Opinion ID: 2637824
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Admissibility of Defendant's Confessions

Text: Before trial, defendant filed a motion challenging the admissibility of his statements to police under Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436 [16 L.Ed.2d 694, 86 S.Ct. 1602] ( Miranda ), and the prosecution opposed the motion. The trial court held an evidentiary hearing, heard arguments, and ultimately rejected defendant's Miranda claims. He renews these arguments on appeal, claiming that (1) he invoked the right to remain silent on the night of his arrest, and the police failed to honor that right by questioning him the following morning; (2) he again invoked the right to remain silent during police questioning that morning, and the police failed to honor that right by questioning him later that day; and (3) he invoked the right to counsel later that same evening, and the police failed to honor that right. We conclude the trial court properly rejected these contentions.
In determining the admissibility of defendant's statements to police, the parties presented the following evidence: On the night of December 4, 1996, after defendant assaulted Sabrina P. and she positively identified him as her attacker, Santa Maria Police Officer Jeff Lopez arrested defendant and transported him to the police station. In an interview room, Officer Lopez advised defendant of his Miranda rights. Defendant said he understood his rights and was willing to talk with Officer Lopez. Officer Lopez questioned defendant about Sabrina P.'s assault, but defendant denied any involvement. Officer Lopez pointed out inconsistencies in defendant's story. After about 10 minutes, Officer Lopez asked defendant why Sabrina would accuse him of an assault, and defendant responded, That's all I can tell you. Officer Lopez then ended the interrogation. The following morning, about 10:00 a.m., Detectives Gregory Carroll and Mike Aguillon spoke with defendant in a police interview room. The interrogation was tape-recorded. Before the interrogation, Detective Carroll was aware that Officer Lopez had read defendant his Miranda rights and that defendant had waived them. Detective Carroll, however, was unaware that defendant had said, That's all I can tell you at the end of Officer Lopez's interrogation. At the beginning of the interrogation, Detective Carroll asked defendant if he remembered the officer who read you your rights last night, and defendant replied, Yeah. Detective Carroll then asked if he remembered those rights and do you still understand them and everything? Defendant again replied, Yeah. Detective Carroll asked defendant if he still wanted to talk with the detectives, and defendant answered, Yeah. The detectives then briefly questioned defendant about Sabrina's assault before taking a short break so they could compare the recording of defendant's voice with the 911 call recording of the man who reported the assault of Sophia Torres. After the detectives returned to the interview room, they began questioning defendant about Sophia's murder. Defendant admitted making the 911 call but denied killing Sophia, instead claiming he saw two Black women attacking her as he was meeting her to buy methamphetamine. Toward the end of the interrogation, the detectives pointed out the inconsistencies in defendant's version of events. Detective Aguillon asked defendant to think about it and told him, We'll let you take a break here now. As everyone stood and prepared to leave, the tape recorder was turned off. Defendant then said, I don't want to talk anymore right now. Detective Carroll said that was fine, they were going to take a break. He again suggested defendant should think about it, and said they would return to talk with him. According to Detective Carroll, defendant responded, Okay. Later that afternoon, about 5:00 p.m., Detectives Carroll and Aguillon returned to pick up defendant and execute a search warrant by bringing him to the community hospital for a sexual assault response team (SART) exam. As they drove to the hospital, Detective Carroll asked defendant if he had been thinking about their earlier conversation, and defendant replied, Not really. The detectives then asked defendant to repeat his version of what he saw on the night of Sophia's murder, and defendant again claimed he saw two women attacking Sophia. After the SART exam, the detectives returned defendant to the police station, where they again brought him to an interview room for an interrogation. This interrogation was partially tape-recorded. [7] The detectives again went over defendant's version of events on the night of Sophia's murder and confronted him with the fact that both Maria M. and Laura Z. had identified him as their attackers in photo lineups earlier that day. During the interrogation, which lasted 30 to 45 minutes, the detectives repeatedly told defendant they did not believe his story about Sophia being attacked by two women. But defendant did not change his story. At the end of the interrogation, Detective Carroll told defendant to think it over and, as the detectives got up to leave, Detective Aguillon asked defendant if he was willing to take a polygraph examination. Detective Aguillon said he could have someone there in five minutes to administer the examination. Defendant replied, I think I should talk to a lawyer before I decide to take a polygraph. The detectives did not ask defendant about the case again until the