Opinion ID: 2188701
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Kehling's Statement to His Probation Officer

Text: At the time of the fire Kehling, as a result of a prior conviction, was on probation subject to conditions that he notify his probation officer of any change of address and of any contact with the police and that he answer any reasonable question of his probation officer. Sometime during the morning of November 4, 1989, Kehling called his probation officer's home and left a message on the officer's telephone answering machine asking the officer to call him back. The probation officer called the Biddeford Police Department and learned that Kehling was going to be arrested and questioned about the fire in his building. When in the afternoon the probation officer returned Kehling's call, Kehling told him that he had moved from his apartment because of a fire. The probation officer asked defendant What happened? and defendant replied: [I] was on the telephone when [I] noticed a fire in the apartment and [I] fled from the house. On defendant's pretrial motion to suppress the admission of that statement, the Superior Court held that since defendant was not in custody at the time he made the telephone statement and since he was not compelled to answer the probation officer's question, the statement was admissible. Defendant argues on appeal that the right to remain silent was self-executing in the circumstances of this case and that the probation officer's failure to give a Miranda warning makes defendant's response to the question what happened inadmissible. We uphold the denial of the motion to suppress. The case at bar is on all fours with Minnesota v. Murphy, 465 U.S. 420, 435, 104 S.Ct. 1136, 1146, 79 L.Ed.2d 409 (1984), in which the Supreme Court held that a State may require a probationer to appear and discuss matters that affect his probationary status and that such a requirement, without more, does not give rise to a self-executing [Fifth Amendment] privilege. Murphy specifically addressed and flatly rejected defendant's present argument that the probation officer's question should be viewed as an attempt to elicit incriminating evidence from him, especially since the officer knew defendant was going to be arrested and questioned: The mere fact that an investigation has focused on a suspect does not trigger the need for Miranda warnings in non-custodial settings, and the probation officer's knowledge and intent have no bearing on the outcome of this case. Id. 465 U.S. at 431, 104 S.Ct. at 1144 (citation omitted). Citing State v. Carisio, 552 A.2d 23 (Me. 1988), defendant also argues that his statement to the probation officer was not voluntary under article I, section 6, of the Maine Constitution. In Carisio we held that [a] confession is voluntary if it results from the free choice of a rational mind, if it is not the product of coercive police conduct, if under all the circumstances, its admission would be fundamentally fair. Id. at 25. Nothing in the present record suggests any violation of Carisio. Kehling initiated the contact with his probation officer that morning. He made his incriminating statement on the probation officer's return call which lasted no more than a couple of minutes. The probation officer did not threaten or coerce Kehling, nor did he threaten Kehling with arrest if he did not talk. On the contrary, the officer testified that if Kehling had said that he did not want to continue talking, the officer would not have pursued his question any further. The trial court committed no error in finding that defendant's statement was not compelled. [1]