Opinion ID: 1592017
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 11

Heading: Fifth Statement

Text: The defendant complains that the police secretly recorded a telephone conversation between the defendant and his brother, Mark Leger, which constituted a functional equivalent of interrogation and violated his invocation of the right to counsel. The record shows that following the recorded statement of December 12, 2001 ( Fourth Statement discussed herein), attorney Gary LeGros arrived at the police station to meet with the defendant. LeGros specifically advised the police that the defendant was invoking his right to counsel and that further questioning of the defendant by the police was prohibited. Thereafter, Mark Leger returned a phone call which Lt. Guillory had placed at the request of the defendant. The recording of the conversation shows that when the call came in, Lt. Guillory asked Mark whether he wanted to speak to the defendant by telephone or whether he would prefer to come down to the police station. Mark opted to speak to his brother on the telephone. Lt. Guillory advised Mark that the telephone call would have to be on speaker phone. Mark affirmed that method of communication would be alright and however he wanted to do it, that's fine. [62] Lt. Guillory testified at the suppression hearing that he also informed Mark that the telephone conversation would be recorded: Normally, under circumstances, we don't let anybody talk to inmates, but I figured that he [the defendant] needed to talk to a family member. So, I went to my office, opened my office up, got him, brought him into my office, explained to his brother that it would be on speaker phone, explained to him that the phones are recorded. All of the phones are recorded at P.D. Let him talk to his brother. I stepped out of my office and left a crack in the door about like that (indicating) and let him talk to his brother. [63] Captain Broussard affirmed that all of the normal business telephone lines in the Franklin Police Department are recorded on a tape machine. [64] At trial, Lt. Guillory testified that he told Mark both that the line was recorded and that the call would be on speaker phone so that the officer could hear it. [65] On cross-examination, he conceded he did not tell the defendant that the line was recorded; however, he stated that the telephone itself is marked as a recorded line. [66] Although Mark testified he heard a tone on the line that he assumed was the telephone being taken off of the speaker phone, [67] Lt. Guillory disputed that fact, testifying that the receiver of the telephone was never picked up. [68] When asked whether he thought the defendant had an expectation of privacy in the conversation, Lt. Guillory questioned how the defendant could have thought he was having a private conversation with the conversation being on speaker phone, with Lt. Guillory looking at him through the door and hearing the whole conversation. [69] In this telephone conversation, the defendant admitted he had committed the crimes with which he was charged. He expressed sorrow and despair. He also instructed his brother to sell his truck and whatever other possessions he owned in order to provide the defendant with money. The question presented here by counsel, whether police have right to record conversations between a suspect in custody and a family member, was answered in Arizona v. Mauro, 481 U.S. 520, 107 S.Ct. 1931, 95 L.Ed.2d 458 (1987). In Mauro, the wife of a murder suspect expressed a desire to speak to him while he was in custody. The police eventually acquiesced but informed both the suspect and his wife that they could only speak together if an officer were present in the room to observe and hear what was going on. The officer placed a tape recorder in plain sight on the desk in the room and taped the conversation, which was later played to the jury at trial. The Mauro defendant sought suppression of the recording on the ground that it was a product of police interrogation in violation of his expressed right to deal with the police only through counsel. The Mauro Court held that under both Miranda and Innis, the suspect was not subjected to interrogation or its functional equivalent. [70] The Court found that the tape recording showed that the police asked no questions about the crime or the suspect's conduct nor was it suggested or supported by evidence that the police's decision to allow the suspect's wife to see him was the kind of psychological ploy that properly could be treated as the functional equivalent of interrogation. [71] The Court did not find improper the presence of the officer during the conversation between the suspect and his wife, nor the fact that the police recorded the conversation. [72] The Court determined that the weakness of the suspect's Miranda claim was underscored by examining the situation from the defendant's perspective, as required by Innis. In other words, the Court doubt[ed] that a suspect, told by officers that his wife will be allowed to speak to him, would feel that he was being coerced to incriminate himself in any way. [73] We find that the defendant's claim regarding the admissibility of the tape recording of his conversation with his brother is controlled by Mauro and the law cited therein. We find that the defendant was not subject to interrogation or its functional equivalent by being allowed to speak with his brother on the telephone at the police station. The actions of the police in permitting the telephone conversation to occur were not coercive. As in Mauro, the defendant's relative was informed that the conversation would be overheard by others. Just as the Mauro defendant could see the tape recorder, the defendant had only to glance down to see the notation that the telephone was a recorded line. In addition, the defendant had to be aware that Lt. Guillory was stationed just outside the cracked door and was listening to the entire conversation. Thus, the statement obtained by the police by recording the telephone conversation was not obtained in violation of the defendant's Miranda rights. We find no abuse of the trial court's discretion in failing to suppress this statement at trial.