Title: Oregon v. Delong
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: S062176
State: Oregon
Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court
Date: June 18, 2015

No. 23	
June 18, 2015	
365
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE 
STATE OF OREGON
STATE OF OREGON,
Petitioner on Review,
v.
WILLIAM RICK DELONG,
Respondent on Review.
(CC 09CR1050FE; CA A146907; SC S062176)
En Banc
On review from the Court of Appeals.*
Argued and submitted October 8, 2014, at Bend Senior 
High School, Bend, Oregon.
Michael A. Casper, Deputy Solicitor General, Salem, 
argued the cause and filed the brief for petitioner on review. 
With him on the brief were Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney 
General, and Anna M. Joyce, Solicitor General.
Daniel C. Bennett, Deputy Public Defender, Salem, 
argued the cause and filed the brief for respondent on review. 
With him on the brief was Peter Gartlan, Chief Defender, 
Office of Public Defense Services.
Shauna M. Curphy, Portland, filed the brief for amici 
curiae Oregon Justice Resource Center, Albina Ministerial 
Alliance Coalition for Justice and Police Reform, The 
Portland Chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, Inc., and 
the American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon, 
Inc. With her on the brief were Sara F. Werboff and Jordan 
R. Silk.
KISTLER, J.
______________
*  Appeal from Douglas County Circuit Court, Joan G. Seitz, Judge. 260 Or App 
718, 320 P3d 653 (2014).
366	
State v. Delong
The decision of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the 
case is remanded to the Court of Appeals for further pro-
ceedings consistent with this decision.
Brewer, J., concurred and filed an opinion.
Walters, J., dissented and filed an opinion in which 
Baldwin, J., joined.
Baldwin, J., dissented and filed an opinion in which 
Walters, J., joined.
Case Summary: During a traffic stop, a deputy sheriff placed handcuffed 
defendant, placed him in a police car, and asked him if “there was anything that 
we should be concerned about” in his car without first giving defendant a Miranda 
warning. Defendant responded, “ 
‘No,’ and that if [the deputies] wanted to search 
the vehicle [they] could.” The search resulted in the discovery of methamphet-
amine and drug paraphernalia and, after the deputies read defendant a Miranda 
warning, defendant gave incriminating statements. Defendant moved to sup-
press the physical evidence during the search and the statements that he later 
made on the ground that that evidence was the product of the earlier Miranda 
violation. The trial court denied the motion. The Court of Appeals reversed. 
Held: (1) voluntary consent to search can attenuate the taint of failing to give a 
Miranda warning in violation of Article I, section 12, of the Oregon Constitution; 
(2) in determining whether an invitation to search breaks the causal connection 
between a Miranda violation and subsequently obtained physical evidence, the 
nature of the illegality, the character of the consent, and the causal relationship 
between the two will bear on whether the physical evidence is attenuated from 
the violation.
The decision of the Court of Appeals is reversed, and the case is remanded to 
the Court of Appeals for further proceedings consistent with this decision.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
367
	
KISTLER, J.
	
During a traffic stop, a deputy sheriff placed defen-
dant in custody and then asked him, without first advis-
ing him of his Miranda rights, “if there was anything we 
should be concerned about” in his car. Defendant “told [the 
deputy] ‘no,’ and that if we wanted to search the vehicle, we 
could.” On appeal, the state conceded that the deputy vio-
lated Article I, section 12, of the Oregon Constitution when 
he asked defendant that question without first advising him 
of his Miranda rights. The state argued, however, that the 
physical evidence that the deputies later found in defendant’s 
car did not “derive from” the Miranda violation. The Court 
of Appeals disagreed. State v. Delong, 260 Or App 718, 320 
P3d 653 (2014). Relying on State v. Vondehn, 348 Or 462, 
236 P3d 691 (2010), the Court of Appeals reasoned that both 
defendant’s offer and the resulting evidence derived from 
the violation. Having allowed the state’s petition for review, 
we reverse the Court of Appeals decision and remand this 
case to the Court of Appeals.
	
Sergeant Robeson worked for the Douglas County 
Sheriff’s office.1 One evening, while Robeson was on patrol, 
defendant’s car pulled out in front of Robeson. Apparently 
noticing Robeson’s marked patrol car behind him, defendant 
“immediately pulled off” into a store parking lot. Robeson 
continued driving, went around the corner, and pulled over 
to the side of the road to see if defendant would resume 
driving once Robeson passed by. “[A] few seconds later,” 
defendant drove past Robeson. In doing so, defendant con-
firmed Robeson’s suspicion that he had been trying to avoid 
Robeson, and he also gave Robeson the opportunity to see 
that he was not wearing a seat belt.
	
Robeson stopped defendant for that traffic violation. 
See ORS 811.210 (requiring that drivers wear seat belts). He 
approached defendant’s car and asked him for his driver’s 
license, registration, and proof of insurance. Defendant gave 
Robeson his name but could not produce a driver’s license 
or other picture identification. Driving without a license 
is a traffic offense; however, it is a defense to that charge 
	
1  We take the facts from the hearing on defendant’s suppression motion and 
state them consistently with the trial court’s ruling.
368	
State v. Delong
that the driver in fact had a valid license. See ORS 807.570. 
Robeson sought to determine defendant’s identity so that he 
could see if defendant in fact had a valid license. Robeson 
also wanted to identify defendant to see if there were a rea-
son why defendant apparently had sought to avoid him; spe-
cifically, Robeson wanted to see if there were an outstanding 
warrant for defendant’s arrest.
	
There was a passenger in defendant’s car, and 
Robeson removed defendant from his car, frisked and hand-
cuffed him, and put him in the backseat of the patrol car 
before asking him some background questions to verify his 
identity.2 At that point, Robeson had not advised defendant 
of his Miranda rights. After asking some questions regard-
ing defendant’s identity, Robeson asked defendant “if there 
was anything we should be concerned about” in his car.3 In 
response to that question, defendant “told [Robeson] ‘no,’ and 
that if we wanted to search the vehicle, we could.”4 Robeson 
relayed that response to another deputy, who had arrived 
at the traffic stop. The second deputy searched defendant’s 
car and found what appeared to be marijuana residue in 
an ashtray underneath the driver’s seat. He then opened a 
canvas fanny pack that was inside the car, where he found 
methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia. At that point, 
the second deputy advised defendant of his Miranda rights. 
Defendant stated that he understood his rights and then 
	
2  Robeson testified at the suppression hearing that he separated defendant 
from the passenger so that she could not conform her answers to defendant’s. At 
the suppression hearing, defendant did not challenge Robeson’s decision to hand-
cuff him. Perhaps for that reason, neither the state nor defendant asked Robeson 
about the circumstances that led him to do so.
	
3  Justice Baldwin’s dissent states that “Robeson questioned [defendant] 
about illegal activity unrelated to the stop without first warning him that he had 
a right to remain silent.” 357 Or at ___ (Baldwin, J., dissenting). Justice Walters’ 
dissent contains a similar statement. To the extent that the dissents suggest that 
Robeson asked defendant something other than (1) questions about defendant’s 
identity and (2) “if there was anything [the deputies] should be concerned about” 
in defendant’s car, that suggestion does not appear consistent with the record. 
	
4  Defendant, for his part, denied that he “volunteer[ed]” that Robeson could 
search his car. However, he agreed that he consented to a search of his car. 
Defendant testified that Robeson asked him,”[I]f he could search—if I minded if 
he searched the vehicle.” Defendant testified that he “told [Robeson] I don’t care 
but I got a whole bunch of stuff in the trunk of the car. You know, ‘I’d like you to 
put it back when you’re done.’ 
”
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
369
acknowledged that the methamphetamine and drug para-
phernalia were his.
	
Before trial, defendant moved to suppress both the 
physical evidence found during the search of his car and the 
statements that he made afterwards on the ground that the 
deputies had unlawfully extended the stop. At the hearing on 
that motion, defendant raised another ground for suppress-
ing that evidence. He argued that, when Robeson asked him 
if there were anything he should be concerned about in the 
car, Robeson violated his state and federal Miranda rights.5
	
In the trial court, the state responded that Robeson’s 
question did not constitute interrogation. In the state’s view, 
that question was no different from the background ques-
tions regarding identity that had preceded it. The trial court 
denied defendant’s suppression motion. It ruled that the dep-
uties had not unlawfully extended the stop, and it agreed 
with the state that Miranda warnings were not required, 
apparently on the ground that Robeson’s question had not 
constituted interrogation. The trial court accordingly denied 
defendant’s suppression motion and ruled that the physical 
evidence found in defendant’s car and the warned state-
ments that he made to the second deputy were admissible 
at his trial. Considering that and other evidence, the jury 
found defendant guilty of possessing methamphetamine.
	
On appeal, defendant challenged the trial court’s 
ruling on his suppression motion. He argued that, once 
Robeson placed him in the back of his patrol car and hand-
cuffed him, Article I, section 12, required Robeson to advise 
him of his Miranda rights before asking him whether there 
was anything in his car that should concern the deputies.6 
The state, in response, conceded that Robeson had violated 
	
5  Defendant did not argue in the trial court that the previous questions that 
Robeson asked regarding defendant’s identity constituted interrogation or that, 
in asking those questions, Robeson had violated his Miranda rights. Cf. State v. 
Cunningham, 179 Or App 498, 501, 40 P3d 535 (2002) (explaining that the federal 
definition of interrogation, which this court adopted for the purposes of Article I, 
section 12, contains an exception for questions “normally attendant to arrest and 
custody”).
	
6  Defendant also argued that, even if he invited the deputies to search his 
car, the scope of his consent did not extend to opening the fanny pack in his car, 
where the deputies found methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia. The Court 
of Appeals did not reach that issue, and the parties have not briefed it on review.
370	
State v. Delong
Article  I, section  12, of the Oregon Constitution when he 
asked defendant that question without first advising him 
of his Miranda rights. The state argued, however, that, 
because defendant’s invitation to search his car attenuated 
the taint of the Miranda violation, the physical evidence 
that the deputies discovered in the car was not the product 
of the violation.
	
The Court of Appeals held that Article I, section 12, 
required Robeson to advise defendant of his Miranda rights 
before asking him if there was anything in the car that should 
concern the deputies. Delong, 260 Or App at 724. It also held 
that the physical evidence the deputies found in defendant’s 
car “derived from” that violation under this court’s decision 
in Vondehn. Id. at 726-27. The court reasoned that Robeson 
“exploited, or took advantage of, the Article  I, section  12, 
violation to obtain [defendant’s] consent; he offered consent 
during a custodial interrogation while denying any wrong-
doing.” Id. at 727. The court accordingly held that the trial 
court should have suppressed the physical evidence discov-
ered in defendant’s car and the statements that defendant 
made after receiving Miranda warnings.
	
We allowed the state’s petition for review to con-
sider whether, under Article  I, section  12, the physical 
evidence that the deputies discovered in defendant’s car 
“derived from” the earlier Miranda violation. See Vondehn, 
348 Or at 476 (stating that standard). On that issue, defen-
dant argues that, because his invitation to search his car 
was the foreseeable result of the deputy’s unwarned ques-
tion, the evidence that the deputies found in his car derived 
from that Miranda violation and should be suppressed. The 
state responds that, because Miranda is a judge-made rule 
and not a constitutional right, we should suppress only the 
evidence that resulted directly from the Miranda violation. 
In the state’s view, we should not suppress the evidence that 
resulted directly from a Miranda violation and the “fruit of 
the poisonous tree,” as we ordinarily do for state constitu-
tional violations.7 Alternatively, the state argues that, even 
	
7  The fruit of the poisonous tree has been defined as “challenged evidence 
[that] is ‘secondary’ or ‘derivative’ in character,” as when “a confession is obtained 
after an illegal arrest, physical evidence is located after an illegally obtained 
confession, or an in-court identification is made following an illegally conducted 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
371
if we suppress both the direct evidence resulting from the 
Miranda violation and the “fruit of the poisonous tree,” our 
Article I, section 9, cases demonstrate that the evidence that 
the deputies found in defendant’s car was not the fruit of the 
poisonous tree and thus did not derive from the Miranda 
violation.
	
Our decision in Vondehn provides the starting point 
for our analysis. Accordingly, we first describe that decision. 
We then explain that the specific holding in Vondehn does not 
control the resolution of this case. We also explain that, even 
if we apply the remedial standard that we ordinarily apply 
to Article I, section 9, violations, defendant’s invitation to 
search his car attenuated the taint from the Miranda viola-
tion. Finally, we address defendant’s argument and the dis-
sents’ view that, even if defendant’s invitation to search his 
car would be sufficient to attenuate the taint of an Article I, 
section 9, violation, his invitation was not sufficient to atten-
uate the taint of an Article I, section 12, violation.
	
