Source: https://www.justice.gov/osg/brief/montejo-v-louisiana-amicus-merits
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 15:31:55+00:00

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By order dated March 27, 2009, the Court directed the parties and permitted amici to file briefs addressing the following question: "Should Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U.S. 625 (1986), be overruled?" In the view of the United States, Michigan v. Jackson was incorrectly decided and has been undermined by recent precedent. The decision therefore should be overruled.
Michigan v. Jackson held that a defendant's waiver of his right to counsel under the Sixth Amendment is presumed invalid if the police initiate interrogation after he has asserted the right at an arraignment or similar proceeding. Because the Sixth Amendment applies to the federal government, the Court's resolution of that question implicates the conduct of federal criminal inves tigations and trials.
In Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U.S. 625 (1986), this Court established a prophylactic rule that automatically invalidates a criminal defendant's waiver of the right to counsel in police-initiated questioning that occurs after his Sixth Amendment right to counsel has attached and he has asserted that right at an arraignment or similar proceeding. Id. at 636. The question here is whether this Court should reconsider that holding. The answer is yes.
Under the doctrine of stare decisis, the Court gener ally does not overrule one of its prior decisions absent a special justification. E.g., Pearson v. Callahan, 129 S. Ct. 808, 816 (2009). But "[s]tare decisis is not an inexora ble command," and this Court has "never felt con strained" to follow a decision that has proven to be "badly reasoned," Payne v. Tennessee, 501 U.S. 808, 827- 828 (1991) (internal quotation marks omitted), or that has had its underpinnings eroded by later precedent, Agostini v. Felton, 521 U.S. 203, 235-236 (1997). Because the Court's "interpretation [of the Constitution] can be altered only by constitutional amendment or by overrul ing [its] prior decisions," id. at 235, the Court's "consid ered practice [is] not to apply stare decisis as rigidly in constitutional as in nonconstitutional cases," Glidden Co. v. Zdanok, 370 U.S. 530, 543 (1962).
The Court should overrule Michigan v. Jackson. Al though the Sixth Amendment affords criminal defen dants a right to counsel at certain critical pre-trial stages, the Amendment should not prevent a criminal defendant from waiving that right and answering ques tions from police following assertion of that right at ar raignment. Jackson serves no real purpose and fits poorly with this Court's recent precedent; although the decision only occasionally prevents federal prosecutors from obtaining appropriate convictions, even that cost outweighs the decision's meager benefits.
The Sixth Amendment provides, in pertinent part, that "[i]n all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall en joy the right * * * to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence." U.S. Const. Amend. VI. As this Court has repeatedly noted, "the core purpose of the [Sixth Amend ment] counsel guarantee was to assure 'Assistance' at trial, when the accused was confronted with both the in tricacies of the law and the advocacy of the public prose cutor." United States v. Cronic, 466 U.S. 648, 654 (1984) (quoting United States v. Ash, 413 U.S. 300, 309 (1973)).
To protect the adversary process leading to criminal punishment, the Court has extended the right to the as sistance of counsel to "certain critical pretrial proceed ings," in which "the accused [is] confronted, just as at trial, by the procedural system, or by his expert adver sary, or by both." United States v. Gouveia, 467 U.S. 180, 189 (1984) (internal quotation marks omitted; brack ets in original). In a line of cases beginning with Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201 (1964), the Court held that the right to counsel is violated when, after at tachment of the right, police deliberately elicit state ments (including during custodial interrogation). See Fellers v. United States, 540 U.S. 519, 523-524 (2004); Michigan v. Harvey, 494 U.S. 344, 348-349 (1990); Kuhlmann v. Wilson, 477 U.S. 436, 457 (1986); Maine v. Moulton, 474 U.S. 159, 172-173 (1985); United States v. Henry, 447 U.S. 264, 270 (1980); Brewer v. Williams, 430 U.S. 387, 400-401 (1977).
As a result, if law enforcement agents deliberately elicit statements from a criminal defendant whose Sixth Amendment right to counsel has attached and who has not voluntarily, knowingly, and intelligently waived that right, then the Sixth Amendment renders those state ments inadmissible in the prosecution's case in chief at trial. E.g., Harvey, 494 U.S. at 348-349. That rule rests on the view that permitting the prosecution to use the defendant's statements as substantive evidence of guilt would undermine the ability of counsel to render assis tance that contributes to a fair trial. See id. at 348.
In Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U.S. 625 (1986), this Court went a significant step further, holding that, even if the defendant waives his right to counsel and chooses to speak with the police, his waiver is presumed invalid if the police initiated interrogation after the defendant asserted his right to counsel at an arraignment or similar proceeding. Id. at 636; see Harvey, 494 U.S. at 345. The Court came to that conclusion by extending the prophy lactic rule developed to protect the Fifth Amendment privilege against compelled self-incrimination in Ed wards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477 (1981), to the Sixth Amendment right to counsel. In Edwards, the Court held that a suspect in custody who has "expressed his desire to deal with the police only through counsel, is not subject to further interrogation by the authorities until counsel has been made available to him, unless the ac cused himself initiates further communication, ex changes, or conversations with the police." Id. at 484- 485. That prophylactic rule was "designed to prevent police from badgering a defendant into waiving his previ ously asserted Miranda rights." Harvey, 494 U.S. at 350.
The Jackson Court decided that "the same rule ap plies to a defendant who has been formally charged with a crime and who has requested appointment of counsel at his arraignment," because "the reasons for prohibiting the interrogation of an uncounseled prisoner who has asked for the help of a lawyer are even stronger after he has been formally charged with an offense than before." 475 U.S. at 626, 631. Giving "a broad, rather than a nar row, interpretation to a defendant's request for counsel," the Court "presume[d]" that a defendant who requests a lawyer at his arraignment "requests the lawyer's ser vices at every critical stage of the prosecution," including police interrogation. Id. at 633. As a result, even if a defendant responds to police questioning by choosing to speak with police, expressly waives his Sixth Amendment right to counsel, and provides a voluntary confession to the charged crime, Jackson renders that confession inad missible as substantive evidence at his trial. Id. at 635; Harvey, 494 U.S. at 345.
The Jackson rule makes little sense in light of the purposes of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel and the myriad protections otherwise afforded to criminal defendants in custodial interrogation.
The text of the Sixth Amendment provides a criminal defendant with the right to counsel, but leaves to the courts the appropriate means of enforcing that guaran tee. See U.S. Const. Amend. VI. To enforce the right to counsel, this Court long has held that, after the Sixth Amendment right to counsel has attached, law enforce ment agents may not deliberately elicit statements from a criminal defendant in the absence of counsel or a valid waiver of the right to counsel and then use those state ments as substantive evidence of guilt at the defendant's trial. E.g., Harvey, 494 U.S. at 348-349. The Court also has held that, once the Sixth Amendment right to counsel has attached, law enforcement officers "may not inter fere with the efforts of a defendant's attorney to act as a medium between [the defendant] and the State during the interrogation." Moran v. Burbine, 475 U.S. 412, 428- 429 (1986) (internal quotation marks omitted). Those rules are consistent with the purpose of the Sixth Amendment guarantee, because if the government could gather evidence from the defendant before trial through circumvention of the defendant's right to counsel, the availability of counsel at the trial itself would be an illu sory protection. United States v. Wade, 388 U.S. 218, 224 (1967).
But the Sixth Amendment does not require an addi tional, prophylactic rule that overrides a defendant's free choice to speak with the police, in police-initiated interro gation, simply because the defendant previously has re quested counsel at an arraignment. The Jackson rule was based on the belief that the concern about coercion in the Fifth Amendment context is also present in the Sixth Amendment context. Jackson, 475 U.S. at 631-632. But that assumption is unfounded. The Sixth Amend ment does not protect a defendant against official com pulsion; it ensures that he will have the assistance of counsel to guide him through the intricacies of the trial process and ensure that his trial is fair. E.g., Cronic, 466 U.S. at 654. That purpose provides no warrant for auto matically invalidating a confession provided by a defen dant who has been approached by the police and apprized of his right to counsel, and who nonetheless voluntarily decides to waive that right and speak with police officers.
The Jackson Court's extension of Edwards to the Sixth Amendment context "cut the Edwards rule loose from its analytical moorings," Jackson, 475 U.S. at 640 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting). The Edwards rule was estab lished "to prevent the police from effectively overriding a defendant's assertion of his Miranda rights by badger ing him into waiving those rights." Id. at 638 (Rehnquist, J., dissenting) (internal quotation marks omitted); see Harvey, 494 U.S. at 350. But the Sixth Amendment right to counsel is about protecting the adversary process at trial, not about police "badgering," so application of the Edwards rule to the Sixth Amendment never made real sense.
