People v. Johnson

These consolidated cases come before us in the wake of our decision in People v. Blue, 189 Ill. 2d 99, 138-39 (2000), wherein a unanimous court held that the cumulative effect of prosecutorial misconduct and trial error had deprived the defendant of a fundamentally fair trial and thus warranted reversal notwithstanding overwhelming evidence of defendant’s guilt. In Blue, this court recognized that a pervasive pattern of error, engendered in the main by prosecutorial misconduct, had divested defendant of his right to a fair, orderly, and impartial trial, a substantial right that inures to a…