We begin with our decision in Vondehn. In that case, 
the officers asked the defendant whether he owned a back-
pack found in a stopped car, whether it contained marijuana, 
and whether they could search it. Vondehn, 348 Or at 484. 
The defendant answered “yes” to each of those questions. Id. 
Pursuant to the defendant’s consent, the officers searched 
his backpack, found marijuana, advised the defendant of his 
Miranda rights, and then asked him additional questions 
about the marijuana that they had found. Id. at 484-85. On 
review, this court held that, under Article I, section 12, the 
officers should have advised the defendant of his Miranda 
rights before asking him whether he owned the backpack. 
Id. at 476. It held that the answers that the defendant gave 
before being advised of his Miranda rights and the mari-
juana that the officers found in his backpack should have 
been suppressed. Id. at 476-77. It also held, however, that 
the answers that the defendant gave after being advised of 
his Miranda rights should not be suppressed. Id. at 486.
	
Much of this court’s opinion in Vondehn focused 
on the state’s argument that we should interpret Article I, 
pretrial identification.” Wayne R. LaFave, Jerold H. Israel, Nancy J. King, Orin 
S. Kerr, 3 Criminal Procedure § 9.3(a) (3d ed 2007 and supp 2014).
372	
State v. Delong
section 12, the same way that the plurality in United States 
v. Patane, 542 US 630, 124 S Ct 2620, 159 L Ed 2d 667 
(2004), would have interpreted the Fifth Amendment. See 
Vondehn, 348 Or at 470 (noting the state’s reliance on the 
plurality opinion in Patane).8 This court did not accept that 
argument. Relying on our cases interpreting Article I, sec-
tion 12, the court explained that “the Oregon Constitution 
requires Miranda warnings” and, as a result, the failure to 
give those warnings, when required, is itself a constitutional 
violation that requires a remedy. Id. at 475-76. The court 
also rejected the state’s argument that vindicating a defen-
dant’s Article  I, section  12, Miranda rights requires only 
that his or her unwarned statements be suppressed. Id. It 
held that Article I, section 12, also precludes the state from 
using “physical evidence that is derived from [a Miranda] 
violation to prosecute a defendant.” Id.
	
Having reached that conclusion, the court turned 
to the question whether the marijuana that the officers 
had found in the defendant’s backpack “derived from” the 
Miranda violation in that case. On that question, the court 
reasoned:
“In this court, the state makes no argument that the 
request for consent to search or the seizure of the mari-
juana derived from some source other than defendant’s 
answers to those unwarned questions, nor does the state 
argue that, even without defendant’s responses, the police 
inevitably would have obtained the marijuana. Thus, in 
this case, we conclude that the marijuana derived from the 
violation of defendant’s Article I, section 12, rights, and the 
trial court erred in failing to exclude it from evidence.”
Id. at 476-77. The court’s conclusion that the marijuana 
derived from the Miranda violation in Vondehn thus appears 
	
8  The plurality opinion in Patane would have held that, under the Fifth 
Amendment, the “mere failure to give Miranda warnings does not, by itself, vio-
late a suspect’s constitutional rights or even the Miranda rule.” 542 US at 641 
(opinion of Thomas, J.). In the plurality’s view, “[p]otential violations occur, if at 
all, only upon the admission of unwarned statements into evidence at trial.” Id. 
The plurality reasoned that, because the mere failure to advise a suspect of his or 
her Miranda rights does not violate either the Fifth Amendment or the Miranda 
rule, there is no reason to apply the “fruit of the poisonous tree” doctrine to that 
failure. Id. at 643-44. It followed, the plurality reasoned, that excluding state-
ments obtained in violation of Miranda from a defendant’s criminal trial is the 
only remedy that the Fifth Amendment requires. Id. at 644.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
373
to have turned primarily on the absence of any argument to 
the contrary. See id.; see also id. at 490 (Linder, J., concur-
ring) (reaching a similar conclusion).
	
The court then turned to the question whether 
the statements that the defendant made after receiving 
Miranda warnings should be suppressed. In analyzing that 
state constitutional issue, the court employed a multifactor 
test that it drew from Missouri v. Seibert, 542 US 600, 124 S 
Ct 2601, 159 L Ed 2d 643 (2004), and Oregon v. Elstad, 470 
US 298, 105 S Ct 1285, 84 L Ed 2d 222 (1985). Vondehn, 348 
Or at 480-81. The court explained that, in considering those 
factors, it was not seeking to determine whether the defen-
dant’s warned statements were the fruit of the poisonous 
tree. Id. at 482.9 Rather, it was seeking to determine whether 
the belated Miranda warnings were effective in ensuring 
that the defendant’s decision to waive his right against self-
incrimination was knowing and voluntary. Id. Considering 
those factors, the court concluded that the belated Miranda 
warnings in that case had been effective. Id. at 486.
	
The statements that the court held admissible 
in Vondehn followed belated Miranda warnings, and the 
test that the court articulated (whether the belated warn-
ings were effective) applies in that circumstance. When no 
belated Miranda warnings have been given, the question 
whether the taint flowing from a Miranda violation has been 
attenuated will vary depending on the totality of the cir-
cumstances. See State v. Jarnagin, 351 Or 703, 716, 277 P3d 
535 (2012). In deciding whether the taint has been attenu-
ated, the court has considered, among other things:
“the nature of the violation, the amount of time between 
the violation and any later statements, whether the suspect 
remained in custody before making any later statements, 
subsequent events that may have dissipated the taint of the 
earlier violation, and the use that the state has made of the 
unwarned statements.”
	
9  The court explained that
“a court does not use those circumstances to attempt to determine the psy-
chological effect that the particular police course of conduct had on the par-
ticular defendant or whether the initial failure to warn caused the particular 
defendant to make the post-Miranda statements.”
Vondehn, 348 Or at 482. Rather, the test was an objective one. Id.
374	
State v. Delong
Id.
	
With that background in mind, we turn to this case. 
At first blush, the holding in Vondehn regarding the search 
of the defendant’s backpack in that case would seem to con-
trol the resolution of this case. As in Vondehn, the deputies 
in this case did not advise defendant of his Miranda rights 
before obtaining his consent to search his car. This case dif-
fers from Vondehn, however, in at least two respects. As dis-
cussed above, this court did not have occasion in Vondehn 
to explore, at any length, whether the marijuana found in 
the defendant’s backpack in that case derived from the pre-
ceding Miranda violation, in large part because the state 
had not argued that it did not. Here, the state has argued 
that the physical evidence that the deputies found did not 
derive from the Miranda violation. Moreover, as is often 
true in cases such as this, the issue in this case arises in 
a different factual posture from the issue in Vondehn. As 
discussed below, Robeson’s unwarned question in this case 
was open-ended; defendant’s direct response to the question 
was exculpatory; and he invited the deputies to search his 
car without an express request for consent.
	
We accordingly cannot say that the specific holding 
in Vondehn controls our resolution of this case, and we look 
instead to the factors identified in Jarnagin to determine 
whether the physical evidence that the deputies found in 
defendant’s car was the product of the preceding Miranda 
violation. On that issue, we note that the amount of time 
that passed between the Miranda violation and the discov-
ery of the physical evidence was brief. Additionally, defen-
dant remained in custody during the encounter. In those 
respects, this case is similar to Vondehn. As noted above, 
however, this case differs from Vondehn in other respects, 
and we focus initially on the primary factual difference, 
defendant’s invitation to search his car. See Jarnagin, 351 
Or at 716 (explaining that, in deciding attenuation, we con-
sider, among other things, “subsequent events that may 
have dissipated the taint of the earlier violation”).
	
When Sergeant Robeson asked defendant “if there 
was anything we should be concerned about” in his car, 
defendant “told [him] ‘no,’ and that if [the officers] wanted 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
375
to search the vehicle [they] could.” Defendant’s answer 
divides into two parts: (1) a statement that nothing in his 
car should concern the officers and (2) an invitation to the 
officers to search his car if they wanted to do so. The sec-
ond part of defendant’s answer can be viewed in one of two 
ways: either as a volunteered response that was admissible 
in defendant’s criminal trial or, even if defendant’s response 
were not admissible in his criminal trial, as evidence of 
attenuation that was relevant to his motion to suppress and 
admissible in the hearing on that motion. Cf. State v. Wright, 
315 Or 124, 131, 843 P2d 436 (1992) (explaining that the 
fact that evidence is inadmissible under the evidence code 
at trial does not mean that it is inadmissible in deciding a 
motion to suppress).
	
We begin with the first way of looking at defen-
dant’s response. The trial court found that defendant had 
“volunteered” the invitation to search. The concept of a vol-
unteered statement has a unique place in Miranda jurispru-
dence. In announcing the requirement that officers advise 
custodial suspects of their rights before questioning them, 
the United States Supreme Court was careful to recognize 
that that requirement does not preclude the admission of a 
defendant’s volunteered statements in his or her criminal 
trial. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 US 436, 478, 86 S Ct 1602, 
16 L Ed 2d 694 (1966) (“Volunteered statements of any kind 
are not barred by the Fifth Amendment and their admissi-
bility is not affected by our holding today.”).
	
The volunteered statements that the Court dis-
cussed in Miranda were statements that a suspect made 
in custody without any questioning by the police. See id.; 
Wayne R. LaFave, Jerold H. Israel, Nancy J. King, and Oris 
S. Kerr, 2 Criminal Procedure § 6.7(d) (3d ed 2007 and 2014 
supp) (discussing volunteered statements). Other courts 
have recognized that the concept also applies to nonre-
sponsive statements that a suspect makes during custodial 
questioning. See LaFave et al., 2 Criminal Procedure § 6.7(d) 
(discussing cases). Specifically, those courts have held that, 
to the extent that a defendant’s answer is not responsive to 
the officer’s question, then the answer is a volunteered state-
ment, as the Court used that term in Miranda, and admis-
sible in the defendant’s criminal trial. See id.
376	
State v. Delong
	
In this case, defendant’s invitation to search his 
car was nonresponsive in one sense. Robeson did not ask 
if he could search defendant’s car. He asked if there were 
anything in the car that he should be concerned about. 
Defendant’s answer went beyond what Robeson had asked 
and included an offer for the officers to search his car “if 
[they] wanted to.” As defendant argues, however, Robeson’s 
question can be viewed as prompting the second part of 
defendant’s answer. See State v. Unger, 356 Or 59, 79, 
333 P3d 1009 (2014) (explaining that asking a defendant 
whether he had any drugs or guns in his apartment could be 
viewed as prompting the defendant’s invitation to “go ahead 
and look”). Viewed in that manner, the second part of defen-
dant’s answer may not be sufficiently nonresponsive to come 
within the concept of a “volunteered” statement that the 
Court identified in Miranda and thus may not be admissible 
as evidence in defendant’s criminal trial.10
	
Even if we assume that defendant’s response to 
Robeson’s question was not “volunteered,” as the Court used 
that term in Miranda, defendant’s response still reflects a 
volitional act on his part and, as such, implicates another 
strand of our case law. In considering a related issue, this 
court has held that similar offers are sufficient to atten-
uate the taint of an Article I, section 9, violation. State v. 
Rodriguez, 317 Or 27, 854 P2d 399 (1993); State v. Kennedy, 
290 Or 493, 624 P2d 99 (1981).11 The point of those cases 
is not that the statement itself (the defendant’s offer) was 
	
10  Justice Baldwin’s dissent devotes some time to explaining that defendant’s 
invitation to search his car was not volunteered. We note that Robeson testified 
that defendant’s invitation was “volunteered,” and the trial court expressly cred-
ited Robeson’s testimony on that point. As a factual matter, describing defen-
dant’s invitation as “volunteered” seems accurate. Of course, the legal effect of 
that invitation is a separate question. And, as we explain above, we assume that 
defendant’s invitation was not “volunteered” in the sense that the Court used 
that term in Miranda. It follows, we think, that our difference with the dissent on 
this point is not substantial.
	
11  The issue in those Article I, section 9, cases was whether a defendant’s 
invitation to search his or her effects attenuated the taint of an unlawful seizure. 
The issue in this Article I, section 12, case is whether defendant’s invitation to 
search attenuated the effects of an unwarned question that followed a lawful cus-
todial seizure. Both types of cases involve situations that can influence a defen-
dant’s ability to make an independent decision. And, as the concurrence explains, 
the factors that we have considered in deciding attenuation in both situations are 
virtually the same.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
377
admissible in the defendant’s criminal trial. Rather, the 
point is that the offer was sufficient to attenuate the taint of 
the preceding constitutional violation, making subsequently 
discovered evidence admissible.
	
This court’s decision in Kennedy illustrates that 
line of cases. In Kennedy, the police approached the defen-
dant as he was leaving the Portland airport. 290 Or at 495. 
Acting on information that the defendant fit a “drug smug-
gler’s profile,” the officers asked to talk to him. Id. When the 
defendant asked one of the officers why they wanted to talk, 
the officer explained that he “had information that led [him] 
to believe that [defendant] may be carrying narcotics on his 
person or in his luggage.” Id. at 496 (brackets in original). 
“Defendant denied that he was carrying narcotics and said, 
‘Would you like to search my luggage?’ 
” Id. The court noted 
that, when the defendant made that offer, the officer “had 
not made any request for consent to search [the] defendant 
or his luggage.” Id. During the ensuing search, the officers 
found and seized a vial with cocaine residue on it. Id.
	
