People v. Maiden

Defendant's notarized certificate was sufficient to show timely mailing of his notice of appeal. Defendant was incarcerated; he placed his notice of appeal in prison mail, and could not aver that prison staff thereafter placed proper postage on it. Court improperly dismissed Section 2-1401 petition for relief from judgment sua sponte on the merits, when State had not answered the petition, contending that it was not properly served as Defendant sent petition by regular mail only. Absent specific motion or explicit statement of waiver of improper service, State did not waive objection to improper service and was not yet in default, and thus 30 days for State to respond had not commenced, and court acted prematurely in dismissing petition sua sponte. (BURKE and SPENCE, concurring.)