Opinion ID: 1890026
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Admission of Detective Mercer's Testimony

Text: We shall, for the trial court's guidance, analyze the issues raised by Detective Mercer's testimony about Newman's Miranda warnings. Newman asserts that testimony by Detective Mercer that she was Mirandized and that her attorney was waiting for her at the police station is an indirect comment on her post- Miranda silence because commenting on the presence of her attorney necessarily implicates the fact that Newman remained silent. As such, Newman argues that the trial court's curative instruction was inadequate and that her Motion for Mistrial was improperly denied. The pertinent part of Detective Mercer's testimony is as follows: STATE: Did you advise her of her rights? DETECTIVE MERCER: Yes, sir. STATE: And what rights did you advise her of? DETECTIVE MERCER: That she had the right to remain silent, she had the right to an attorney. At which time she advised that she would like to consult with an attorney. Actually, she had an attorney waiting in the station lobby for her. The United States Constitution and the Maryland Declaration of Rights guarantee the innocent and guilty alike the right to remain silent. See U.S. CONST. amend. V (providing that [n]o person ... shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself); Md. Const. Declaration of Rights, art. 22 (That no man ought to be compelled to give evidence against himself in a criminal case). [8] An inherent component of this guarantee is that one who invokes the privilege against self-incrimination shall remain free from adverse presumptions surrounding the exercise of such right. See Md.Code (1973, 2002 Repl.Vol.), § 9-107 of the Courts and Judicial Proceedings Article (providing that [t]he failure of a defendant to testify in a criminal proceeding on this basis does not create any presumption against him); see Crosby v. State, 366 Md. 518, 528, 784 A.2d 1102, 1107 (2001); Younie v. State, 272 Md. 233, 244, 322 A.2d 211, 217 (1974) (stating that no penalty shall flow from the exercise of one's right to remain silent). Cognizant of the fundamental importance of the privilege against self  incrimination  an essential pillar of our adversarial system-the Supreme Court adopted certain procedural safeguards to ensure the protection of this right in the context of a custodial interrogation. Pursuant to Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), an individual in police custody must be warned, prior to any interrogation, that he has the right to remain silent, that anything he says can be used against him in a court of law, and that he has the right to the presence of an attorney. Id. at 479, 86 S.Ct. at 1630, 16 L.Ed.2d at 726. The viability of Miranda was reenforced in Dickerson v. United States, 530 U.S. 428, 120 S.Ct. 2326, 147 L.Ed.2d 405 (2000). It is well established that the prosecution's use of post- Miranda silence to obtain a conviction is a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of due process. Wainwright v. Greenfield, 474 U.S. 284, 292, 106 S.Ct. 634, 639, 88 L.Ed.2d 623, 630-31 (1986); Doyle, 426 U.S. at 619, 96 S.Ct. at 2245, 49 L.Ed.2d at 98. A defendant's exercise of his right to remain silent includes his desire to remain silent until counsel has been consulted. Wainwright, 474 U.S. at 295 n. 13, 106 S.Ct. at 640 n. 13, 88 L.Ed.2d at 632 n. 13. This Court has maintained that the right to remain silent has always been liberally construed in order to give fullest effect to this immunity. Crosby, 366 Md. at 527 n. 8, 784 A.2d at 1107 n. 8, quoting Allen v. State, 183 Md. 603, 607, 39 A.2d 820, 821 (1944). Notably, we have previously interpreted Maryland's privilege against self-incrimination contained in Article 22 of the Maryland Declaration of Rights to be more comprehensive than that contained in the federal Bill of Rights. Judge Eldridge, writing for this Court in Hardaway v. State, 317 Md. 160, 161, 562 A.2d 1234 (1989), held that absent special circumstances, instructing a jury, over the defendant's objection, that the defendant has the constitutional right not to testify and that no adverse inference should be drawn from his election to remain silent, violated state common law and was reversible error. In so holding, this Court departed from Supreme Court jurisprudence which provides that the giving of a cautionary instruction over a defendant's objection does not violate his privilege against self-incrimination. See Lakeside v. Oregon, 435 U.S. 333, 340-41, 98 S.Ct. 1091, 1095, 55 L.Ed.2d 319, 326 (1978). The predicate for this deviation, which effectively extends a defendant's constitutional protections, was our State's common law and the approach taken by this Court generally with respect to defendants' rights and entitlements in criminal cases. Hardaway, 317 Md. at 168, 562 A.2d at 1238. We find that our conclusion in Hardaway is dispositive of the issue at bar. In the present case, Newman objected to the admission of Detective Mercer's testimony about Newman's exercise of her Fifth Amendment right to counsel, and by implication, the exercise of her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. The State also failed to proffer a legitimate reason for eliciting the prejudicial testimony. Moreover, Newman objected to the use of a curative instruction to counteract the prejudice that she had suffered. As we stated in Hardaway, `It is unrealistic to assume that instructions on the right to silence always have a benign effect.' Hardaway, 317 Md. at 166 n. 3, 562 A.2d at 1236-37 n. 3, quoting Lakeside v. Oregon, 435 U.S. at 347, 98 S.Ct. at 1098, 55 L.Ed.2d at 330 (Stevens, J., dissenting). In cases, such as the one at bar, where the testimony regarding a defendant's exercise of the right to remain silent post- Miranda is elicited inadvertently at best and intentionally at worst, the curative instruction is not sufficient to overcome the prejudicial inferences. Therefore, we find that a curative instruction, given over the objection of the defendant, fails to cure the prejudice caused by testimony about the post- Miranda exercise of the right against self-incrimination under the Fifth Amendment. [9]