In deciding whether that evidence was the product 
of an unlawful stop, this court assumed that the officers had 
stopped the defendant and that they lacked reasonable sus-
picion to do so. Id. at 499. The court also recognized that the 
stop was the “but for” cause of the officers’ discovery of the 
evidence. Id. at 500-01. However, relying on, among other 
things, the “defendant’s offer to let [the officer] search his 
luggage without a prior request for consent,” the court con-
cluded that the discovery of the evidence was sufficiently 
attenuated from any illegality to say that it did not derive 
from it. Id. at 504-06 (explaining that the defendant’s unso-
licited offer to search was the “[m]ost importan[t]” consider-
ation in reaching its conclusion). The decision in Rodriguez 
is to the same effect.12 See also State v. Crandall, 340 Or 
	
12  In Rodriguez, state and federal officers arrested the defendant at his home. 
317 Or at 29. The officers advised the defendant of his Miranda rights. Id. at 30. 
In response to the question, “Do you have any drugs or guns in the house,” the 
defendant replied, “No, go ahead and look.” Id. The officers did so and found a 
gun, which the defendant later sought to suppress as the product of an unlawful 
arrest. Similarly to Kennedy, the court accepted the state’s concession that the 
arrest violated Article I, section 9. Id. at 37. The court also recognized that the 
arrest was the “but for” cause of defendant’s statement, “Go ahead and look.” 
Id. at 39-40. The court concluded, however, that defendant’s unsolicited offer 
378	
State v. Delong
645, 136 P3d 30 (2006) (defendant’s unilateral act in hid-
ing drugs under a parked car after officers unlawfully had 
stopped and directed him to come over and talk to them 
attenuated the taint of the unlawful stop).
	
In Unger, this court explained that Kennedy and 
Rodriguez stand for the proposition that, “in some situations, 
a defendant’s voluntary consent itself may be sufficient to 
demonstrate that the unlawful conduct did not affect or had 
only a tenuous connection to the evidence produced.” 356 Or 
at 77-78. Unger thus reaffirmed that, when a defendant’s 
consent to a search either was not affected by or was only 
tenuously connected to a prior illegality, the defendant’s vol-
untary consent can be sufficient to break the causal chain. 
The court identified three factors that bear on when volun-
tary consent will attenuate a prior illegality:
“That legal determination—whether, in the circumstances 
of a particular case, consent has so attenuated the con-
nection between the prior illegal conduct and the evidence 
obtained in the consent search—requires a court to con-
sider the illegal conduct that comprised the stop or search, 
the character of the consent, and the causal relationship 
between the two.”
 Id. at 78.13
	
Regarding the first factor (the nature of the ille-
gal conduct), the state has conceded that Robeson violated 
defendant’s Article I, section 12, rights when he asked him 
if there were anything in his car that should concern the 
deputies. That violation can hardly be characterized as 
egregious, however. This was not the sort of prolonged sta-
tionhouse questioning that concerned the United States 
Supreme Court in Miranda. See 384 US at 448-55 (describ-
ing interrogation techniques designed to break down a sus-
pect’s will). Robeson did not engage “in repeated efforts to 
wear down [defendant’s] resistance.” See State v. Foster, 288 
Or 649, 655-56, 607 P2d 173 (1980) (considering that situa-
tion) (internal quotation marks omitted); State v. Mendacino, 
to search his house sufficiently attenuated the taint of the unlawful arrest and 
upheld the admission of the evidence found in the ensuing search. Id. at 41-42.
	
13  The factors that the court identified in Unger are a subset of the factors 
that the court identified in Vondehn and Jarnagin.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
379
288 Or 231, 238, 603 P2d 1376 (1980) (same). The trial court 
found that only two to three minutes elapsed between the 
time that Robeson stopped defendant and defendant’s invita-
tion to search his car. And other than the initial background 
questions he asked, Robeson asked defendant only one ques-
tion: “[I]f there was anything we should be concerned about” 
in defendant’s car.
	
Defendant has not argued that his response to 
that question was “actually coerced” within the meaning of 
Article I, section 12, nor could he reasonably do so. Similarly, 
he has not argued that Robeson deliberately sought to violate 
his state constitutional rights. Although Robeson’s question 
went too far, his question was not dissimilar from a question 
that the Court of Appeals had held falls within an exception 
to the state constitutional Miranda requirement. See State 
v. Cunningham, 179 Or App 498, 504, 40 P3d 535 (2002) 
(asking defendant “whether he had anything that was sharp 
or would hurt him” before the officer performed a lawful pat-
down search did not constitute “interrogation” as defined 
by the United States Supreme Court and adopted by the 
Oregon Supreme Court).14 The violation was not egregious.
	
The second factor we consider is the character of 
defendant’s consent. As noted, defendant invited the depu-
ties to search his car if they wanted to do so. Defendant’s 
invitation to search his car in this case is virtually identi-
cal to the invitations in Kennedy and Rodriquez, which this 
court held attenuated the taint of the unlawful seizures in 
those cases. It may be that Robeson’s question in this case 
prompted defendant’s invitation to search his car, as defen-
dant argues, but the question that Robeson posed was more 
open-ended and thus more benign than the officers’ state-
ments in Kennedy and Rodriguez. In Kennedy, the officer 
told the defendant that they had reason to believe that he 
	
14  We express no opinion on whether the Court of Appeals was correct in 
Cunningham in applying that exception to the definition of “interrogation.” 
We note the Court of Appeals decision only to observe that Robeson’s question 
was similar to one that the Court of Appeals had approved. Robeson’s question 
differed in two respects, however. Unlike the question in Cunningham, which 
focused on harm to the officer as he carried out procedures designed to effectuate 
a lawful seizure, Robeson’s question was not limited to officer safety, and it asked 
about items in the car even though defendant was handcuffed and seated in the 
deputy’s patrol car.
380	
State v. Delong
had drugs on his person or in his luggage. 290 Or at 496. In 
Rodriguez, the officer asked if the defendant had any drugs 
or guns in his apartment. Rodriguez, 317 Or at 30. In this 
case, Robeson asked only whether there was anything that 
the deputies should be concerned about in defendant’s car.
	
Finally, we consider the causal connection between 
the violation and defendant’s invitation. This is not a case in 
which Robeson’s unwarned questioning left “ 
‘little, if any-
thing, of incriminating potential * 
* 
* unsaid.’ 
” See Jarnagin, 
351 Or at 722 (quoting Seibert, 542 US at 616-17 (plurality 
opinion)). Rather, defendant told the deputies that he did 
not have anything of concern in his car before extending an 
invitation to them to search his car if they wanted to. Not 
only did the deputies not trade on the first part of defen-
dant’s response, but there was nothing on which to trade. 
Nothing that defendant said in the first part of his response 
to Robeson’s unwarned question impaired defendant’s abil-
ity to make an independent decision to invite the deputies to 
search his car if they wanted to do so. In that respect, this 
case is no different from Kennedy and Rodriguez. Under the 
analysis in Kennedy and Rodriguez, defendant’s invitation to 
search his car attenuated the taint flowing from Robeson’s 
unwarned question. The evidence that the deputy found in 
defendant’s car did not derive from the preceding Miranda 
violation.15
	
Defendant and the two dissenting opinions take a 
different position. They reason that, even if the invitations 
to search in Kennedy and Rodriguez were sufficient to atten-
uate the taint of the Article I, section 9, violations in those 
cases, defendant’s invitation in this case is not sufficient to 
	
15  Justice Walters’ dissent compares this case to Jarnagin, where the offi-
cers obtained from defendant, during multiple extended interviews in violation of 
Miranda, an explanation as to how his daughter had been injured and an agree-
ment to reenact that explanation the next morning while the officers videotaped 
him. 351 Or at 718. Our holding that the resulting videotape was the product 
of the earlier violations turned in large part on the fact that the defendant’s 
unwarned statements formed the script that he acted out the next morning while 
being videotaped. Id. We do not view the specific circumstances that we consid-
ered in Jarnagin, as the dissent appears to do, as exhausting the totality of the 
circumstances that can bear on whether subsequently discovered evidence is the 
product of an earlier Miranda violation. Nor do we view Jarnagin as standing for 
the proposition that a defendant’s voluntary invitation to search can never atten-
uate the taint of a Miranda violation.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
381
remedy the taint of a Miranda violation. We begin with an 
argument that defendant alone advances.
	
Defendant argues that Kennedy and Rodriguez are 
inapposite because, under Article I, section 12, his invita-
tion to search his car will attenuate the taint of the Miranda 
violation only if the invitation was extended with knowl-
edge of his right against self incrimination. As defendant 
notes, this court stated in Vondehn that Article I, section 12, 
requires Miranda warnings “to ensure that a person’s 
waiver [of his or her Article I, section 12, rights] is knowing 
as well as voluntary.” See Vondehn, 348 Or at 474. It follows 
from that proposition, defendant contends, that, because his 
invitation to search his car was made without knowledge of 
his Miranda rights, that invitation should have little or no 
weight in the attenuation analysis.
	
One difficulty with that argument is that it fails to 
distinguish two separate issues. The issue in this case is 
not whether defendant’s response to Robeson’s question was 
knowing and thus admissible in his criminal trial. It may 
not have been.16 Rather, the issue in this case is whether 
defendant’s response was admissible in the hearing on his 
suppression motion to determine whether the physical evi-
dence discovered in his car derived from the Miranda vio-
lation. On the latter question, defendant offers no basis for 
saying that his invitation to search cannot be considered at 
a suppression hearing as evidence of attenuation. Cf. Wright, 
315 Or at 131 (explaining that the fact that evidence is inad-
missible under the evidence code at trial does not mean it is 
inadmissible in determining a motion to suppress).
	
We customarily have considered a suspect’s 
responses to unwarned questioning in determining whether 
subsequently discovered evidence derived from or was a 
product of an earlier Miranda violation. See Jarnagin, 351 
Or at 722-23 (considering the defendant’s responses to 
unwarned questioning in deciding attenuation); Vondehn, 
	
16  In the trial court, defendant did not move to suppress his response to 
Robeson’s question. He moved to suppress the physical evidence found in his 
car and the warned statements that he later made. In any event, even if defen-
dant had moved to suppress his response to Robeson’s question and even if that 
response should not have been admitted in his criminal trial, any error in admit-
ting the response was harmless.
382	
State v. Delong
348 Or at 485-86 (same). For example, among the factors 
that we considered in deciding attenuation in Jarnagin were 
“the use that the state has made of the unwarned state-
ments” and whether “the unwarned interrogation left ‘little, 
if anything, of incriminating potential * 
* 
* unsaid.’ 
” See 351 
Or at 716, 722 (quoting Seibert, 542 US at 616-17 (plural-
ity opinion)). Those factors necessarily entail considering a 
defendant’s responses to unwarned questioning in deciding 
whether subsequently discovered evidence was the product 
of an earlier Miranda violation.17
	
Defendant advances a second argument, which both 
dissents also raise. They reason that, even if defendant’s 
invitation would have been sufficient to attenuate the taint 
of an unconstitutional seizure, as this court held in Kennedy 
and Rodriguez, something more is required to attenuate the 
taint of a Miranda violation. They conclude that, because 
Miranda requires warnings following an arrest and because 
an arrest entails a greater level of restraint than a stop, 
an event that will be sufficient to attenuate the taint of an 
unlawful stop will be insufficient to attenuate the taint of 
a Miranda violation. Neither defendant nor the dissenting 
opinions, however, cite any case that stands for that cate-
gorical proposition. If anything, the cases that address the 
issue have held that less is required to attenuate a Miranda 
violation than is required to attenuate an unconstitutional 
seizure. See Dickerson v. United States, 530 US 428, 440-41, 
120 S Ct 2326, 147 L Ed 2d 405 (2000); Elstad, 470 US at 
306; Patane, 542 US at 644-45 (Kennedy, J., concurring in 
the judgment).
	
The United States Supreme Court explained in 
Elstad that “a procedural Miranda violation differs in sig-
nificant respects from violations of the Fourth Amendment, 
which have traditionally mandated a broad application of 
the ‘fruits’ doctrine.” 470 US at 306. The Court accordingly 
held in Elstad that the defendant’s subsequent warned state-
ments were admissible against him in his criminal trial 
	
17  There is a suggestion in Justice Walters’ dissent that, because defendant 
did not know that he had a right to remain silent, his invitation to search his car 
cannot be considered in deciding attenuation. That reasoning proves too much. If 
that were correct, no invitation to search following a Miranda violation could be 
considered without belated Miranda warnings.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
383
without regard to whether those statements were the fruit 
of his earlier admissions obtained in violation of Miranda. 
See id. at 316-17; see also Seibert, 542 US at 612 n 4 (plural-
ity opinion) (same). And the Court rejected an argument in 
Elstad that the degree of attenuation required to purge the 
taint of coerced or compelled statements applies equally to 
statements obtained as a result of a “technica[l]” Miranda 
violation. 470 US at 318.
	
To be sure, in Elstad, the Court justified a more lim-
ited remedy for Miranda violations than Fourth Amendment 
violations on the ground that Miranda was a judge-made 
rule, not a constitutional right. See id. at 305-06. Since then, 
however, the Court has recognized that Miranda warnings 
are “constitutionally based,” but it has adhered to its con-
clusion in Elstad that Miranda violations do not require 
as extensive a remedy as a Fourth Amendment violation 
and that the same degree of attenuation is not required. 
Dickerson, 530 US at 440-41; accord Seibert, 542 US at 612 
n 4 (plurality opinion).
	
