Title: In re Robinson

State: vermont

Issuer: Vermont Supreme Court

Document:

IN_RE_ROBINSON.93-174; 161 Vt. 550; 641 A.2d 779

[Filed 15-Apr-1994]

 NOTICE:  This opinion is subject to motions for reargument under V.R.A.P. 40
 as well as formal revision before publication in the Vermont Reports.
 Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Vermont Supreme
 Court, 109 State Street, Montpelier, Vermont 05609-0801 of any errors in
 order that corrections may be made before this opinion goes to press.


                                 No. 93-174


 In re Michael Robinson                       Supreme Court

                                              On Appeal from
                                              Chittenden Superior Court

                                              December Term, 1993


 Matthew I. Katz, J.

 Charles Martin and James Teixeira, Law Clerk, of Martin & Paolini, Barre,
   for petitioner-appellant

 Scot Kline, Chittenden County State's Attorney, and Pamela Hall Johnson,
   Deputy State's Attorney, Burlington, for respondent-appellee


 PRESENT:  Allen, C.J., Gibson, Dooley, Morse and Johnson, JJ.


      ALLEN, C.J.   Petitioner appeals from the superior court's denial of
 his petition for post-conviction relief, in which he claims that defense
 counsel's failure to object to the admission of his inculpatory statement on
 state constitutional grounds constituted ineffective assistance of counsel
 and required reversal of his conviction for lewd and lascivious conduct with
 a child.  We affirm.
      During a routine booking procedure, after being arrested and read his
 rights, petitioner blurted out the following unresponsive statement: "I
 didn't think anything like this would happen again."  The State sought to
 introduce petitioner's comment as an admission that he had committed the
 crime charged.  Defendant moved to suppress the statement on the ground that

 

 it had been given involuntarily.  Among the relevant findings made by the
 motion judge were the following: (1) the comment was spontaneous and
 unrelated to statements made by the officers; (2) the officers did nothing
 improper to overcome petitioner's will; (3) petitioner had been an
 outpatient at a mental health clinic for three years; (4) he had been
 diagnosed as having schizophrenia and major depression with psychotic
 features; (5) on occasions, he suffered from delusions of persecution and
 grandeur, and his depression sometimes interfered with his ability to cope
 with stressful situations; and (6) his mental health counselor testified
 that he was very stressed during the booking procedure, but the counselor
 could not say whether the spontaneous comment was the product of
 petitioner's psychosis.
      Based on these findings, the motion judge concluded that the State had
 not met "its burden of proving that [petitioner's] mental condition was such
 that rendered his statements admissible."  The court, however, denied the
 motion to suppress with respect to the comment at issue here, noting that
 under federal law a suspect's mental condition alone, absent coercive police
 conduct, is insufficient to exclude a statement on involuntariness grounds,
 see Colorado v. Connelly,