following morning, December 6, 1996, about 9:00 a.m. The detectives approached defendant in his holding cell and asked if he would mind if they talked to him. Defendant replied No and shrugged his shoulders. During the subsequent conversation, defendant admitted assaulting both Sabrina P. and Maria M., but denied any involvement in the incident involving Laura Z. The prosecutor also presented evidence that defendant had previously waived his Miranda rights on three different occasions when he was arrested as a juvenile. When Officer Jorge Lievanos arrested defendant as an adult for the assaults he committed on April 2, 1996, however, he initially waived his Miranda rights, but later invoked his right to remain silent by saying, I have nothing more to say. In the trial court, defendant challenged the admissibility of his statements under Miranda and the Fifth, Sixth, and Fourteenth Amendments. Specifically, defendant argued he invoked his right to remain silent at the end of Officer Lopez's interrogation when he said, That's all I can tell you. Defendant argued that his right to remain silent was not honored when Detectives Carroll and Aguillon interrogated him the following morning. Defendant further argued he invoked his right to remain silent a second time when, at the end of the first interrogation by Detectives Carroll and Aguillon, he said, I don't want to talk anymore right now, and the detectives failed to honor that invocation by questioning him again later that day. Finally, defendant argued he invoked his right to counsel during the second partially recorded interrogation later that same night when he stated, I think I should talk to a lawyer before I decide to take a polygraph. After a hearing, the trial court rejected defendant's arguments. The court concluded that defendant's statement to Officer Lopez was not an attempt to invoke the right to remain silent, but was merely defendant's way of saying he was sticking to his version of events regarding Sabrina's assault. The court concluded that defendant's statement to Detectives Carroll and Aguillon about his desire not to talk about it anymore right now was simply an expression of the desire not to discuss the matter at the moment and was not intended as a bar to later questioning. Finally, the court concluded that defendant, in discussing the polygraph examination, was only conditioning his invocation of the right to counsel on whether he was going to take the exama condition that was never satisfied. [8] Defendant renews these same arguments on appeal. We conclude the trial court properly rejected defendant's arguments and did not err in admitting all of his statements at trial.
(2) As a prophylactic safeguard to protect a suspect's Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, the United States Supreme Court, in Miranda, required law enforcement agencies to advise a suspect, before any custodial law enforcement questioning, that he has the right to remain silent, that anything he says can be used against him in a court of law, that he has the right to the presence of an attorney, and that if he cannot afford an attorney one will be appointed for him prior to any questioning if he so desires. ( Miranda, supra, 384 U.S. 436, 479; see Connecticut v. Barrett (1987) 479 U.S. 523, 528 [93 L.Ed.2d 920, 107 S.Ct. 828].) If the suspect knowingly and intelligently waives these rights, law enforcement may interrogate, but if at any point in the interview he invokes the right to remain silent or the right to counsel, the interrogation must cease. ( Miranda, at p. 474; see id. at pp. 444-445, 473-475, 479.) (3) In Davis v. U.S. (1994) 512 U.S. 452 [129 L.Ed.2d 362, 114 S.Ct. 2350] ( Davis ), the United States Supreme Court explained that to invoke the right to counsel during an interrogation, a suspect must articulate his desire to have counsel present sufficiently clearly that a reasonable police officer in the circumstances would understand the statement to be a request for an attorney. ( Id. at p. 459.) If the suspect's statement is not an unambiguous or unequivocal request for counsel, the officers have no obligation to stop questioning him. ( Id. at pp. 461-462.) Although when a suspect makes an ambiguous or equivocal statement it will often be good police practice for the interviewing officers to clarify whether or not he actually wants an attorney, the high court specifically declined to adopt a stop and clarify rule that would require officers to ask clarifying questions about whether the right was being invoked. ( Id. at p. 461.) In the absence of any contrary authority from the high court, we have also applied Davis 's articulation standard to ambiguous statements made in the context of a suspect's invocation of the right to remain silent. [9] As we stated in People v. Stitely (2005) 35 Cal.4th 514, 535 [26 Cal.Rptr.3d 1, 108 P.3d 182], [i]n order to invoke the Fifth Amendment privilege after it has been waived, and in order to halt police questioning after it has begun, the suspect `must unambiguously ' assert his right to silence . . . . (See also People v. Rundle (2008) 43 Cal.4th 76, 114 [74 Cal.Rptr.3d 454, 180 P.3d 224].) In addition, we also concluded that the stop and clarify rule does not apply to ambiguous assertions of the right to silence. Faced with an ambiguous or equivocal statement, law enforcement officers are not required . . . either to ask clarifying questions or to cease questioning altogether. ( People v. Stitely, supra, 