As we read those decisions, they adhered to the 
conclusion in Elstad because of the prophylactic nature of 
the Miranda right. The purpose of Miranda warnings is 
“[t]o protect a person’s right against compelled testimony.” 
Jarnagin, 351 Or at 713. To ensure that that right is pro-
tected, the United States and Oregon constitutions require 
officers to advise suspects who are in custody or comparable 
circumstances of their Miranda rights. However, this court 
has never equated the point at which the Miranda right 
attaches with the point at which a person’s statements are 
either actually compelled or coerced. See id. at 724 (distin-
guishing statements obtained in violation of a defendant’s 
Article I, section 12, right to Miranda warnings from state-
ments obtained in violation of Article I, section 12, as a result 
of actual coercion). Between those two points lies a range 
of circumstances that can affect whether subsequently dis-
covered evidence derives from the failure to give required 
Miranda warnings.
	
In this case, defendant was in custody or compara-
ble circumstances, and his Miranda rights attached at that 
point. The dissents would give talismanic significance to 
384	
State v. Delong
that fact and hold that, as a result, defendant was disabled 
from inviting the officers to search his car. As we explained 
in Jarnagin, however, the question whether the circum-
stances are sufficient to attenuate the taint of an officer’s 
failure to give Miranda warnings will turn on the facts of 
each case. 351 Or at 716. That entails a consideration of the 
extent to which the nature and extent of the custodial ques-
tioning affected a suspect’s decision to invite the search.
	
In this case, we are hard pressed to say that the 
failure to give required Miranda warnings disabled defen-
dant from making an independent decision. It is true that 
defendant was in custody or comparable circumstances. 
However, that is true in every case in which an officer fails 
to give required Miranda warnings. Defendant was not 
detained in the stationhouse for an extended period of time, 
nor was he subjected to the sort of extended questioning that 
caused the Court to require Miranda warnings in the first 
instance. Rather, the detention was brief, only two to three 
minutes the trial court found. Robeson asked only one ques-
tion that went beyond determining defendant’s identity, and 
defendant’s response to that question was not inculpatory.18 
Given those circumstances, we conclude that our holdings 
in Kennedy and Rodriguez provide persuasive guidance for 
deciding this case.
	
One other consideration cuts against the conclusion 
that defendant urges and that the dissents would reach. 
Defendant concedes in his brief on the merits that an officer 
lawfully may ask a suspect who is in custody or compelling 
circumstances for consent to search without first advising 
the suspect of his or her Miranda rights. It follows that, if 
the suspect consents and the officer finds incriminating evi-
dence in the ensuing search, that evidence will be admissi-
ble in the suspect’s criminal trial, even though the suspect 
	
18  Justice Walters’ dissenting opinion states that the deputies “went on a fish-
ing expedition—deliberately interrogating defendant and seeking incriminating 
evidence without first warning defendant of his right to remain silent and con-
sult a lawyer.” 357 Or at ___ (Walters, J., dissenting). The trial court did not 
find, however, that the deputies “deliberately interrogat[ed]” defendant, nor did it 
find that they were on a “fishing expedition” or “seeking incriminating informa-
tion.” What Robeson actually said to defendant (even the words that defendant 
recounted) seems far milder than might appear from the dissent’s description of 
the events.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
385
was in custody or compelling circumstances when he or she 
consented.
	
If, as defendant concedes, an officer need not advise 
a suspect in custody of his or her Miranda rights before ask-
ing for consent to search, it is difficult to see why a suspect 
who is in custody cannot invite an officer to search. It may 
be, as defendant argues, that Robeson’s question prompted 
defendant’s invitation in this case. But, even if that is true, 
then Robeson’s question functioned implicitly the same way 
that an explicit request for consent would have, and defen-
dant points to nothing in the first part of his answer to 
Robeson’s question (that there was nothing in his car of con-
cern to the deputies) that would have affected or somehow 
tainted his decision to invite the deputies to search his car. 
Given Kennedy, Rodriguez, and defendant’s concession, we 
are not persuaded that we should automatically give less 
effect to invitations to search that follow a Miranda viola-
tion than we give invitations to search that follow an unlaw-
ful seizure.
	
One final matter requires discussion. At trial and 
on appeal, defendant argued that the deputies exceeded the 
scope of his invitation when they opened a fanny pack they 
found in his car, which contained methamphetamine and 
drug paraphernalia. The Court of Appeals did not reach 
that issue because it held that defendant’s invitation to 
search his car and the resulting search were the fruit of 
the Miranda violation. Because we reach a different conclu-
sion, it is necessary to resolve defendant’s argument that the 
officer’s search exceeded the scope of defendant’s invitation. 
The parties have not briefed that issue on review, and we 
conclude that the case should be remanded to the Court of 
Appeals so that it can decide that issue in the first instance.
	
If the Court of Appeals finds that the deputy’s search 
did not exceed the scope of defendant’s invitation, then the 
remaining question is whether the statements that defen-
dant made to the deputy after receiving belated Miranda 
warnings were admissible. As we understand defendant’s 
argument on that issue, it rests on the proposition that the 
deputies unlawfully discovered the physical evidence in his 
car and that, as a result, the belated Miranda warnings 
386	
State v. Delong
he received were not effective to render his statements 
voluntary. If the deputies lawfully discovered the physical 
evidence in defendant’s pack, then the physical evidence 
and defendant’s warned statements presumably would be 
admissible. Conversely, if the deputy’s search exceeded the 
scope of defendant’s consent, then the question will be, as 
it was in Vondehn, whether the belated Miranda warnings 
were effective. See Vondehn, 348 Or at 485-86 (holding that 
belated Miranda warnings were effective even though offi-
cers unlawfully had discovered marijuana in the defendant’s 
backpack).
	
The decision of the Court of Appeals is reversed, 
and the case is remanded to the Court of Appeals for further 
proceedings consistent with this decision.
	
BREWER, J., concurring.
	
I agree with the majority’s conclusion that the phys-
ical fruits of the invited search in this case are not suppress-
ible as a result of the admitted violation of defendant’s rights 
under Article  I, section 12, of the Oregon Constitution. 
However, I distance myself from two aspects of the majori-
ty’s discussion of the principles governing the suppression of 
evidence for violations of Article I, section 12.
	
First, I agree with the majority that there is no per-
suasive support for the proposition that something more is 
required to attenuate the taint of a Miranda violation than a 
violation of Article I, section 9. 357 Or at ___, ___. However, 
I do not believe that less is required to attenuate a Miranda 
violation than is required to attenuate an unconstitutional 
search or seizure. Although this court has held that the two 
attenuation analyses are not identical, they are animated 
by similar concerns, and, in my view, the attenuation frame-
works for violations of rights under Article  I, section 12, 
and Article  I, section 9, are structured—and ought to be 
applied—in comparable terms.
	
To protect a person’s right against compelled self-
incrimination under Article  I, section 12, this court has 
held that, before questioning, law enforcement must give 
Miranda warnings to a person who is in “full custody” or 
in circumstances that “create a setting which judges would 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
387
and officers should recognize to be ‘compelling.’ 
” State v. 
Jarnagin, 351 Or 703, 713, 277 P3d 535 (2012) (quoting 
State v. Smith, 310 Or 1, 7, 791 P2d 836 (1990)). When an 
officer fails to give the requisite warnings, a court must sup-
press not only the statements that a suspect makes in direct 
response to unwarned questioning but also evidence that 
derives from that constitutional violation. State v. Vondehn, 
348 Or 462, 476, 236 P3d 691 (2010).1
	
In Jarnagin, this court applied a totality of the cir-
cumstances test in determining whether physical or testi-
monial evidence derived from an earlier Miranda violation 
must be suppressed. Jarnagin, 351 Or at 716. In doing that, 
the court relied on Vondehn, 348 Or at 482, where it had 
directed courts to consider “all relevant circumstances” in 
deciding whether belated Miranda warnings were effec-
tive in ensuring a knowing and voluntary waiver of rights. 
Among other factors, this court in Jarnagin stated that “the 
nature of the violation, the amount of time between the vio-
lation and any subsequent statements, whether the suspect 
remained in custody before making any later statements, 
subsequent events that may have dissipated the taint of 
the earlier violation, and the use that the state has made of 
the unwarned statements” were proper considerations in a 
“fact-intensive” inquiry. Jarnagin, 351 Or at 716-17.
	
The court in Jarnagin distinguished the attenua-
tion inquiry under Article I, section 12, from the attenuation 
analysis under Article I, section 9:
	
1  In Vondehn, this court examined the basis for the requirement that law 
enforcement inform people in custody of their right against self-incrimination 
under Article I, section 12. The court explained that,
“[b]ecause a custodial interrogation is inherently compelling, and to ensure 
the validity of a waiver of the right against self-incrimination, Article  I, 
section 12, requires that the police inform a person subjected to custodial 
interrogation that he or she has a right to remain silent and to consult with 
counsel and that any statements that the person makes may be used against 
the person in a criminal prosecution. Article  I, section 12, requires those 
Miranda warnings to ensure that a person’s waiver is knowing as well as vol-
untary. If the police conduct a custodial interrogation without first obtaining 
a knowing and voluntary waiver of the suspect’s rights, then they violate the 
suspect’s Article I, section 12, rights.”
348 Or at 474.
388	
State v. Delong
“Defendant argues that we should apply the particular 
methodology set out in State v. Hall, 339 Or 7, 24-25, 115 
P3d 908 (2005), to determine whether evidence is the prod-
uct of a Miranda violation. The Hall methodology applies to 
violations of Article I, section 9. It does not apply to viola-
tions of Article I, section 12. Cf. Brown v. Illinois, 422 US 
590, 602-03, 95 S Ct 2254, 45 L Ed 2d 416 (1975) (explain-
ing that the question whether a statement is the product 
of a Fifth Amendment violation differs from the question 
whether it is a product of a Fourth Amendment violation). 
In Vondehn, we cited Hall once in describing the Court of 
Appeals’ reasoning, see 348 Or at 465, but we did not cite 
Hall afterwards or apply its methodology in determining 
whether the physical evidence in that case derived from the 
Miranda violation, see id. at 476. Similarly, we do not apply 
Hall’s methodology here.”
Jarnagin, 351 Or at 717 n 9.
	
Despite what the court said in Jarnagin, in reaching 
its decision in this case, the majority has borrowed liberally 
from the attenuation analyses of consent search cases under 
Article  I, section 9. That, I submit, is because the analy-
ses for both types of constitutional violations are aimed at 
similar concerns. Whenever the state has obtained evidence 
following the violation of a defendant’s Article I, section 9, 
rights, it is presumed that the evidence was tainted by the 
violation and must be suppressed. State v. Unger, 356 Or 
59, 84, 333 P3d 1009 (2014). The state may rebut that pre-
sumption by establishing that the disputed evidence “did 
not derive from the preceding illegality.” Hall, 339 Or at 25. 
When determining whether a defendant’s consent to search 
derived from police misconduct, courts are to consider the 
totality of the circumstances, including the temporal prox-
imity between the misconduct and the consent; the existence 
of any intervening or mitigating circumstances; the nature 
of the misconduct, including its purpose and flagrancy and 
whether the police took advantage of it; and the volun-
tariness of the consent. Unger, 356 Or at 89-93. Although 
expressed in different words, those factors closely track the 
factors that the court in Jarnagin indicated are pertinent in 
an Article I, section 12, attenuation analysis. In short, I do 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
389
not perceive that the bar is set higher or lower for a violation 
of either provision.
	
Second, I agree with the majority that a know-
ing waiver of Miranda rights is not required for a court to 
conclude that an ensuing consent or invitation to search 
is entitled to weight in the attenuation analysis. 357 Or at 
___. However, I would place more explicit emphasis on the 
absence of a knowing waiver as an aspect of the totality 
of circumstances. The reason is simple: a person’s lack of 
knowledge that he or she has a right not to self-incriminate 
should raise the same rebuttable presumption that evidence 
obtained in a consent search was tainted by the preceding 
illegality that arises in an Article I, section 9, attenuation 
analysis. In other words, a causal connection between a 
Miranda violation and the discovery of challenged evidence 
requires the state to establish the existence of circum-
stances that either legally or factually break that connec-
tion. See Vondehn, 348 Or at 476; see also id. at 490 (Linder, 
J., concurring). To be sure, the violation casts a meaningful 
shadow in the attenuation analysis even though it is not, by 
itself, dispositive.
	
Despite my differences with the majority’s analy-
sis, I agree with the outcome that it reaches. This is a close 
case. Weighing in favor of suppression are the presumption 
of taint arising from the absence of warnings, the close tem-
poral proximity between the violation and the invitation to 
search, the fact that defendant was handcuffed and in cus-
tody when he invited the deputy to search, and the absence 
of any indication that the violation was inadvertent. For 
various reasons, people in custody sometimes invite law 
enforcement officers to search their persons or belongings, 
even when they know that contraband is likely to be found. 
We would be naive to assume that experienced law enforce-
ment officers do not understand that.
	