Further, the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments serve as an additional check on police overreaching by prohibiting actual coercion. See, e.g., Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 398-399 (1978). Those myriad protections for criminal defendants during custodial interrogations make an additional prophylactic Sixth Amendment rule unnecessary. See Texas v. Cobb, 532 U.S. 162, 171 n.2 (2001).
The Jackson rule also runs counter to the general principle that criminal defendants may waive their con stitutional rights. The effect of the Jackson rule is to invalidate a concededly knowing and intelligent waiver of the right to counsel. This Court long has recognized that the Sixth Amendment right to counsel, like any other basic right of a criminal defendant, may be waived. See Faretta v. California, 422 U.S. 806, 833-835 (1975); see also Peretz v. United States, 501 U.S. 923, 936 (1991) ("The most basic rights of criminal defendants are * * * subject to waiver."). To the extent that concerns about police coercion justify invalidating a defendant's waiver of Fifth Amendment rights after he has requested coun sel, no similar concerns in the Sixth Amendment context justify a special anti-waiver rule. See Cobb, 532 U.S. at 174-175 (Kennedy, J., concurring) ("[I]t is difficult to understand the utility of a Sixth Amendment rule that operates to invalidate a confession given by the free choice of suspects who have received proper advice of their Miranda rights but waived them nonetheless.").
Jackson rests as well on an erroneous factual prem ise. The Court assumed that a defendant's assertion of his Sixth Amendment right to counsel in the formal con text of a courtroom necessarily should carry over to police-initiated interrogation, thus "giv[ing] a broad, rather than a narrow, interpretation to a defendant's request for counsel." 475 U.S. at 633. But it is one thing to assume that a defendant who desires counsel in court for one hearing also desires it for other formal proce dural encounters with prosecutors, and it is quite another thing to presume that the defendant who desires counsel in the formal criminal setting also feels the need for counsel in dealing with the police. A criminal defendant "might want the assistance of an expert in the law to guide him through hearings and trial, and the attendant complex legal matters that might arise, but nonetheless might choose to give on his own a forthright account of the events that occurred" to police. Cobb, 532 U.S. at 177 (Kennedy, J., concurring); see McNeil, 501 U.S. at 178 (making the same point).
Unlike the situation in Edwards, where the defendant has received warnings from the police and has made a clear and unambiguous assertion of his rights in custodial interrogation, Davis v. United States, 512 U.S. 452, 459 (1994), a defendant protected by Jackson has made no similar decision. Cobb, 532 U.S. at 176 (Kennedy, J., con curring). Jackson is triggered solely by a request for counsel at arraignment. The Jackson rule therefore pre cludes the defendant from "making an initial election as to whether he will face the State's officers during ques tioning with the aid of counsel, or go it alone" in any case in which the police initiate questioning. Patterson v. Illi nois, 487 U.S. 285, 291 (1988) (emphasis deleted). Be cause the defendant, by his assertion of the right to coun sel at arraignment, has not in fact elected to deal with the police only through counsel, the defendant should be permitted afterward to waive his rights and respond to police-initiated questioning.
In federal prosecutions, the effect of the Jackson rule must be assessed in light of other constraints on prosecu tors approaching represented defendants after the Sixth Amendment right to counsel has attached. In the main, federal authorities do not approach represented defen dants, for reasons independent of `Jackson. State rules of professional conduct generally prohibit attorneys from knowingly communicating with a represented person about the matter on which he is represented without coun sel's presence, unless counsel consents to the communica tion or the communication is authorized by law or court order, see, e.g., Model Rule of Prof'l Conduct 4.2, and those rules are made applicable to federal prosecutors, see 28 U.S.C. 530B(a) (a federal government attorney is subject to state rules of professional conduct to the same extent as any other similarly situated attorney). Al though some jurisdictions deem communications permit ted by the Constitution to be authorized by law within the meaning of the professional conduct rule, see, e.g., Utah Rule Prof'l Conduct 4.2(a) and (b), in other jurisdic tions the rule would require prosecutors to refrain from initiating communication with represented defendants notwithstanding the Jackson rule. And although federal law enforcement agents generally are not constrained by the ethical rules that apply to prosecutors, law enforce ment interests are not well-served when law enforcement agents have an incentive to communicate with repre sented defendants without direction from prosecutors. Accordingly, even if this Court were to overrule Jackson, that decision likely would not significantly alter the man ner in which federal law enforcement agents investigate indicted defendants. Nor has the Jackson rule resulted in the suppression of significant numbers of statements in federal prosecutions in the past.
