Leonardo v. People

The majority reverses the court of appeals’ ruling that the trial court committed harmless error in failing to obtain the presence of counsel before replying to a jury question during deliberations. I respectfully dissent.

I disagree with the majority’s analysis of the issue in this case. The majority writes:

The issue in this case is not the adequacy of the original instructions given, but rather the jury’s demonstrated misunderstanding of those instructions.

Majority op. at 1255. I believe the issue is whether there was error contained in the answer which the judge gave to the jury, and…