However, Article I, section 12, does not set an insur-
mountable bar to a custodial invitation to search, even when 
the invitation would not have been made in the absence of 
a constitutional violation. I agree with the majority that the 
physical fruits of the search in this case did not derive from 
the Miranda violation. The detention here was brief; only 
390	
State v. Delong
one impermissible question was asked; that question was 
not asked coercively; and, in asking the impermissible ques-
tion, the deputy did not seek consent to search. Although 
there is no evidence that defendant knew that he had the 
right to remain silent, nothing prevented him—apart from 
his self-accountable volition—from simply answering the 
deputy’s question and leaving it at that. He did not need to 
invite the deputy to search his vehicle. In the end, that fac-
tor tips the scales for me.
	
For the foregoing reasons, I concur.
	
WALTERS, J., dissenting.
	
This case begins with a conceded violation of the 
Oregon Constitution and once again, ends without legal 
consequence. See State v. Unger, 356 Or 59, 103, 333 P3d 
1009 (2014) (Walters, J., dissenting). In this case, a deputy 
stopped defendant for not wearing his seat belt, handcuffed 
him, searched him, and placed him in the backseat of a 
patrol car. The deputy then committed a blatant and con-
ceded constitutional violation when he interrogated defen-
dant about illegal activity without informing defendant that 
he had a constitutional right to remain silent. Although the 
government is precluded from obtaining “a criminal con-
viction through the use of evidence obtained in violation of 
[constitutional] rights,” State v. Davis, 313 Or 246, 253, 834 
P2d 1008 (1992) (citing State v. Davis, 295 Or 227, 666 P2d 
802 (1983)), and an individual has a right to suppression 
of illegally obtained evidence to preserve the individual’s 
rights “to the same extent as if the government’s officers had 
stayed within the law,” id., the majority holds otherwise. I 
respectfully dissent.
	
In Unger, this court considered the appropriate 
consequences when officers violate the constitution. The 
defendant in that case was in his own home, not in com-
pelling circumstances or subject to interrogation, when he 
consented to search. The court held that the evidence that 
officers obtained as a result need not be suppressed. The 
court reasoned that the fact that the officers had violated 
Article  I, section 9, by entering the defendant’s backyard 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
391
did not affect the defendant’s decision to consent to search. 
Unger, 356 Or at 92.
	
Unlike 
Article 
I, 
section 
9, 
of 
the 
Oregon 
Constitution, 
Article I, section 12, does not prohibit an officer from enter-
ing private property without a warrant. Rather, it applies 
when an officer holds an individual in compelling circum-
stances and prohibits the officer from conducting a criminal 
interrogation without first warning the detained individual 
that he or she has the right to remain silent and to consult 
a lawyer. Despite those differences, the question that is pre-
sented when an officer violates Article I, section 12, is the 
same as the question that is presented when an officer vio-
lates Article I, section 9: Did the evidence “derive from” the 
constitutional violation? See Unger, 356 Or at 80 (“[O]ur task 
is to determine whether police ‘exploited’ or ‘took advantage 
of’ or ‘traded on’ their unlawful conduct to obtain consent, 
or—examined from the perspective of the consent—whether 
the consent was ‘tainted’ because it was ‘derived from’ or 
was a ‘product of’ the unlawful conduct.”); State v. Vondehn, 
348 Or 462, 475-76, 236 P3d 691 (2010) (court’s task is to 
determine whether evidence “derived from” an Article I, sec-
tion 12, violation).
	
I understand and agree with the majority and con-
currence that the principles that underlie the exclusionary 
rule and its attenuation exceptions apply equally to viola-
tions of both Article I, section 9, and Article I, section 12, 
and that the same factors may be relevant in deciding 
whether evidence that officers obtain can be used to convict 
a defendant. Delong, 357 Or at ___; id. at ___ (Brewer, J., 
concurring). However, one of those factors is the nature of 
the police misconduct. Unger, 356 Or at 81. It seems to me 
that an officer’s unlawful entry onto an individual’s prop-
erty when the individual is not in compelling circumstances 
may have a different effect on the individual’s consent to 
search than does an officer’s failure to advise an individual 
held in compelling circumstances that the individual has a 
right to remain silent.
	
In this case, for example, the deputy’s violation 
of Article I, section 12, had a more direct causative effect 
on defendant’s consent to search than did the violation of 
392	
State v. Delong
Article I, section 9, that the court considered in Unger. Here, 
the deputy had handcuffed defendant and placed him in a 
patrol car, when, without telling defendant that he had the 
right to remain silent and to consult a lawyer, the deputy 
asked him for incriminating evidence. Thus, in this case, 
unlike in Unger, defendant was held in compelling circum-
stances and was entitled to information that the defendant 
in Unger was not entitled to receive. And, unlike in Unger, 
the majority concludes that defendant’s consent to search 
derived from the deputy’s constitutional violation. As the 
majority acknowledges, it was the deputy’s question and con-
stitutional violation that prompted defendant’s unknowing 
response—the consent to search—and that response must 
be suppressed. Delong, 357 Or at ___. Thus, although the 
principles underlying the exclusionary rule are the same, 
its application in this case is different from its application in 
Unger and compels a different result.
	
Had the majority adhered to the “totality of the cir-
cumstances” analysis that it has used in past Article I, sec-
tion 12, cases and to its reasoning in Unger, it would have 
suppressed not only defendant’s response to the deputy’s 
question, but also the physical evidence that the deputies 
obtained as a consequence of that response. Just five years 
ago, this court discussed the basis for suppression of evi-
dence obtained in violation of Article I, section 12, and flatly 
rejected the state’s argument that the “mere failure to pro-
vide Miranda warnings” requires only suppression of state-
ments made in response to the unwarned questions and 
not suppression of the physical evidence obtained. Vondehn, 
348 Or at 475-76. In Vondehn, the officer asked the defen-
dant three unwarned questions: (1) Is this your backpack? 
 
(2) Does it contain marijuana? (3) Can I search it? The defen-
dant answered the first two questions affirmatively and, in 
response to the third, voluntarily consented to the search 
of his backpack. Nevertheless, the court concluded that the 
trial court had been required to suppress the defendant’s 
answers to all three questions and the marijuana that the 
officer had obtained as a result of the defendant’s consent. 
Id. at 476-77. The court held that, “[w]hen the police vio-
late Article I, section 12, whether that violation consists of 
‘actual coercion’ or the failure to give the warnings necessary 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
393
to a knowing and voluntary waiver, the state is precluded 
from using evidence derived from that violation to obtain a 
criminal conviction,” including the “physical evidence that 
is derived from that constitutional violation.” Id. at 475-76.
	
The majority does not overrule Vondehn, but distin-
guishes it on its facts, as does the concurrence. The majority 
points out that “Robeson’s unwarned question in this case 
was open-ended; defendant’s direct response to the question 
was exculpatory; and he invited the deputies to search his 
car without an express request for consent.” Delong, 357 Or 
at ___. The concurrence says that, in this case, the detention 
was brief, only one question was asked and not coercively, 
and the deputy did not seek consent to search. Id. at ___ 
(Brewer, J., concurring).
	
Those factual differences exist, but they are not of 
consequence. An unwarned question is an unwarned ques-
tion, no matter how open ended. Defendant’s response to 
the deputy’s unwarned question was of a piece, and it was 
inculpatory. And defendant’s “invitation to search” was not 
any less prompted by the deputy’s question than it would 
have been if the deputy had asked defendant for consent. In 
Unger, the court took pains to explain that there is little to 
distinguish “unprompted or volunteered consent,” like that 
in State v. Kennedy, 290 Or 493, 624 P2d 99 (1981), and State 
v. Rodriguez, 317 Or 27, 854 P2d 399 (1993), from consent 
that is given in response to a request for consent. Both types 
of consents, the court reasoned in Unger, are “prompted by 
the officer’s question about drugs and guns.” Unger, 356 Or 
at 79. The more salient inquiry, the court held in Unger, is 
not whether the officer sought consent, but “whether the 
consent was ‘tainted’ because it was ‘derived from’ or was a 
‘product of’ the unlawful conduct.” Id. at 80-81.
	
I agree. The question at hand is: Did defendant’s 
response, which included a consent to search, derive from 
the constitutional violation? “Yes,” the majority says, “it did.” 
Delong, 357 Or at ___. The majority is correct. A response 
to an unwarned question that is prompted by, and results 
from, the question is a direct link in the causal chain, not 
394	
State v. Delong
independent of it. Suppression of the response—the consent 
to search—should also result in suppression of the evidence 
that is a product of that response.
	
That does not mean that Article I, section 12, sets, 
as the concurrence would have it, “an insurmountable bar” 
to the admission of evidence obtained pursuant to a custo-
dial consent to search. Id. at ___ (Brewer, J., concurring). 
In State v. Jarnagin, 351 Or 703, 716, 277 P3d 535 (2012), 
the court considered the kinds of facts that can attenuate 
a Miranda violation, and I do not oppose consideration of a 
response to unwarned questions as one factor in the alterna-
tive analysis. But I do think it important to look at how we 
have applied the “totality of the circumstances” test in the 
past.
	
In Jarnagin, officers questioned the defendant 
about injuries to an eight-month-old victim at the police 
station and later at the hospital where the victim had been 
taken. The officers did not give the defendant the required 
Miranda warnings, and the defendant described his role 
in the victim’s injuries. The defendant also told the offi-
cers that he would reenact those events. The next day, the 
defendant participated in a video reenactment at his home. 
The circumstances were not compelling—the officers did 
not challenge or confront the defendant during the reenact-
ment—and the officers again did not administer Miranda 
warnings. At trial, the court granted the defendant’s motion 
to suppress not only the defendant’s statements at the sta-
tion and the hospital, but also the videotape.
	
On review in this court, the state argued that the 
officers’ Miranda violations at the station and the hospital 
did not require suppression of the videotape. The court dis-
agreed. The court acknowledged that a change in time and 
circumstances can be sufficient to dissipate the effects of 
an earlier Miranda violation and that the Miranda viola-
tions at the station and the hospital “were not flagrant.” Id. 
at 717. The officers had not physically restrained the defen-
dant and had advised him that he was not under arrest. Id. 
“[A]ccording to the trial court’s unchallenged ruling,” the 
court explained, “the officers [had] failed to recognize that the 
circumstances had become sufficiently compelling to require 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
395
Miranda warnings.” Id. Nevertheless, the court required 
suppression of the videotape, reasoning that the defendant 
had reenacted the same events that he had described earlier 
and “[n]o advice of Miranda rights had intervened to break 
the causal chain.” Id. at 718. Significantly, the court did not 
view the defendant’s voluntary agreement or his voluntary 
participation in the reenactment as breaking the causal 
chain. See id. at 719.
	
Neither the majority nor the concurrence rest their 
conclusions on the types of facts recognized in Jarnagin as 
attenuating the taint of a Miranda violation—a change in 
time or circumstances, a lifting of restraints, an officer’s 
failure to recognize that the circumstances were so compel-
ling that Miranda warnings were required, or the fact that 
belated Miranda warnings were given. Instead, the primary 
fact that the majority and concurrence deem essential is a 
fact that was of no consequence in Vondehn or Jarnagin 
and that pertains in virtually every instance in which a 
defendant seeks to exclude evidence obtained as a result 
of a “mere” Miranda violation—the fact that defendant’s 
response was volitional and the deputy did not coerce defen-
dant’s response.
	
An officer’s coercion can, of course, make a defen-
dant’s response involuntary. See State v. Foster, 288 Or 
649, 656, 607 P2d 173 (1980) (defendant’s waiver of right 
to counsel not voluntary where police persisted in repeated 
efforts to persuade defendant to waive right); see also State 
v. Mendacino, 288 Or 231, 238, 603 P2d 1376 (1979) (later 
confession inadmissible where “coercive conditions which 
resulted in * 
* 
* [earlier] confessions were not effectively 
removed”). But, as the court made clear in Unger, volun-
tariness alone does not necessarily make evidence obtained 
in violation of the constitution admissible. 356 Or at 79. 
Miranda warnings are required in circumstances that are 
compelling but not coercive to ensure that a defendant speaks 
not out of compulsion but as a result of a knowing, deliberate 
choice. The purpose of Miranda warnings is to ensure that a 
defendant knows that he or she has a right to remain silent 
and to consult a lawyer. Without that information, a waiver 
of rights, even a voluntary waiver, is invalid. Jarnagin, 351 
396	
State v. Delong
Or at 716; Vondehn, 348 Or at 476; see State v. Joslin, 332 
Or 373, 386, 29 P3d 1112 (2001) (holding that defendant’s 
waiver of Article I, section 12, rights, “although voluntary, 
was not knowingly made and, therefore, was invalid”). Thus, 
as the majority acknowledges, the failure to give Miranda 
warnings demands suppression of derivative evidence even 
when the consent to search is voluntary. Vondehn, 348 Or at 
476-77.
	