Nevertheless, Jackson can potentially and inappropri ately result in the loss of statements in federal prosecu tions. This occurs, for example, federal agents misjudge whether a defendant has initiated dialogue with the offi cers and they commence interrogation in the belief that the interchange is permissible under Jackson. The rule in Jackson may also be inadvertently implicated when federal agents approach represented defendants to in vestigate other crimes and obtain statements on the charged offense. The conduct of state law enforcement agents could also result in the loss of evidence in federal prosecutions if state officials obtain evidence in violation of Jackson, federal agents seek to use that evidence in a federal prosecution, and the state and federal offenses are treated as the "same offense" for Sixth Amendment purposes. See, e.g., United States v. Burgest, 519 F.3d 1307, 1310-1311 (11th Cir.) (noting circuit split on whether state and federal offenses with the same ele ments are the "same offense"), cert. denied, 129 S. Ct. 274 (2008). Those consequences, even if infrequent in federal cases, provide cause for concern about constitutionalizing through an exclusionary remedy a violation of professional norms.
This Court has recognized that exclusion of a defen dant's own voluntary statement from his trial imposes real costs on the truth-seeking process by depriving the trier of fact of "what concededly is relevant evidence." Colorado v. Connelly, 479 U.S. 157, 166 (1986). The loss of "highly probative evidence of a voluntary confession" is a "high cost to legitimate law enforcement activity." Oregon v. Elstad, 470 U.S. 298, 312 (1985). In light of its costs to the truth-seeking function, the Jackson rule re quires a substantial justification. No such justification is present here. See pp. 5-11, supra.
The Jackson rule is not only unfounded, but warrant reconsideration because it has been substantially under mined by several subsequent decisions of this Court and cannot otherwise be readily confined.
1. In Patterson v. Illinois, 487 U.S. 285, 298 (1988), this Court held that a defendant whose Sixth Amendment right to counsel has attached may waive that right and agree to talk with the police. In so holding, the Court made three key points that fundamentally undermine its rationales in Jackson. First, the Court recognized the difference between protecting an accused's prior choice to deal with the police only through counsel and "barring an accused from making an initial election as to whether he will face the State's officers during questioning with the aid of counsel, or go it alone." Id. at 291. In the lat ter case, the Court explained, the suspect should be per mitted to knowingly and intelligently waive the right to counsel. Ibid. Yet the Jackson rule precludes a defen dant who has asserted the right to counsel in a formal courtroom context from making the initial choice whether to talk with police if the police, rather than the defendant, happen to initiate questioning.
Second, the Patterson Court rejected the view that it should be more difficult to waive the Sixth Amendment right to counsel during interrogation than the Fifth Amendment protections set forth in Miranda. The Court explained that "[t]he State's decision to take an addi tional step and commence formal adversarial proceedings against the accused does not substantially increase the value of counsel to the accused at questioning, or expand the limited purpose that an attorney serves when the accused is questioned by authorities." 487 U.S. at 298- 299. The Court therefore rejected the Jackson Court's assumption that "the reasons for prohibiting the interro gation of an uncounseled prisoner who has asked for the help of a lawyer are even stronger after he has been for mally charged with an offense than before," 475 U.S. at 626, 631.
Third, the Patterson Court noted that there is no rea son to assume automatically that a defendant who elects counsel at his arraignment is unwilling to speak with the police on his own: "[A]n attorney's role at postindictment questioning is rather limited, and substantially different from the attorney's role in later phrases of criminal pro ceedings," because "[a]t trial, an accused needs an attor ney to perform several varied functions-some of which are entirely beyond even the most intelligent layman," while "during postindictment questioning, a lawyer's role is rather unidimensional: largely limited to advising his client as to what questions to answer and which ones to decline to answer." 487 U.S. at 294 n.6. That observation directly contradicts the Jackson Court's "presum[ption]" that a defendant who requests counsel in courtroom pro ceedings necessarily has invoked his right to counsel in the very different context of police interrogation. 475 U.S. at 633.
