Case Title: The People v. Dana R. Bradford

Citation: 

Docket Number: 

State: new-york

Court: New York Appellate Court

Date: 2010-10-19T00:00:00Z

Document:
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This opinion is uncorrected and subject to revision before
publication in the New York Reports.
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No. 159  
The People &c.,
            Respondent,
        v.
Dana R. Bradford,
            Appellant.
Kimberly F. Duguay, for appellant.
Geoffrey Kaeuper, for respondent.
GRAFFEO, J.:
This appeal requires us to consider whether there is
record support for the Appellate Division's conclusion that the
exclusionary rule does not require the suppression of defendant's
confession.  Because there is a basis in the record for the
Appellate Division's determination that the confession was
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No. 159
* Because the girl's identity must remain confidential (see
Civil Rights Law § 50-b), in this opinion we refer to her as
"Jane."
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sufficiently attenuated from defendant's initial detention by the
police, we affirm.
In November 2003, defendant began a relationship with a
young woman he met on a telephone "chat line."  He was a 37-year-
old registered sex offender; she was a 16-year-old who had been
adjudicated a "person in need of supervision" under article 7 of
the Family Court Act.*  In order to visit with Jane, defendant
would pick her up near her mother's house in Ontario County,
drive her to his apartment in Monroe County (a 30 to 45 minute
trip each way) and then return her home later in the day.  During
these visits, defendant usually supplied Jane with alcoholic
beverages and he engaged in sexual intercourse with her on
several occasions.
Defendant and Jane eventually made plans to celebrate
New Year's Eve.  On the afternoon of December 31, 2003, Jane and
her 15-year-old sister (also adjudicated a "person in need of
supervision") were preparing to leave their house when their
mother's boyfriend overheard Jane on the telephone telling
someone that she was going out in 10 minutes.  When the mother's
boyfriend left for work shortly thereafter, he noticed a grey
Mitsubishi parked around the corner from the house, with a man in
the driver's seat speaking on a cellphone.  Because he did not
recognize the car or the driver, he jotted down the vehicle's
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license plate number before continuing to his workplace.
At around 5:00 P.M. that evening, Jane's mother left
her job, went food shopping and then drove to her boyfriend's
place of employment to bring him dinner.  He told her what he had
observed earlier that day and provided her with the vehicle's
license plate number.  On her way home, she decided to stop at
the State Police barracks to give them information about her
daughters and the vehicle that her boyfriend had observed. 
Supplied with this information, the trooper undertook a search of
vehicle registration records and learned that the grey Mitsubishi
belonged to defendant.  The computer search also revealed
defendant's status as a registered sex offender and his home
address in Rochester.   
When Jane's mother arrived home at approximately 9:30
P.M., she discovered that neither girl was present, despite their
8:30 P.M. curfew.  She telephoned the trooper that she had spoken
to earlier and he issued a "file 6" bulletin, which notified
police agencies to be on the lookout for two young women
suspected as runaways.  A short time later, a trooper patrolling
in the vicinity of defendant's residence received a police radio
transmission directing him to defendant's address, where he
located the grey Mitsubishi with the identified license plate in
the parking lot.  The trooper saw defendant exiting the apartment
building with two females who matched the description of Jane and
her sister.  As defendant walked to the parking lot, he noticed
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No. 159
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the State Police vehicle and changed direction.  The trooper
immediately approached defendant, confirmed his name, handcuffed
him and placed him in the police vehicle.  After conferring with
Jane and her sister, the trooper called for another police car to
transport the girls.
Upon arriving at the State Police barracks at about
11:00 P.M., defendant was taken to a room and issued Miranda
warnings.  He indicated that he was willing to speak to the
trooper but the officer did not engage in further conversation at
that point.  Jane and her sister were placed in a different room
and interviewed.  Jane told the police that defendant was her
boyfriend and that they had engaged in sexual intercourse on a
number of occasions at his apartment.  Her sister provided some
corroborating information and both young women acknowledged that
defendant had supplied them with alcohol.
Defendant was confronted with these statements at
approximately 1:00 A.M.  He then admitted to the police that he
gave Jane alcohol and had intercourse with her once, though he
claimed that Jane had represented that she was 17 years old. 
Defendant eventually revised his story, admitting that he had sex
with Jane three times and that both girls had consumed alcohol in
his presence.  After an investigator prepared his typewritten
confession, defendant again waived his Miranda rights and signed
the document shortly before 4:00 A.M.
As a result of the admissions he provided and the
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statements of the sisters, defendant was charged with multiple
counts of rape in the third degree (see Penal Law § 130.25 [2])
and endangering the welfare of a child (see Penal Law § 260.10
[1]).  Defendant moved to suppress his statements to the police,
claiming that his arrest in the parking lot of his apartment