In this case, even if defendant’s response to the 
deputy’s unwarned interrogation, including his consent to 
search, can be described as volitional, it must be suppressed 
because, considering the totality of the circumstances, it 
was the product of the deputy’s constitutional violation. 
That conclusion also compels the conclusion that the result-
ing physical evidence must be suppressed. Both the consent 
and the physical evidence are the products of the same con-
stitutional violation and, on these facts, defendant’s consent 
to search cannot serve to attenuate the taint of the Miranda 
violation and permit the admission of the physical evidence 
any more than did the voluntary, but unknowing, consents 
of the defendants in Vondehn and Jarnagin.
	
The only additional peg on which the majority hangs 
its hat is its characterization of the Miranda violation in this 
case as “not egregious.” Delong, 357 Or at ___. But why? 
This is not a case in which the trial court could make an 
unchallenged ruling—as did the trial court in Jarnagin—
that the deputy failed to recognize that defendant was in 
compelling circumstances. Here, defendant was handcuffed 
when the interrogation began, and the deputy had to know 
that Miranda warnings were required. The majority does 
not contend otherwise, but nevertheless terms the deputy’s 
Miranda violation “not egregious,” implying that there may 
be different degrees of Miranda violations. Although there 
may be degrees of coercion, once coercion reaches the level at 
which Miranda warnings are required, an officer must pro-
vide the information that the constitution requires. When 
Miranda warnings are required, no adjectival description 
can render an officer’s constitutional violation meaningless.
	
Finally, returning to Unger, it is important to note 
that, in that case, the court cautioned that “consent that 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
397
follows a random stop or seizure that lacks probable cause 
or reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed 
and that is nothing more than a fishing expedition for 
incriminating evidence” may be consent that is voluntary 
but nevertheless so tainted that suppression is required. 
356 Or at 91. Here, although the deputy had probable cause 
to believe that defendant had been driving without a seat-
belt, he did not have probable cause to believe that he was 
in possession of drugs. Nevertheless, the deputy handcuffed 
defendant and placed him in the back seat of the police car 
and went on a fishing expedition—deliberately interrogat-
ing defendant and seeking incriminating evidence without 
first warning defendant of his right to remain silent and to 
consult a lawyer. In Unger terms, defendant’s invitation to 
search may have been voluntary, but it was nevertheless so 
tainted that suppression is required.
	
I fear that the majority advances such police prac-
tices when it refuses to impose consequences for a deputy’s 
constitutional violation. And, on the other side of the coin, 
holding law enforcement officers accountable will not result 
in the long-term loss of evidence. If the majority is correct 
that, in circumstances like those in this case, detained 
individuals give consent to search not because they lack an 
understanding of their rights, but because they make a delib-
erate decision to waive those rights, then such individuals 
will give consent to search even if we require law enforce-
ment officers to adhere to constitutional requirements.
	
In Unger, the court declined to impose a judicial con-
sequence for the officers’ constitutional violation, expressing 
its expectations that officers will act within constitutional 
limitations. Id. at 94. Most law enforcement officers do act 
within constitutional limits and they do so most of the time. 
But when they do not, it benefits neither the officers nor our 
system of justice to excuse their violations by saying that 
they were “not egregious.” Our system of justice depends on 
the public’s respect for law enforcement. When officers do 
not obey the law, the public loses respect for law enforcement 
and the law—posing a danger to both. When we counsel, but 
do not demand, the best from law enforcement, we imperil 
both law enforcement and our system of justice.
398	
State v. Delong
	
Judicially expressed expectations are not enough to 
secure liberty. “Liberty comes not from officials by grace but 
from the Constitution by right.” Maryland v. Wilson, 519 US 
408, 424, 117 S Ct 882, 137 L Ed 2d 41 (1997) (Kennedy, J., 
dissenting). Because the majority retreats from principles 
necessary to give effect to those rights and to protect our 
system of laws and those who enforce them, I respectfully 
dissent.
	
Baldwin, J., joins in this dissenting opinion.
	
BALDWIN, J., dissenting.
	
I respectfully disagree with the majority’s conclu-
sion that defendant’s consent to the search of his vehicle 
attenuated the taint of the Miranda violation by the depu-
ties in this case. In particular, I disagree with the majori-
ty’s conclusion that defendant’s consent—given in response 
to police questioning while he was in custody and in hand-
cuffs—was volunteered. I disagree with the reasoning that 
the majority has used to reach its conclusion, and I am con-
cerned about how that reasoning may affect other cases in 
which citizens are interrogated by law enforcement officers 
under compelling circumstances in violation of their right 
to remain silent under Article I, section 12, of the Oregon 
Constitution.1
I.
	
I begin with a brief additional background. Sergeant 
Robeson stopped defendant because defendant was not 
wearing his seat belt while operating his automobile. After 
Robeson activated his overhead lights and pulled defendant 
over, defendant identified himself by name and date of birth 
but did not provide Robeson with a driver’s license. Robeson 
handcuffed defendant, searched him, and placed him in 
the backseat of his patrol car. Robeson testified that his 
purpose in taking defendant into custody was to establish 
defendant’s identity. While defendant was handcuffed in 
Robeson’s patrol car, Robeson questioned him about illegal 
activity unrelated to the stop without first warning him that 
	
1  Article I, section 12, of the Oregon Constitution provides, in part:
“No person shall * 
* 
* be compelled in any criminal prosecution to testify 
against himself.” 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
399
he had a right to remain silent. Robeson asked defendant 
if there was anything in defendant’s car that the deputies 
should be concerned about. According to Robeson, defendant 
“told me ‘no,’ and that if we wanted to search the vehicle, 
we could.” Robeson testified that the above encounter lasted 
“maybe two or three minutes.” Deputy Poe searched defen-
dant’s vehicle immediately after Robeson’s conversation 
with defendant and found a fanny pack that contained drug 
paraphernalia and drug residue. Poe did not give defendant 
Miranda warnings until after his search had disclosed the 
physical evidence of drugs.
	
At the suppression hearing, defendant agreed that 
he had told Robeson that Robeson would not find anything 
in his car, but he denied that he had consented to the search 
his car. The trial court found that
“during this period of time * 
* 
* is when Sergeant Robeson 
initiated the conversation with the defendant about does he 
have anything of concern in his vehicle, and the defendant 
responded no, and then ultimately gave consent to search. 
Deputy Robeson said he did not ask for consent. That it was 
volunteered in a way by the defendant and the Court finds 
that appears to be credible.
“* 
* 
* 
* 
*
“[I]t was after the search when Deputy Poe approached the 
defendant, he gave him his Miranda rights and after giv-
ing those Miranda rights did ask extensive questions about 
what he found in the car and statements—incriminating 
statements were made by the defendant. The Court is find-
ing that the prior conversation about identification while 
he was detained to pursue that investigation, that at that 
point Miranda wasn’t needed.”
	
On appeal, the state conceded that the trial court 
had erred and that Miranda warnings were required before 
Robeson could question defendant because defendant had 
been in custody and under compelling circumstances at 
the time. The state nevertheless argued that suppression 
of the physical evidence was not required, because, in its 
view, defendant had made a spontaneous offer of consent 
to search his car. Defendant argued that State v. Vondehn, 
400	
State v. Delong
348 Or 462, 236 P3d 691 (2010), supported his contention 
that his consent (as found by the trial court), other state-
ments he had made, and the physical evidence all derived 
from the Article I, section 12, violation and should have been 
suppressed.
	
The Court of Appeals concluded that this case “is 
largely governed by the principles and reasoning that the 
Supreme Court set forth in Vondehn” and reversed the 
trial court’s denial of defendant’s motion to suppress. State 
v. Delong, 260 Or App 718, 722-23, 320 P3d 653 (2014). In 
Vondehn, the defendant was likewise handcuffed, placed in 
a patrol car, and briefly interrogated without the benefit of 
Miranda warnings, in violation of his rights under Article I, 
section 12. In response to a deputy’s question, the defendant 
admitted that he owned the backpack in the car and that it 
contained marijuana. The defendant consented to a search 
of the backpack, marijuana was found, and the officers 
then gave the defendant his Miranda warnings. This court 
observed that it had long held “that the Oregon Constitution 
requires suppression of statements made without the benefit 
of Miranda warnings.” Vondehn, 348 Or at 472. The court 
held that “the state is precluded from using evidence derived 
from the violation to obtain a criminal conviction,” including 
“physical evidence that is derived from that constitutional 
violation.” Id. at 475-76.
	
This court also explained in Vondehn that the ratio-
nale for the constitutional requirement that police warn cit-
izens of their right against self-incrimination is the level of 
coercion inherent in custodial interrogations. Article I, sec-
tion 12, protects citizens against the use of compelled state-
ments, because such statements do not provide an acceptable 
basis for proving guilt of a crime in a civilized society. See 
State v. Mendacino, 288 Or 231, 236, 603 P2d 1376 (1979) 
(so stating). To give effect to that constitutional right, this 
court has prohibited the state from using physical evidence 
derived from an Article I, section 12, violation to prosecute 
a suspect. The principles of law that this court applied in 
Vondehn are highly pertinent to this case:
	
“Since Magee, this court consistently has held that the 
Oregon Constitution requires suppression of statements 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
401
made without the benefit of Miranda warnings. See, e.g., 
State v. Roble-Baker, 340 Or 631, 643-44, 136 P3d 22 (2006) 
(suppressing unwarned statements made during custodial 
interrogation); State v. Smith, 310 Or 1, 7, 791 P2d 836 
(1990) (so stating). The full extent of the court’s discussion 
of the rationale for that rule has been to state that, when 
a suspect is subjected to custodial interrogation, warnings 
are necessary ‘ 
“because of the inherent level of coercion 
that exists in such interrogations.” 
’ State v. Scott, 343 Or 
195, 200, 166 P3d 528 (2007) (quoting State v. Joslin, 332 
Or 373, 380, 29 P3d 1112 (2001)); see also State v. Meade, 
327 Or 335, 339, 963 P2d 656 (1998). * 
* 
*
	
“* 
* 
* 
* 
*
	
“Article I, section 12, affords a constitutional right to 
remain silent. That right is, however, subject to waiver. 
Because a custodial interrogation is inherently compelling, 
and to ensure the validity of a waiver of the right against 
self-incrimination, Article I, section 12, requires that the 
police inform a person subjected to custodial interroga-
tion that he or she has a right to remain silent and to con-
sult with counsel and that any statements that the per-
son makes may be used against the person in a criminal 
prosecution. Article I, section 12, requires those Miranda 
warnings to ensure that a person’s waiver is knowing as 
well as voluntary. If the police conduct a custodial inter-
rogation without first obtaining a knowing and voluntary 
waiver of the suspect’s rights, then they violate the sus-
pect’s Article I, section 12, rights. To give effect to those 
constitutional rights, the state is precluded from using, in 
a criminal prosecution, statements made in response to the 
interrogation.”
348 Or at 472-74.
	
In applying those principles to the facts in Vondehn, 
this court concluded:
“As noted, defendant was in custody, in the back seat of 
a patrol car and handcuffed, when the police subjected 
him to custodial interrogation. Defendant had the right to 
remain silent and to advice of counsel, but the police con-
ducted their custodial interrogation without obtaining a 
valid waiver of those rights. When they did so, the police 
violated Article I, section 12. That constitutional violation 
402	
State v. Delong
requires suppression of both the answers that defendant 
gave in response to, and the marijuana that the police iden-
tified and seized as a result of, that interrogation.”
Id. at 476.
II.
	
With that background in mind, I now explain my 
disagreement with the majority’s conclusion that defen-
dant’s consent to the search of his vehicle attenuated the 
taint of Robeson’s illegal questioning. The majority begins 
its attenuation analysis by “not[ing] that the amount of time 
that passed between the Miranda violation and the discov-
ery of the physical evidence was brief. Additionally, defen-
dant remained in custody during the encounter. In those 
respects, this case is similar to Vondehn.” 357 Or at ___. The 
majority does not, however, discuss the compelling nature of 
the circumstances confronting defendant or give those cir-
cumstances any weight in its attenuation analysis. Not only 
did defendant “remain in custody” after he was stopped for 
a seat belt violation, he was searched, handcuffed, placed in 
the back of a patrol car, and then basically asked by Robeson 
if he had engaged in any illegal activity.2 The majority does 
not consider the effect of those circumstances on defen-
dant at the time that he responded to Robeson’s unwarned 
question.
	