35 Cal.4th at p. 535; see also People v. Rundle, supra, 43 Cal.4th 76, 115.) [10] Defendant argues that we should distinguish the right to silence from the right to counsel at issue in Davis, and at the very least we should require the police to stop and clarify ambiguous invocations of the right to silence. He contends that the stop and clarify rule should apply to the right to remain silent because it is the core right Miranda sought to protect, unlike the right to counsel, which is only a second layer Miranda protection. We disagree. (4) Applying different rules to invocations of the right to counsel and the right to remain silent would be difficult for law enforcement officials to implement in the interrogation setting, especially where the suspect's ambiguous statements may relate to both the right to counsel and the right to remain silent. (See Johnson v. Harkleroad (4th Cir. 2004) 104 Fed. Appx. 858, 867 [suspect stated, `maybe I should stop talking and get a lawyer']; U.S. v. Cheely (9th Cir. 1994) 36 F.3d 1439, 1447 [suspect, when asked whether he wished to waive his Miranda rights, stated `he didn't think his attorney would want him talking to us . . .'].) The police would not be required to clarify whether the suspect sought the assistance of counsel, but would be required to clarify whether the suspect sought to remain silent. Therefore, although the right to silence is the core right protected by Miranda, as Davis itself noted, we must consider the other side of the Miranda equation: the need for effective law enforcement. ( Davis, supra, 512 U.S. at p. 461.) Applying the same rule to both the right to remain silent and the right to counsel provides a bright line that can be applied by officers in the real world of investigation and interrogation without unduly hampering the gathering of information. ( Ibid. ) With these principles in mind, we now examine defendant's Miranda claims.
As noted, defendant claims that he invoked his right to silence with Officer Lopez and again the following morning with Detectives Carroll and Aguillon. He also claims he invoked his right to counsel later that same day. In reviewing Miranda issues on appeal, we accept the trial court's resolution of disputed facts and inferences as well as its evaluations of credibility if substantially supported, but independently determine from undisputed facts and facts found by the trial court whether the challenged statement was legally obtained. ( People v. Smith (2007) 40 Cal.4th 483, 502 [54 Cal.Rptr.3d 245, 150 P.3d 1224].)
Defendant argues he invoked his right to silence when he told Officer Lopez, That's all I can tell you, and that, as a result, Detectives Carroll and Aguillon improperly questioned him the following morning. We disagree. In very similar circumstances, in In re Joe R. (1980) 27 Cal.3d 496 [165 Cal.Rptr. 837, 612 P.2d 927], we concluded that a defendant's use of the phrase That's all I have to say was not an attempt to end the interrogation and that [i]t was not unreasonable for the [trial] court to endorse the prosecutor's inference that what defendant was saying was, That's my story, and I'll stick with it. ( Id. at p. 516.) In the present case, we agree with the trial court's conclusion, supported by Officer Lopez's testimony, that he believed defendant was telling him [t]hat's all the information he had for me. But even assuming defendant made a sufficiently clear invocation under Davis, which In re Joe R. predates, there was no error. Officer Lopez stopped the interrogation, did not try to persuade defendant to talk, and obtained no further statements from him. Moreover, under the principles of Michigan v. Mosley (1975) 423 U.S. 96 [46 L.Ed.2d 313, 96 S.Ct. 321], defendant's interrogation the following morning by Detectives Carroll and Aguillon also complied with Miranda. In Mosley, despite the defendant's invocation of the right to remain silent, the high court declined to find a Miranda violation because the police here immediately ceased the interrogation, resumed questioning only after the passage of a significant period of time and the provision of a fresh set of warnings, and restricted the second interrogation to a crime that had not been a subject of the earlier interrogation. ( Michigan v. Mosley, supra, 423 U.S. at p. 106.) In Mosley, the time elapsed between the invocation of the right to silence and the reinterrogation was more than two hours. ( Id. at p. 104.) The present case is factually similar. Here, the detectives waited overnight to approach defendant again, and their questioning shifted quickly from Sabrina P.'s assault to a different crime, Sophia's murder. Although the detectives did not reread defendant his Miranda rights verbatim, they did remind him of the admonition given the night before and then specifically asked him if he remembered those rights and whether he still wanted to talk. Defendant responded affirmatively. Given that defendant had been read his Miranda rights the night before and on at least four prior occasions, the record fails to support any inference that defendant was unaware of his rights and the significance of his waiver. ( People v. Riva (2003) 112 Cal.App.4th 981, 994 [5 Cal.Rptr.3d 649]; see also Weeks v. Angelone (4th Cir. 1999) 176 F.3d 249, 268 [ Mosley was complied with where the officer asked the defendant whether he remembered the rights he had been read from the first interrogation]; U.S. v. Andrade (1st Cir. 1998) 135 F.3d 104, 106-107 [same].)
