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[Congressional Bills 111th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 5934 Introduced in House (IH)]

111th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 5934

 To declare the sense of Congress that the public safety exception to 
  the constitutional requirement for what are commonly called Miranda 
 warnings allows for unwarned interrogation of terrorism suspects, and 
 to amend section 3501 of title 18, United States Code, to assure the 
 admissibility of certain confessions made by terrorism suspects, and 
                          for other purposes.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             July 29, 2010

  Mr. Schiff introduced the following bill; which was referred to the 
                       Committee on the Judiciary

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL

 
 To declare the sense of Congress that the public safety exception to 
  the constitutional requirement for what are commonly called Miranda 
 warnings allows for unwarned interrogation of terrorism suspects, and 
 to amend section 3501 of title 18, United States Code, to assure the 
 admissibility of certain confessions made by terrorism suspects, and 
                          for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Questioning of Terrorism Suspects 
Act of 2010''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    The Congress finds the following:
            (1) The United States Supreme Court, in New York v. 
        Quarles, 467 U.S. 649 (1984), determined that there is an 
        exception to the constitutional requirement for what are 
        commonly called Miranda warnings in situations posing a threat 
        to public safety.
            (2) Terrorist plots have often consisted of coordinated 
        attacks on multiple targets.
            (3) Captured terrorists may be the best and sometimes only 
        source of intelligence necessary to prevent pending or planned 
        attacks.
            (4) The initial hours and days after capture are often the 
        most valuable from an intelligence collection perspective. Due 
        to the complexity of terrorist plots, an extended interview may 
        be necessary to procure the information necessary to protect 
        the public from a pending or planned attack.
            (5) Just as courts have held that the public safety 
        exception established in Quarles exists even when questioning 
        is designed solely to protect the lives of police officers, the 
        public safety exception in the terrorism context is broad 
        enough to include questioning necessary to protect the lives of 
        troops on the battlefield from a pending or planned attack.
            (6) Given the nature of international terrorism 
        investigations, it is often necessary to question captured 
        terrorists overseas in cooperation with other countries.
            (7) In many cases, the full warnings set out in Miranda 
        cannot be provided to terrorism suspects in foreign custody, 
        since the rights referenced in Miranda may not be available to 
        the individual in that particular country.

SEC. 3. PUBLIC SAFETY EXCEPTION TO MIRANDA RULE IN TERRORISM 
              INVESTIGATIONS.

    It is the sense of Congress that the public safety exception to the 
constitutional requirement for what are commonly called Miranda 
warnings allows unwarned interrogation of terrorism suspects for as 
long as is necessary to protect the public from pending or planned 
attacks when a significant purpose of the interrogation is to gather 
intelligence and not solely to elicit testimonial evidence.

SEC. 4. ADMISSIBILITY OF CERTAIN CONFESSIONS MADE DURING TERRORISM 
              INVESTIGATIONS.

    (a) Intelligence Gathering To Protect the Public Safety.--Section 
3501 of title 18, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end 
the following:
    ``(f)(1)(A) In the case of an individual who is a terrorism 
suspect, upon ex parte application made by the Government within 6 
hours immediately following the person's arrest or other detention, 
that individual may be taken before a magistrate not later than 48 
hours after arrest or other detention and any confession made within 
those 48 hours shall not be considered inadmissible solely because the 
individual was not presented to a magistrate earlier.
    ``(B) Such an application must contain a certification by the 
Attorney General or the Deputy Attorney General, and the Director of 
National Intelligence or the Principal Deputy Director of National 
Intelligence, that--
            ``(i) the individual with respect to whom the application 
        is made is a terrorism suspect; and
            ``(ii) the individual may be able to provide intelligence 
        necessary to protect the public safety.
    ``(C) Upon ex parte application, the appropriate judicial officer 
shall, for good cause shown and subject to such conditions as that 
officer may prescribe, extend the time limitation provided by this 
subsection for an additional 48 hours. Such application may be filed in 
camera and the court's order shall be subject to interlocutory appeal.
    ``(2) As used in this subsection, the term `terrorism suspect' 
means a person suspected of international terrorism or domestic 
terrorism as those terms are defined in section 2331.''.
    (b) Overseas Terrorism Investigations.--It is the sense of Congress 
that a confession given during overseas questioning of a terrorism 
suspect in foreign custody shall not be rendered inadmissible for 
failure to provide Miranda warnings, if such confession was voluntarily 
given and reliable.
                                 <all>
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