Opinion ID: 752168
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Whether Gregory Was an Agent of the State

Text: 20 Mr. Castro claims that Steven Gregory, the cell mate to whom he made incriminating statements, was a government informant who deliberately elicited information from him, in violation of his Fifth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Mr. Castro filed a motion to suppress Gregory's statements. At a pre-trial hearing on that motion, the trial court found that Gregory was not an agent of the State. Mr. Castro raised this argument in his direct appeal, and the Court of Criminal Appeals held as follows: 21 Although Gregory was looking for favorable treatment from the district attorney's office when he provided the information on appellant, there was no evidence presented of any expressed or implied relationship between Gregory and the State as relates to appellant. Therefore, we hold that Gregory was not acting as an agent for the State, and therefore the trial court did not err in failing to suppress his testimony. 22 Castro v. State, 844 P.2d 159, 170 (Okla.Crim.App.1992) (citations omitted). 23 [T]he Supreme Court has held that an individual who stands indicted of a crime is denied his right to counsel when agents of the state circumvent that right by 'deliberately elicit[ing]' inculpatory statements from him in the absence of his counsel, absent a voluntary and knowing waiver. Bey v. Morton, 124 F.3d 524, 528 (3d Cir.1997) (quoting Michigan v. Harvey, 494 U.S. 344, 348-49, 110 S.Ct. 1176, 1179-80, 108 L.Ed.2d 293 (1990)). Thus, the police must do more than merely listen: the defendant must demonstrate that the police and their informant took some action, beyond merely listening, that was designed deliberately to elicit incriminating remarks. Kuhlmann v. Wilson, 477 U.S. 436, 459, 106 S.Ct. 2616, 2630, 91 L.Ed.2d 364 (1986). 24 The Oklahoma state courts, both at trial and on appeal, found no evidence supporting Mr. Castro's claim that Gregory had some arrangement or understanding with the State pursuant to which he elicited information from Mr. Castro. Those factual findings are entitled to a presumption of correctness, unless we determine that they are not fairly supported by the record. Demosthenes v. Baal, 495 U.S. 731, 735, 110 S.Ct. 2223, 2225, 109 L.Ed.2d 762 (1990) (per curiam) (quoting 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)(8)). Mr. Castro points to nothing specific in the record refuting those factual findings; rather, he continues to rely upon the circumstance that he in fact revealed damaging information to Gregory, and Gregory's subsequent sentence was lighter than Mr. Castro claims it otherwise would have been. Those speculative accusations are insufficient to convince us that Gregory was acting as a state agent, deliberately eliciting information from Mr. Castro. We therefore reject this argument. 5