Opinion ID: 1225502
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Threats to defendant's wife.

Text: (5) Defendant also contends that, during their questioning of him, Detectives Bell and Reed made threats against his wife. The portion of the transcript of the interview on which defendant relies (set out below) comes after he had already confessed to murdering Norma Painter. MUSSELWHITE: Where's my wife? Still here? BELL: I think so. I'll let you talk to her as soon as we get through here, Joe. As soon as we get, you come a long way. You might as well clear it all up. After providing the detectives with additional details surrounding the Painter murder, defendant said: MUSSELWHITE: Got to see my wife first. Man, let me see my wife. BELL: Alright. Like I say, well right now, tell me about the video store, Joe. MUSSELWHITE: I want to see my wife. BELL: Okay. I have only one question, Joe, before I go. I don't understand why you hit the lady in the video store. I mean, was she starting to scream too? There's got to be a reason for it, Joe. You didn't just do it out of cold-blood, what was it? MUSSELWHITE: She was trying to get away from me. BELL: She was trying to run out the store? MUSSELWHITE: No, she was trying to get in the other door cause there was people out front. I want to see my wife. BELL: Let me talk, have you concluded? MUSSELWHITE: Want to tell.... BELL: You want to tell her? MUSSELWHITE: Yeah. BELL: Okay. MUSSELWHITE: (Inaudible) BELL: He wants to talk to his wife. (Door opens, Reed returns) REED: Sure, no problem. BELL: What I going to do, why don't we turn this tape off, let him talk to her. REED: Okay. This exchange, defendant argues, demonstrates that the detectives' refusal to allow him to speak to his wife implied that if he did not confess, they might never release her. [T]here were implied threats, defendant asserts, to [his] wife. He was thereby induced to complete his confession to the murder of Norma Painter and to confess to the video store robbery. The trial court rejected a similar argument  casting the exchange between Detective Bell and defendant not as a threat to defendant's wife, but as a reward to defendant himself for his cooperation. It found that [i]t was the defendant who asked to speak to his wife.... I don't view that as a request to terminate the proceedings. I didn't view that as a request for an attorney or for help. I simply don't think it rises to that level. Although the trial court focused on the question whether defendant's request to see his wife amounted to an indication that he wanted the questioning to cease, we agree that the exchange equally fails to present a factual basis for a finding that the detectives threatened either defendant or his wife, offered a reward for his cooperation, or otherwise rendered defendant's waiver of his rights under Miranda and his subsequent confession involuntary. Defendant had already confessed to killing Norma Painter; it was he who raised the question of seeing his wife, not the detectives. Moreover, nothing in the record suggests that Mrs. Musselwhite was under any official constraint; she appears to have accompanied her husband to the stationhouse and waited there while he underwent questioning. The fact that Detective Bell tied up a couple of loose ends left hanging during previous questioning before acceding to defendant's request to see his wife does not render his statements involuntary. ( People v. Howard (1988) 44 Cal.3d 375, 394 [243 Cal. Rptr. 842, 749 P.2d 279]; People v. Thompson (1980) 27 Cal.3d 303, 327 [165 Cal. Rptr. 289, 611 P.2d 883]; In re Shawn D., supra, 20 Cal. App.4th at pp. 213-214.) In short, evaluating the circumstances of the police questioning of defendant in its totality, we conclude it falls short of rendering his confession to the murder of Norma Painter involuntary in any constitutionally meaningful sense.