The Court again distinguished between a defendant's choice to have counsel at formal proceedings and his choice to have counsel during police questioning in McNeil v. Wisconsin, 501 U.S. 171 (1991), when it held that a defendant's invocation of his Sixth Amendment right to counsel in judicial proceedings does not consti tute invocation of the Miranda right to counsel. Id. at 178-179. The Court recognized the very different pur poses of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments, and it noted that it is "not necessarily true" that a defendant who has requested counsel's assistance in formal proceedings has chosen to deal with the police only through counsel. Id. at 178. For that reason, the Court explained, the Ed wards rule applies only when the defendant has made "some statement that can reasonably be construed to be an expression of a desire for the assistance of an attorney in dealing with custodial interrogation by the police." Ibid. That observation runs contrary to the Court's rea soning in Jackson that a defendant who has elected coun sel at his arraignment should be presumed to have in voked his right to counsel in police questioning. 475 U.S. at 636.
The Court's decision in Davis v. United States, 512 U.S. 452 (1994), similarly undermines Jackson's reason ing. In Davis, the Court held that a suspect must "un ambiguously request counsel" during custodial interroga tion for the prophylactic rule of Edwards to apply; "[i]f the statement fails to meet the requisite level of clarity, Edwards does not require that the officers stop question ing the suspect." Id. at 459. Yet Jackson imposes the Edwards rule without an unambiguous invocation of the right to counsel for custodial interrogation, 475 U.S. at 636, in circumstances in which the defendant may be will ing to speak to the police without counsel. See p. 10, su pra.
The reach of the Jackson rule also has been limited by this Court's decision in Texas v. Cobb, 532 U.S. 162 (2001), which reiterated that the Sixth Amendment right to counsel is offense-specific. Id. at 165. As a result, the prophylactic Jackson rule applies only to questioning about the crime for which the defendant has been in dicted, and law enforcement officers may initiate ques tioning of a represented defendant about any other crimes. See id. at 167-168; see also McNeil, 501 U.S. at 175 ("[J]ust as the right [to counsel] is offense specific, so also its Michigan v. Jackson effect of invalidating subse quent waivers in police-initiated interviews is offense specific."). Cobb confirms that the police may question an indicted defendant about crimes other than the charged offense and that, when questioned about other crimes, a defendant may well wish to provide a full and truthful account to police. 532 U.S. at 171-172. At the same time, Cobb reaffirms that the Fifth Amendment plays a sub stantial role "in protecting a defendant's right to consult with counsel before talking to police." Id. at 171 n.2. In light of Cobb, there is both little basis and little need for the prophylactic rule announced in Jackson.
2. The difficulty in identifying a coherent limiting principle in cases like this one, in which the defendant did not even request counsel, provides a final reason to revisit that decision. Several of this Court's precedents may be read to suggest that Jackson applies only when a defendant affirmatively requests counsel. See, e.g., McNeil, 501 U.S. at 175; Harvey, 494 U.S. at 350; Pat terson, 487 U.S. at 291; Jackson, 475 U.S. at 633 & n.7, 634. Yet a rule that distinguishes between those defen dants who speak up in connection with the routine ap pointment of counsel at an arraignment and those who do not is difficult to square with the rationale of Jackson and the practical realities of arraignment proceedings. A defendant who silently accepts counsel at arraignment neither more nor less signals a desire not to speak with the police than one who requests counsel at arraignment; and a defendant who is automatically appointed counsel would rarely have occasion to speak up in order to invoke Jackson. It therefore would be appropriate to overrule Jackson rather than take the intermediate step of lessen ing its impact by limiting it to cases in which the defen dant affirmatively has requested counsel.
Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U.S. 625 (1986), should be overruled.
1 In Maryland v. Shatzer, No. 08-680, the Court has granted cer tiorari to consider whether Edwards protection terminates when there has been a break in custody or a significant lapse in time before the reinitiation of custodial interrogation. Edwards would continue to serve as an important supplemental safeguard even if the Court were to impose limits on its duration. Indeed, the Edwards rule would serve this function even if the Court were to modify it so as to permit police to seek to reinitiate interrogation after the occurrence of attenuating circumstances that prevent police badgering.
2 As the Court has observed, the Fifth Amendment Miranda/ Edwards protections are both broader and narrower than the Sixth Amendment Massiah rule. They are broader because they apply to police questioning about any offense, not just the charged offense, and they are narrower because they apply only in the context of custodial interrogation. McNeil, 501 U.S. at 178; see Fellers, 540 U.S. at 523-524. Although the Sixth Amendment applies to police questioning beyond custodial interrogation, the Court has never held that such non- custodial questioning raises concerns about coercion. Those concerns arise from the fact of custody itself, see, e.g., Davis v. United States, 512 U.S. 452, 458 (1994), and thus provide no justification for extending the Edwards rule to the Sixth Amendment context.

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