Defendant also argues he invoked his right to silence when, at the end of the interrogation on the morning of December 5, 1996, he told Detectives Carroll and Aguillon, I don't want to talk anymore right now. Defendant argues that this statement was a clear invocation of that right, especially given the context in which it was madewith no question pending, after the detectives had confronted him with inconsistencies in his version of events, told him to think it over, announced that they were taking a break, and were beginning to leave the room. He argues, therefore, that the detectives improperly reapproached him and questioned him later that afternoon. We disagree. Defendant relies heavily on People v. Peracchi (2001) 86 Cal.App.4th 353, 361 [102 Cal.Rptr.2d 921], a Court of Appeal decision concluding that the defendant's use of the phrase I don't want to discuss it right now, was a refusal to waive his right to remain silent. In Peracchi, after the officer read the defendant his Miranda rights and asked the defendant whether he wanted to talk, the defendant responded, At this point, I don't think so. At this point, I don't think I can talk. When the officer tried to clarify, the defendant explained that his head was not clear enough to discuss the charges against him right now. When the officer again tried to clarify, the defendant said, I don't want to discuss it right now. The officer asked why, and the defendant then made statements incriminating himself. ( Peracchi, at pp. 358-359.) The Peracchi court concluded that the officer's first attempts to clarify the defendant's statements were proper, but once the defendant stated, `I don't want to discuss it right now,' he was clearly indicating that he intended to invoke his right to remain silent and the officer thereafter improperly continued to interrogate because [o]fficers have no legitimate need or reason to inquire into the reasons why a suspect wishes to remain silent. ( Id. at p. 361.) (5) Although defendant's statement here is similar to the one uttered in Peracchi, the context in which it was uttered is markedly different. Peracchi involved a Miranda waiver, not an invocation during the course of an interrogation. Invocation and waiver are entirely distinct inquiries, and the two must not be blurred by merging them together. ( Smith v. Illinois (1984) 469 U.S. 91, 98 [83 L.Ed.2d 488, 105 S.Ct. 490].) The defendant in Peracchi invoked his right to silence at the outset of the interrogation, making clear he did not wish to waive his right to silence at that time. Defendant in the present case made the statement after a lengthy interrogation session and after the detective made clear that the session was over. The resumption of questioning later that day did not, as in Peracchi, amount to a failure to heed a suspect's clear refusal to waive his right to silence. In any event, even though he was not required to do so, Detective Carroll employed good police practice by clarifying any ambiguity when he responded to defendant's statement by saying that was fine, that they were going to take a break, encouraged him to think about it, and said that they would come back and talk to him. ( Davis, supra, 512 U.S. at p. 461.) Defendant could have responded negatively and explained that he would not be interested in talking further, even after a break. He did not. Instead, by saying, Okay, he in effect agreed to allow the detectives to return for more questioning. For the same reason, defendant's claim that he reiterated his previously invoked right to remain silent hours later as they drove to the hospital must also fail. As explained, Detective Carroll asked defendant if he had been thinking about their earlier conversation, and defendant replied, Not really. Detective Carroll had already elicited the clarification that defendant was willing to discuss the matter after a break, and that wish had been honored. At this point, defendant was merely indicating that he had not really thought about changing his version of events and that, as he had previously told Officer Lopez, he was sticking to his story.
Defendant claims that at the end of his last interrogation on December 5, 1996, his statement, I think I should talk to a lawyer before I decide to take a polygraph, was a clear invocation of his right to counsel, made in response to Detective Aguillon's offer to provide a polygraph examination. We disagree. (6) As we have held, a defendant does not unambiguously invoke his right to counsel when he makes that request contingent on an event that has not occurred. (See People v. Gonzalez (2005) 34 Cal.4th 1111 [23 Cal.Rptr.3d 295, 104 P.3d 98] [defendant's request for counsel was conditioned on whether he was going to be charged with any crimes].) In the present case, defendant's statement was conditionalI think I should talk to a lawyer before I decide to take a polygraph. (Italics added.) [11] Under these circumstances, the detectives reasonably could conclude that defendant only wanted the assistance of counsel if he was taking a polygraph exam. Since no polygraph exam was administered, defendant did not need the assistance of counsel, and the detectives, under Davis, supra, 512 U.S. 452, were not obligated to inquire further at that point or when they approached him again the following morning. (7) Accordingly, defendant's Miranda claims lack merit, and the trial court did not err in admitting his statements at trial.