The majority instead focuses on what it sees as 
“the primary factual difference” between Vondehn and this 
case—”defendant’s invitation to search his car.” 357 Or at 
___. “When Sergeant Robeson asked defendant ‘if there was 
anything we should be concerned about’ in his car, defendant 
‘told [him] “no,” and that if [the deputies] wanted to search 
the vehicle [they] could.’ 
” Id. Although defendant’s response 
	
2  The majority acknowledges that Robeson’s question “went too far” and 
states that his question “was not limited to officer safety.” 357 Or at___, ___. 
Because defendant had already been searched and handcuffed at the time that 
Robeson questioned him, however, officer safety would not appear to be an issue 
at all. Rather, based on the circumstances and the substance of Robeson’s ques-
tion, it appears that Robeson’s sole purpose in asking the question was to elicit 
incriminating information from defendant. See Rhode Island v. Innis, 446 US 
291, 300-01, 100 S Ct 1682, 64 L Ed 2d 297 (1980) (holding that “the Miranda 
safeguards come into play whenever a person in custody is subjected to * * 
* any 
words or actions on the part of the police * 
* 
* that the police should know are 
reasonably likely to elicit an incriminating response from the suspect”).
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
403
to the unwarned question was immediate and directly per-
tained to the deputy’s question, the majority sharply breaks 
the response into two parts, giving great weight to what it 
characterizes as defendant’s “invitation” to search his car. 
Notwithstanding the compelling circumstances confronting 
defendant, the majority views the “invitation” to search as 
spontaneous and in no way causally related to those circum-
stances or to the deputy’s illegal conduct. The majority con-
cludes that defendant’s consent was “volunteered.” 357 Or at 
___.3 Thus, the majority ultimately views defendant’s con-
sent as representing a complete break in the causal chain 
between the taint of the Miranda violation and the physical 
evidence obtained from the consent search.
	
In my view, the majority’s conclusion that defen-
dant’s consent to search was volunteered is inconsistent 
with the weight of pertinent case law. As the majority notes, 
Professor LaFave identifies two types of statements that 
properly may be considered “volunteered” in the Miranda 
context: (1) statements that are not prompted by police ques-
tioning, and (2) statements that are nonresponsive to a police 
officer’s question. 357 Or at ___ (citing Wayne R. LaFave 
et al., 2 Criminal Procedure § 6.7(d) (3d ed 2007 and 2014 
supp) (discussing volunteered statements)). The majority 
appears to implicitly concede that defendant’s statements did 
not fall into the category of unprompted statements. Rather, 
the majority posits that defendant’s statement that the dep-
uties could search his car was nonresponsive because his 
answer to Robeson’s question “went beyond what Robeson 
had asked and included an offer for the officers to search his 
car.” 357 Or at ___ 
	
The cases that Professor LaFave cites for the prop-
osition that a nonresponsive statement may be considered 
volunteered, however, do not support the majority’s posi-
tion. Those cases primarily involved suspects who had made 
incriminating statements that were wholly unrelated to the 
	
3  I have great difficulty viewing a consent to search given by a suspect in 
custody, in handcuffs, and in response to police questioning as a “volunteered” 
act. A “volunteer” is a “voluntary actor or agent in a transaction; * * 
* [s]omeone 
who gratuitously and freely confers a benefit on another.” Black’s Law Dictionary 
1807 (10th ed 2014). For me, to characterize defendant’s consent, if we are to call 
it that, as “volunteered” under the compelling circumstances confronting defen-
dant strains the meaning of that word to a breaking point.
404	
State v. Delong
questions asked by the police or that were not a product of 
unwarned interrogation. See, e.g., United States v. Crisolis-
Gonzalez, 742 F3d 830, 836-37 (8th Cir 2014) (the defen-
dant’s statement that he had a gun under his mattress was 
volunteered, because that statement was “wholly unrelated” 
to law enforcement agent’s inquiry into his immigration sta-
tus); United States v. Woods, 711 F3d 737, 741 (6th Cir 2013) 
(the defendant volunteered the “unexpected and unrespon-
sive reply” that he had a weapon in his car when asked by 
officer what object was in his pocket); United States v. Fleck, 
413 F3d 883, 893 (8th Cir 2005) (when the officer asked the 
defendants “how they liked the food” in the county jail, the 
officer’s question was not “calculated to elicit an incrim-
inating response” from the defendants); United States v. 
Castro, 723 F2d 1527, 1530-31 (11th Cir 1984) (when law 
enforcement agent asked the defendant, “What in the world 
is going on here?”, the defendant’s subsequent offer to bribe 
the agent was a “spontaneously volunteered” statement that 
was “totally unresponsive” to the agent’s question).
	
In contrast to the above cases, the state has con-
ceded that Robeson’s question whether “there was anything 
[the deputies] should be concerned about” in defendant’s 
car constituted a Miranda violation. Moreover, defendant’s 
statements that nothing in his car should concern the depu-
ties and that they could search his car were made in direct 
response to that unwarned question. Accordingly, because 
defendant’s statements were both prompted by and made in 
response to Robeson’s question, I would conclude that defen-
dant’s consent to search in this case may not properly be 
considered “volunteered.”
	
In determining that defendant’s consent attenuated 
the taint of the Miranda violation, the majority relies on State 
v. Unger, 356 Or 59, 333 P3d 1009 (2014), a case recently 
decided by this court in which police officers trespassed into 
the defendant’s backyard in violation of his privacy rights 
protected by Article I, section 9, of the Oregon Constitution. 
In that case, the officers knocked on the back door of the 
defendant’s residence, and the defendant consented to the 
entry into and the search of his residence. The defendant 
was not physically restrained by handcuffs or otherwise 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
405
subjected to compelling circumstances. Thus, no Miranda 
warnings were required or at issue in Unger. The majority 
cites Unger as “reaffirm[ing] that, when a defendant’s con-
sent to a search either was not affected or was only tenuously 
connected to a prior illegality, the defendant’s voluntary con-
sent can be sufficient to break the causal chain [between the 
illegality and the evidence obtained in the consent search].” 
357 Or at ___. The majority does not explain, however, why 
the attenuation analysis in Unger—an Article I, section 9, 
case—should apply in an Article I, section 12, case in which 
a suspect was not given his Miranda warnings before he 
consented to a search under compelling circumstances. 
Moreover, in applying Unger, the majority again disregards 
the effect of the compelling circumstances confronting defen-
dant as a causal factor in producing defendant’s consent and 
the physical evidence obtained in the consent search. In my 
view, Unger does not provide a readymade answer to how 
this court should conduct an attenuation analysis under the 
circumstances of this case.
	
In relying on Unger, the majority applies three fac-
tors identified in that case that it thinks bear on when a 
consent to search will attenuate the illegality of a Miranda 
violation:
“That legal determination—whether, in the circumstances 
of a particular case, consent has so attenuated the con-
nection between the prior illegal conduct and the evidence 
obtained in the consent search—requires a court to con-
sider the illegal conduct that comprised the stop or search, 
the character of the consent, and the causal relationship 
between the two.”
Unger, 356 Or at 78. First, the majority considers the illegal 
conduct of law enforcement. Again, no consideration is given 
to the compelling circumstances confronting defendant when 
he consented to the search. Instead, the majority observes 
that the violation of defendant’s Miranda rights “can hardly 
be characterized as egregious * 
* 
*. Robeson did not engage 
in repeated efforts to wear down [defendant’s] resistance. 
* 
* 
* [O]ther than the initial background questions he asked, 
Robeson asked defendant only one question[.]” 357 Or at ___ 
(internal quotation marks omitted). Of course, there was no 
406	
State v. Delong
reason for Robeson to ask defendant repeated or additional 
questions. Under compelling circumstances, defendant pro-
vided incriminating information to the deputies based on a 
single question. From Robeson’s question and the circum-
stances, it is apparent that the purpose of the question was 
to elicit potentially incriminating information from defen-
dant. Here, that purpose was achieved by Robeson asking a 
single question.
	
Second, the majority considers “the character of 
defendant’s consent.” 357 Or at ___. Again, without any ref-
erence to the compelling circumstances confronting defen-
dant, the majority concludes that, in response to an accusa-
tion by a sheriff’s deputy who had searched and handcuffed 
him, defendant simply “invited the deputies to search his 
car if they wanted to do so. Defendant’s invitation to search 
his car in this case is virtually identical to the invitations 
in Kennedy and Rodriguez, which this court held attenu-
ated the taint of the unlawful seizures in those cases.” 357 
Or at ___ (citing State v. Kennedy, 290 Or 493, 624 P2d 
99 (1981), and State v. Rodriguez, 317 Or 27, 854 P2d 399 
(1993)). However, as with its reliance on Unger, the majority 
fails to recognize critical differences between Kennedy and 
Rodriguez and this case. In Kennedy, the defendant was not 
confronting compelling circumstances when he consented to 
a search of his luggage after police officers had stopped him 
at an airport without reasonable suspicion. The defendant 
was not in custody or improperly questioned as part of any 
Miranda violation. In Rodriguez, the defendant consented 
to a search of his apartment after he “had been read his 
Miranda rights and stated that he understood them. He was 
under no compulsion to answer the agent’s question.” 317 
Or at 41 n 15. Both cases involved alleged violations of the 
defendants’ privacy rights under Article I, section 9—not a 
defendant’s right to remain silent protected by Article I, sec-
tion 12.
	
Finally, the majority purports to consider “the 
causal connection between the violation and defendant’s 
invitation.” 357 Or at ___. As previously noted, defendant’s 
response to Robeson’s question immediately followed that 
question. The conversation was brief, with no intervening 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
407
circumstances occurring between the question and the 
response. Notwithstanding the direct and obvious causal 
connection between the question and the consent, the major-
ity observes that “[t]his is not a case in which Robeson’s 
unwarned questioning left ‘little, if anything, of incrimi-
nating potential * 
* 
* unsaid.’ 
” 357 Or at ___ (quoting State 
v. Jarnagin, 351 Or 703, 722, 277 P3d 535 (2012) (internal 
quotation marks omitted)). However, the quoted portion of 
Jarnagin pertains to the efficacy of belated Miranda warn-
ings. The quoted discussion from Jarnagin appears to have 
little bearing on the causal connection between the Miranda 
violation and defendant’s consent to search in this case.4
	
In short, I do not find the majority’s attenuation 
analysis in this case persuasive. As noted, pertinent case 
law does not support the majority’s conclusion that defen-
dant’s consent was volunteered. Moreover, the majority does 
not recognize that the compelling circumstances to which 
defendant was subjected bears on whether defendant’s con-
sent attenuates the police illegality in this case. Although 
the majority purports to consider the causal connection 
between the illegality and defendant’s consent, it declines to 
actually look at those compelling circumstances as a causal 
factor. In my view, that oversight represents a major flaw in 
the majority’s attenuation analysis. The majority then com-
pounds that error by giving inordinate weight to defendant’s 
consent as a factor that—by itself, and in a highly fictional-
ized manner5—attenuates the taint of the police illegality.
	
4  The complete quote in Jarnagin is as follows:
	
“With that background in mind, we turn to the facts of this case. We note, 
as an initial matter, that this is not a case, as in [Missouri v. Seibert, 542 US 
600, 124 S Ct 2601, 159 L Ed 2d 643 (2004)], where the unwarned interroga-
tion left ‘little, if anything, of incriminating potential * 
* 
* unsaid,’ making it 
‘unnatural’ not to ‘repeat at the second stage [of the interrogation] what had 
been said before.’ See Seibert, 542 US at 616-17 (plurality opinion).”
351 Or at 722.
	
5  I understand that legal fictions are commonly used in the analysis of legal 
principles and in their application to particular facts. See Louise Harmon, Falling 
Off the Vine: Legal Fictions and the Doctrine of Substituted Judgment, 100 Yale 
LJ 1, 2-16 (1990) (discussing historical debate on use of legal fictions). Professor 
Lon Fuller defined a legal fiction as “either (1) a statement propounded with a 
complete or partial consciousness of its falsity, or (2) a false statement recognized 
as having utility.” Lon L. Fuller, Legal Fictions 9 (1967). Fuller distinguished a 
fiction from a lie “by the fact that it is not intended to deceive.” Id. at 6. He distin-
guished a fiction from an erroneous conclusion “by the fact that it is adopted by 
408	
State v. Delong
III.
	