building lacked probable cause.  County Court denied the motion,
concluding that it was proper to detain defendant to conduct a
preliminary investigation and that the statements from Jane and
her sister justified the arrest.  Following a jury trial,
defendant was convicted of four counts of statutory rape in the
third degree and six counts of endangering the welfare of a
child.  Defendant was sentenced as a second felony offender to an
aggregate 4½ to 9-year term of imprisonment and orders of
protection were issued relating to Jane and her sister.
The Appellate Division modified by amending the length
of time that the orders of protection would remain in force, but
otherwise affirmed (61 AD3d 1419 [4th Dept 2009]).  The court
determined that defendant had been arrested without probable
cause, but that his inculpatory statements were admissible
because they were sufficiently attenuated from the arrest.  A
Judge of this Court granted leave to appeal (13 NY3d 794 [2009]).
Evidence that is obtained through illegal police action
is not automatically subject to the exclusionary rule (see e.g.
People v Jones, 2 NY3d 235, 241-242 [2004]; People v Young, 55
NY2d 419, 425 [1982], cert denied 459 US 848 [1982]).  For
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No. 159
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example, a confession that is made after an arrest without
probable cause is not subject to suppression if the People
adequately demonstrate that the inculpatory admission was
"attenuated" from the improper detention; in other words, it was
"acquired by means sufficiently distinguishable from the arrest
to be purged of the illegality" (People v Conyers, 68 NY2d 982,
983 [1986]).  The attenuation doctrine requires a court to
consider "the temporal proximity of the arrest and the
confession, the presence of intervening circumstances and,
particularly, the purpose and flagrancy of the official
misconduct" (id.; see Brown v Illinois, 422 US 590, 603-604
[1975]).  Because application of the attenuation doctrine is a
mixed question of law and fact (see e.g. People v Ryan, 12 NY3d
28, 31 [2009]; People v Divine, 6 NY3d 790, 791 [2006]), our
review is limited and the determination of the Appellate Division
may be disturbed only if there is no evidence in the record to
support it (see People v Paulman, 5 NY3d 122, 129 [2005]).
We hold that the proof in this case is sufficient to
support the finding of attenuation.  After defendant was
initially detained around 10:30 P.M., he was taken to a police
barracks and given Miranda warnings about 30 minutes later (see
People v Conyers, 68 NY2d at 983 [post-arrest Miranda warnings
are an "important" attenuation factor]; Brown v Illinois, 422 US
at 603).  Defendant proceeded to waive his Miranda rights and
offered to talk to the police.  But he was not questioned at that
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No. 159
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time; rather, his interrogation did not begin until 1:00 A.M. --
about 2½ hours after defendant was first handcuffed (see
generally People v Rogers, 52 NY2d 527, 532 [1981] [three hours],
cert denied 454 US 898 [1981]).
In the interim, the police secured statements from Jane
and her younger sister, which clearly established probable cause
for defendant's arrest.  Because those statements were obtained
independent of defendant's detention, they were not subject to
suppression.  The fact that defendant gave a confession after
being confronted with the statements constitutes a "significant
attenuating factor" that reasonably could be deemed a
"precipitating cause" of his admissions (id. at 534).  Defendant
was also not subjected to any pre-Miranda interrogation, nor was
he mistreated while in police custody (see id.).  Thus, it was
reasonable for the Appellate Division to conclude that
defendant's confession was the product of the independently
obtained statements from Jane and her sister, along with his
willingness to speak to the police -- not the result of the
initial detention in the parking lot.
In addition, there is no demonstrable proof in the
record that the initial detention of defendant was motivated by
bad faith or a nefarious police purpose (see e.g. People v
Borges, 69 NY2d 1031, 1033 [1987]; People v Boodle, 47 NY2d 398,
404 [1979], cert denied 444 US 969 [1979]; People v Martinez, 37
NY2d 662, 670 [1975]).  Although the Appellate Division decided
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that probable cause was lacking when defendant was apprehended --
an issue we do not reach -- the trooper nevertheless had a "fair
basis" (People v Martinez, 37 NY2d at 671) for approaching and
detaining defendant:  he knew that defendant was a registered sex
offender in the company of two teenage girls who had been
reported as missing by their mother; that they were at
defendant's apartment complex at approximately 10:30 P.M.; and
that defendant's car had been observed in close proximity to the
girls' residence on the last occasion that they had been seen. 
While reasonable minds may differ as to the precise level of
objective suspicion that was present at that moment and whether
the actual extent of police interference was justified, the
trooper undoubtedly had a good faith basis for the intervention. 
Simply put, this is not the type of situation that the
exclusionary rule's deterrence principle was designed to address. 
In sum, there is record support for the Appellate
Division's application of the attenuation doctrine in this case
and we therefore lack the power to disturb its determination.
Accordingly, the order of the Appellate Division should
be affirmed.
*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *
Order affirmed.  Opinion by Judge Graffeo.  Chief Judge Lippman
and Judges Ciparick, Read, Smith, Pigott and Jones concur.
Decided October 19, 2010