Justice Gordon joined by Justices Cahill and McBride, reverses and remands defendant’s murder conviction and natural life sentence, because the trial court abused her discretion and abandoned her role as a neutral referee where she answered a question from the jury on a question of fact, thus providing unsworn testimony to the jurors on a critical factual issue. During the jury’s second day of deliberations, in a case where the defense attempted to discredit the defendant’s confession, the jury sent out a note asking, in effect, if the detectives had coerced the confession by taking the death penalty off the table during defendant’s interrogation. This issue had not been mentioned during trial testimony or argument. Over defense objection, the trial court answered “No, please continue your deliberations, jurors.” This, Justice Gordon finds was an abuse of discretion, “as well-intentioned as she [Judge Dianne Cannon] may have been.”
This is a clear and thorough opinion on the subject of answering jury questions worth putting in one’s trial book.
