSustained.\u201d\nDefendant\u2019s Attorney: \u201cWho was in the lineup, if\nyou know, Officer?\u201d\nOfficer: \u201cThat I know?\u201d\nDefendant\u2019s Attorney: \u201cYes.\u201d\nOfficer: \u201cI don\u2019t know anyone in\nthe lineup, or I didn\u2019t.\u201d\nDefendant\u2019s Attorney: \u201cWere some of the neigh-\nbors in the lineup, Officer ?\u201d\nState\u2019s Attorney: \u201cObjection, asked and an-\nswered.\u201d\nThe Court: \u201cSustained.\u201d\nDefendant\u2019s Attorney: \u201cYour Honor, I don\u2019t feel\nit has been asked and answered. I asked if any of the neighbors \u2014 if you know \u2014 \u201d\nOfficer: \u201cI\u2019m not sure.\u201d\nThe defendant complains that by sustaining the objections the court restricted his cross-examination in an area essential to his defense: the circumstances surrounding his identification. The cross-examination was not unreasonably restricted. The officer was asked five times who was in the lineup. Three times he answered that he did not know and two times objections were sustained to repetitive questions. The defense was allowed liberal latitude in its cross-examination.\nThe defendant did not testify and no evidence was presented in his behalf. In their opening and closing arguments the prosecutors stated that the State\u2019s evidence was uncontradicted. The defendant contends that these statements constituted comment on his failure to testify. The fact that a defendant does not take the witness stand raises no adverse presumption, and reference to his not testifying is not permitted. Ill Rev Stats 1965, c 38, \u00a7 155-1. However, a prosecutor may call the jury\u2019s attention to the State\u2019s uncontradicted evidence and may do so even if the defendant is the only person who could deny it. People v. Norman, 28 Ill2d 77, 190 NE2d 819 (1963). From the record it is clear that the prosecutors\u2019 statements were addressed to the evidence and therefore were not improper.\nThe defendant also complains that other portions of the prosecutors\u2019 final argument were prejudicial. One of these was the remark that \u201ccounsel for the defense is playing a game with you in this lawsuit.\u201d This remark was in response, to a story told by the defendant\u2019s counsel about a game he played in school in which something would be whispered to one child and by him to another and so on, and that the last version was completely different from the first. The prosecutor\u2019s reply was a fair response to the defense counsel\u2019s story and did not reflect upon the latter\u2019s integrity.\nThe other remarks complained about were also fair comments on the evidence. The prosecutor said that an armed person who talked and acted as Sibley did was a potential murderer; that it was fortunate for Mrs.\nAxelrod and her husband that a robbery instead of a murder case was being tried and that Sibley pistol-whipped Mrs. Axelrod. Sibley threatened to kill the Axelrod children and he did strike Mrs. Axelrod with a pistol. Mentioning her husband and children did not inject them into the case for the purpose of calling attention to her family, as the defendant contends. Mrs. Axelrod testified that her hands had been bound behind her back with her husband\u2019s neckties, and her children had been referred to several times in the testimony.\nThe judgment is 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 (Norman W. Fishman 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 Richard A. Rinella, Assistant State\u2019s Attorneys, of counsel), for appellee."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "People of the State of Illinois, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. George J. Sibley, Defendant-Appellant.\nGen. No. 51,764.\nFirst District, Third Division.\nMarch 7, 1968.\nGerald W. Getty, Public Defender of Cook County, of Chicago (Norman W. Fishman 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 Richard A. Rinella, Assistant State\u2019s Attorneys, of counsel), for appellee."
  },
  "file_name": "0038-01",
  "first_page_order": 44,
  "last_page_order": 49
}