As noted in Vondehn, 348 Or at 476 n 8, other state 
courts have decided under their state constitutions that 
physical evidence obtained in violation of Miranda rights 
must be excluded at trial as “fruit of the poisonous tree.” 
See, e.g., State v. Peterson, 181 Vt 436, 446-47, 923 A2d 585 
(2007) (holding, under Vermont Constitution, that “[p]hysi-
cal evidence gained from statements obtained under circum-
stances that violate Miranda is inadmissible in criminal 
proceedings as fruit of the poisonous tree”); Commonwealth 
v. Martin, 444 Mass 213, 215, 827 NE2d 198 (2005) (adopt-
ing common-law rule under Massachusetts Constitution 
that physical evidence, “if derived from unwarned state-
ments where Miranda warnings would have been required 
by Federal law in order for them to be admissible, is pre-
sumptively excludable from evidence at trial as ‘fruit’ of the 
improper failure to provide such warnings”); State v. Knapp, 
285 Wis 2d 86, 123, 700 NW2d 899 (2005) (noting that “the 
goals of the exclusionary rule and fruit of the poisonous 
tree doctrines are to curb ‘illegal governmental activity,’ ” 
and concluding that “it is appropriate that the exclusion-
ary rule bars physical fruits obtained from a deliberate 
Miranda violation under Article I, Section 8” of Wisconsin 
Constitution); but see State v. Sole, 185 Vt 504, 514, 974 A2d 
587 (2009) (holding that physical evidence not tainted by 
prior Miranda violation where the defendant consented to 
search in response to officer’s request because “a consent 
request is not designed to elicit an incriminating response”) 
(internal quotation marks omitted)).
its author with knowledge of its falsity.” Id. at 7. Thus, for Fuller, a legal fiction 
was problematic only if it was used without recognition of its falsity: “In practice, 
it is precisely those false statements that are realized as being false that have 
utility. A fiction taken seriously, e.g., ‘believed,’ becomes dangerous and loses its 
utility. It ceases to be a fiction under either alternative of the definition given 
above.” Id. at 9-10. Other commentators have agreed with Fuller that the danger-
ousness of a fiction derives from the failure to acknowledge its falsity and have 
sometimes criticized the fiction of “consent” in criminal procedure on that basis. 
See, e.g., David A. Sklansky, Traffic Stops, Minority Motorists, and the Future of 
the Fourth Amendment, 1997 Sup Ct Rev 271, 322 (1997) (“Unfortunately, the 
fiction of consent in criminal procedure is used by the Supreme Court with some-
thing far short of ‘a complete consciousness of its falsity.’ 
”) (Quoting Fuller.) In 
my view, using a legal fiction without recognizing its falsity is particularly dan-
gerous when the scope of protection afforded a constitutional right is determined 
based on the use of that fiction.
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
409
	
The physical evidence that defendant has challenged 
in this case is derivative in nature, because it was obtained 
as the result of an unwarned question directed by Robeson 
to defendant when defendant was in custody. Defendant 
is therefore entitled to a determination as to whether that 
derivative evidence is “tainted” by the constitutional viola-
tion or, as famously stated by Justice Frankfurter, whether 
the evidence is the “fruit of the poisonous tree.” Nardone 
v. United States, 308 US 338, 341, 60 S Ct 266, 84 L Ed 
307 (1939). As pointed out by Professor LaFave, Nardone 
“established the doctrine of ‘attenuation’ by authoritatively 
recognizing that the challenged evidence might sometimes 
be admissible even if it did not have an ‘independent source’ 
because the ‘causal connection * 
* 
* may have become so 
attenuated as to dissipate the taint.” LaFave, 3 Criminal 
Procedure § 9.3(a) at 419-20; see also Wong Sun v. United 
States, 371 US 471, 83 S Ct 407, 9 L Ed 2d 441 (1963) (sus-
pect’s confession to crime untainted by his illegal arrest the 
day before, because it was given after his release and his 
voluntary return to police station).
	
In this case, there was an immediate, direct causal 
relationship between the compelling circumstances confront-
ing defendant and the consent to search that defendant gave 
in response to Robeson’s unwarned question. As observed in 
Vondehn, this court has long recognized the inherent level 
of coercion that exists when suspects in custody are ques-
tioned by police officers. Vondehn, 348 Or at 472; see Joslin, 
332 Or at 380 (noting that protection against compelled self-
incrimination under Article I, section 12, “extends to custo-
dial interrogations, because of the inherent level of coercion 
that exists in such interrogations”); Meade, 327 Or at 339 
(court “has recognized that a level of coercion is inherent in 
any custodial setting”); State v. Brewton, 247 Or 241, 244, 
422 P2d 581, cert den, 387 US 943 (1967) (recognizing “the 
inherently coercive character of police interrogation of a sus-
pect in custody who has not been advised of his rights”). 
Indeed, the United States Supreme Court identified the 
compulsion inherent in custodial interrogations as the pri-
mary reason for requiring police officers to warn suspects 
of their rights. See Miranda v. Arizona, 384 US 436, 467, 86 
S Ct 1602, 16 L Ed 2d 694 (1966) (concluding that, without 
410	
State v. Delong
providing such warnings, “the process of in-custody inter-
rogation of persons suspected or accused of crime contains 
inherently compelling pressures which work to undermine 
the individual’s will to resist and to compel him to speak 
where he would not otherwise do so freely”).
	
In recent years, several courts have recognized the 
compelling effect of a police officer’s presence on an indi-
vidual’s consent and have considered empirical studies in 
fashioning appropriate tests for determining the validity of 
consent searches. For example, the Supreme Court of New 
Jersey cited various psychological studies regarding the 
compulsion inherent in police-citizen encounters in State v. 
Carty, 170 NJ 632, 790 A2d 903 (2002). The court noted, “In 
the context of motor vehicle stops, where the individual is 
at the side of the road and confronted by a uniformed officer 
seeking to search his or her vehicle, it is not a stretch of the 
imagination to assume that the individual feels compelled 
to consent.” Id. at 644 (citing psychological studies that have 
shown that “there is an almost reflexive impulse to obey an 
authority figure”). The court also cited data from the New 
Jersey State Police Independent Monitors’ reports that indi-
cated that nearly 95 percent of detained motorists granted 
a law enforcement officer’s request for consent to search. Id. 
at 644-45. Based in part on that social science, the court 
altered its test for determining the validity of a motorist’s 
consent to search, holding that law enforcement personnel 
must have a reasonable and articulable suspicion of crimi-
nal wrongdoing, beyond the initial valid motor vehicle stop, 
before seeking consent to search. Id. at 647.
	
Similarly, in Brown v. State, 182 P3d 624 (Alaska 
Ct App 2008), the Court of Appeals of Alaska relied on var-
ious studies on the inherently compelling nature of police-
citizen interactions to conclude that federal law does not 
adequately protect motorists. The court noted that consent 
searches are nearly always held to be valid under the Fourth 
Amendment: “The federal law in this area is premised on 
the assumption that, all things being equal, a motorist who 
does not wish to be subjected to a search will refuse consent 
when the officer seeks permission to conduct a search. But 
experience has shown that this assumption is wrong.” Id. 
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
411
at 630. After citing various studies that have undercut the 
notion that a person truly consents to be searched, the court 
concluded:
	
“Whatever the exact reasons for motorists’ willingness 
to accede to the requests of law enforcement officers, it is 
clear that large numbers of motorists are consenting to be 
searched each year—indeed, each month, and each week. 
Motorists are giving consent in such large numbers that 
it is no longer reasonable to believe that they are making 
the kind of independent decision that lawyers and judges 
typically have in mind when they use the phrase ‘consent 
search.’ 
”
Id. at 630-31. Ultimately, the court held, under the search-
and-seizure provision of the Alaska Constitution, that an 
officer who had stopped the defendant for a vehicle-equip-
ment violation was prohibited from requesting the defen-
dant’s consent to search her person and vehicle for drugs. 
Id. at 634.
	
Several other courts have acknowledged the wide-
spread academic criticism of case law pertaining to con-
sent searches. The Supreme Court of Kansas, for example, 
observed, “Commentators, in addition to noting the difficulty 
in applying the case law relating to consensual searches 
to specific fact situations, argue that the [United States 
Supreme] Court’s analysis utilizes an ill-crafted paradigm 
[for interpreting and applying the Fourth Amendment].” 
State v. Thompson, 284 Kan 763, 777-79, 166 P3d 1015 (2007), 
as modified, (Oct 17, 2007) (noting numerous scholars’ cri-
tiques that consent searches after routine traffic stops are 
inherently coercive). Similarly, the Supreme Court of Iowa 
described the abundant academic commentary on consent 
searches pursuant to traffic stops and acknowledged that 
a common criticism with the consensual search doctrine is 
that “a traffic stop gives rise to an element of compulsion.” 
State v. Pals, 805 NW2d 767, 780-82 (Iowa 2011).
	
In particular, scholars have criticized the wide gap 
between the fiction that ordinary citizens consent to a police 
officer’s requests and the reality that police-citizen encoun-
ters involve such inherently compelling circumstances as to 
vitiate any true choice on the part of the citizen. According 
412	
State v. Delong
to a study performed in Maryland and Ohio, which exam-
ined motorists’ compliance with police requests for consent 
to search their vehicles, approximately 90 percent of the 
motorists studied consented to have their vehicles searched. 
Daniel J. Steinbock, The Wrong Line Between Freedom and 
Restraint: The Unreality, Obscurity, and Incivility of the 
Fourth Amendment Consensual Encounter Doctrine, 38 San 
Diego L Rev 507, 534-35 (2001). Similar studies on police-
citizen encounters have shown that “people tend to underes-
timate the strength of situational constraints and overesti-
mate the voluntariness of others[’] actions.” Josephine Ross, 
Can Social Science Defeat a Legal Fiction? Challenging 
Unlawful Stops Under the Fourth Amendment, 18 Wash & 
Lee J Civil Rts & Soc Just 315, 332 (2012) (advocating for 
defeat of legal fiction of consensual nature of police-citizen 
encounters through use of social science). Indeed, one com-
mentator has concluded, “The truth is that people consent 
so often that it undermines both the meaningfulness of 
the consent and the believability that the police are really 
respecting the doctrine.” Oren Bar-Gill & Barry Friedman, 
Taking Warrants Seriously, 106 Nw U L Rev 1609, 1662 
(2012).
	
In State v. Jenkins, 298 Conn 209, 3 A3d 806 (2010) 
(Palmer, J., dissenting), Justice Palmer recently surveyed 
much of the academic commentary and social science regard-
ing the coercive effect that an officer’s request for consent is 
likely to have on a motorist who has been detained in con-
nection with a traffic stop. Id. at 325-34. He summarized 
that literature as follows:
“[E]mpirical studies over the last several decades on the 
social psychology of compliance, conformity, social influ-
ence, and politeness have all converged on a single conclu-
sion: the extent to which people feel free to refuse to comply 
is extremely limited under situationally induced pressures. 
* 
* 
* It therefore has been argued that the United States 
Supreme Court should incorporate the empirical find-
ings on compliance and social influence into * 
* 
* consent 
[search] jurisprudence * 
* 
* to dispel the air of unreality 
that characterizes the current doctrine.”
Id. at 326 (internal quotation marks omitted).
Cite as 357 Or 365 (2015)	
413
	
The foregoing authorities have all recognized that 
compulsion is an inherent feature of a police encounter when 
a motorist is detained in connection with a routine traffic 
stop. In this case, we have the additional circumstances that 
defendant was personally searched, handcuffed, and placed 
in the back of a patrol car; that strong show of authority 
subjected defendant to more compulsion than is ordinarily 
inherent in a routine traffic stop. Based on its prior prece-
dents, this court should give those compelling circumstances 
appropriate weight in considering the causal connection 
between Robeson’s Miranda violation and defendant’s con-
sent to the search of his car. Vondehn, 348 Or at 472; Joslin, 
332 Or at 380; Meade, 327 Or at 339; Brewton, 247 Or at 
244.
	
This court has generally looked to the totality of the 
circumstances and applied a fact-intensive inquiry to deter-
mine whether physical or testimonial evidence derives from 
or is a product of a Miranda violation. Jarnagin, 351 Or at 
716-17; see Vondehn, 348 Or at 482 (considering “all relevant 
circumstances” in deciding whether belated Miranda warn-
ings were effective in ensuring valid waiver of rights). Here, 
Robeson illegally asked defendant an unwarned question in 
violation of Article  I, section 12, for the purpose of elicit-
ing incriminating information from defendant. Defendant’s 
direct and immediate response to that question, given under 
compelling circumstances, included defendant’s consent 
to search his car. Those circumstances involved a strong 
show of police authority, including personally searching 
defendant, handcuffing him, and placing him in the back 
of Robeson’s patrol car. There were no intervening events 
between Robeson’s unwarned question and defendant’s con-
sent. Robeson exploited that unwarned question to obtain 
incriminating information from defendant. And that infor-
mation, in turn, was offered by the state to convict defen-
dant of possession of a controlled substance. Under those 
circumstances, defendant’s consent cannot properly be 
viewed as a complete break in the causal chain between the 
Miranda violation and the physical evidence obtained by the 
police. Put differently, defendant’s consent was more than 
tenuously related to the Miranda violation. Jarnagin, 351 
Or at 716-17; see also State y. Ayles, 348 Or 622, 636-39, 
414	
State v. Delong
237 P3d 805 (2010) (Miranda warnings alone not sufficient 
to “ensure that the unlawful police conduct did not affect, 
or had only a tenuous connection to, [the] defendant’s 
responses”); LaFave, 3 Criminal Procedure § 9.3(c) at 423-24 
(discussing relevant criteria for determining “when there is 
only an ‘attenuated connection’ between a violation and cer-
tain derivative evidence”); Comment, Fruit of the Poisonous 
Tree—A Plea for Relevant Criteria, 115 U Pa L Rev 1136, 
1148-49 (1967) (source of “relevant criteria” relied upon by 
Professor LaFave).
	
For the foregoing reasons, I would hold that defen-
dant’s consent to the search of his car did not attenuate the 
taint of the Miranda violation by Robeson. Where, as here, 
a suspect consents to the search of his car under compelling 
circumstances and in direct response to an unwarned ques-
tion by a law enforcement officer seeking to elicit incrimi-
nating information from that suspect, the physical evidence 
obtained from that search must be excluded as the “fruit of 
the poisonous tree” to give effect to the constitutional protec-
tion against self-incrimination provided for by Article I, sec-
tion 12, of the Oregon Constitution. In my view, the majority 
‘s contrary conclusion unduly diminishes the vital constitu-
tional protection against self-incrimination provided for by 
Article I, section 12. I therefore respectfully dissent.
	
Walters, J., joins this dissenting opinion.