Opinion ID: 2538024
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: the 1981 suppression hearing

Text: In 1980, inmate James Smith worked as an informant and potential witness in several cases for Investigator Ben Wilkerson of the Polk County Sheriff's Office. After Johnson was arrested in January 1981, Smith encountered Johnson in the visitation area of the Polk County jail. At the suppression hearing prior to the first trial, [10] Smith testified as follows concerning this initial encounter: Q. On that occasion did you have a conversation with Paul Johnson? A. Yes, I did. Q. Before talking about any of the charges against Mr. Johnson, did you have other types of conversations? A. Yeah, I asked him what he was down there for and he told me they were coming to get a hair sample. He didn't specify what kind of hair sample. He told me he wasn't going to let them have it until they got a court order. Q. Is that when you began talking about your case? A. Yes. Q. Did you ask him about what he was charged with? A. Yes. Q. At the time that you talked to Mr. Johnson had anybody asked you to speak to Mr. Johnson about his case? A. No. After speaking with Johnson, Smith sought to meet with Investigator Wilkerson to discuss the encounter, and he met with him on February 5, 1981, several days after the encounter. At the suppression hearing, Smith testified as follows with respect to that meeting: Q. Did you discuss with Mr. Wilkerson the possibility oflet me rephrase that. Did you discuss with Mr.Investigator Wilkerson that you might talk to Mr. Johnson in the future? A. Yes. Q. And what did Investigator Wilkerson say to you about talking to Mr. Johnson in the future? A. Nothing. Q. Did he ever ask you to record or make any notes about any conversations you had with Mr. Johnson? A. No. Q. How about at a later time, did he ever ask you to make any notes? A. No. A. You did begin to take notes; is that correct? A. Yes. Q. Whose idea was that? A. Mine. Q. Did anybody ever suggest that to you? A. No. (Emphasis added.) Investigator Wilkerson testified as follows at the suppression hearing with respect to that meeting, on direct examination by defense counsel: Q. After he told you what he told you about those conversations, did you ever suggest to him that he keep any notes or memos of what was told to him? A. I believe I did. And he brought up the fact that he would not be able to remember half of the things that he had told him about that day. And I said, Well, it would be in your best interest to write them down. Q. Did you talk about if he heard further things from Mr. Johnson that it would be better off for him to write them down? A. Specifically on that particular meeting, it was strictly the information he gave me at that time. Q. Did you ever suggest to him that hedid ever at any time you suggest to him that he keep notes of conversations that he had with Mr. Johnson at future times? A. I don't recall. Q. Is it possible? A. Having previously suggested that he write down what he reported to him, yes, I would have to say it's possible. On cross-examination by prosecutor Pickard, Wilkerson backtracked, clarifying his prior testimony as follows: Q. Did you everafter you found out that James Smith had been talking with Paul Johnson or Mr. Johnson had been giving him information, did you give Smith any instructions on what to do in the future as far as going back and talking to Johnson again and getting more information or anything along those lines? A. No, sir, I did not. Q. Did you tell himgive him any instructions at all? A. No, sir. (Emphasis added.) A few days after this meeting with Wilkerson, Smith was transferred from his cell on the third floor of the Polk County jail to a cell directly adjoining Johnson's cell in a secluded area of the second floor. At the suppression hearing, Smith testified as follows concerning his encounters with Johnson after the transfer: Q. And you've told investigators, haven't you, that while you were next door toin the next cell to Mr. Johnson you had some conversations with him about his case; is that right? A. Correct. Q. Did you ask him about his charges and how his case was going? A. Yeah, and he would just come out and tell me. Q. Sometimes he would? A. Well, you know, we would be talking about all the while we were back there. Q. Sometimes you'd ask him about his case and sometimes he'd volunteer things; is that right? A. Yeah. Q. Did you make any notes of this? A. Yes. .... Q. And what type of notes were those? A. Just, you know, what had been said during the conversations. Q. Why did you take those notes? A. I just took them. Q. Excuse me? A. I just took the notes. Q. For what reason? A. Because I was going to give them to the State Attorney. Q. Did you have any motive for giving them to the State attorney, any plans? A. Yeah, because I didn't think it was right what he had done. .... Q. Do you recall the first time you gave notes to Ben Wilkerson? A. Yeah. .... Q. Did he say anything about these [notes] are good or anything like that? A. I think he said it would help me remember. I don't remember exactly what was said. Q. Did he ever say these looked good? A. I can't remember, it's been a while back. Q. And Mr. Wilkerson told you that if it helped you to remember better to go ahead and write them down; is that right? A. I think that was the conversation. (Emphasis added.) Prosecutor Pickard argued as follows in closing argument to the court at the suppression hearing: Mr. Smith did not even go to the police until after statements had already been made to him. The police indicated that once they were aware that statements had been made to Mr. Smith they made no request of him, did not tell him to go back and get more information, simply took down his information and sent him back into the jail. Mr. Smith later got other information and reported it to the police. That's his doings. And that's Mr. Johnson's doings if he wants to trust Smith. But the bottom line is, as I said, it was not done at the request of any police officer or police agency. And under those circumstances, there is no governmental involvement in it. .... The issue is whether the police had anything to do with what Smith was doing. And they did not according to all the testimony from all the police officers and Mr. Smith, Smith did it on his own. (Emphasis added.) The trial court denied the motion to suppress, reasoning that although it was a close question as to whether Smith was operating as a government agent, it appeared that the police were passive recipients of information that was being passed to them from Johnson through Smith: [T]he officers have all testified that none of them directed or told or in any fashion tried to get Mr. Smith to elicit these statements from Mr. Johnson especially the first statements. And it gets to be a closer question on the ones where he was making notes. But apparently they were merely, as Mr. Smith has said, passively receiving those things. Finally, Mr. Smith himself testified that he was doing it all on his own. In light of all the testimony that I've heard ... I believe this Court has no choice but to find that the officers did not directly or surreptitiously or in any fashion direct Mr. Smith to do what he did. In light of that, I am going to deny your motion as to Mr. Smith's statements or whatever notes he may have in the particular matter. (Emphasis added.) This Court on direct appeal agreed that it was a close question as to whether Smith was operating as a government agent, but the Court concluded that the evidence supported the trial court's suppression ruling: Here, the trial court held that the detectives did not direct Smith, either directly or surreptitiously, to talk with Johnson or to take notes on their conversations. [The relevant cases] do not impose on the police an affirmative duty to tell an informer to stop talking and not approach them again nor do they require that informers be segregated from the rest of a jail's population. We agree with the trial court that this case presents a close question on whether Smith had become an agent of the state, but we find the ruling that he had not to be supported by the evidence. Johnson v. State, 438 So.2d 774, 776 (Fla. 1983) (emphasis added). Subsequently, at the 2007 evidentiary hearing, prosecutor Pickard was confronted with his own handwritten notes from the State files that were disclosed to the defense in 1997 and that are now the subject of Johnson's present postconviction motion. One of the notes, which was dated February 19, 1981, states: Wilcox Talk to me + Glen about agent theory. And another note on the same page is configured as follows: Ben [Wilkerson]Smith had already talked to Johnson Told Smith to make notes Told [Smith] to keep ears open When Pickard was confronted with these notes on direct examination by defense counsel, the following transpired: Q. Who was Wilcox? A. Don Wilcox wasI think he was in charge of our intake unit in the State Attorney's Office at that time. He was working in intake. He was an assistant state attorney in our office is who he was. Q. And so the indication thatwell, again, the note says, talked to me and Glen about agent theory. Who's Glen, do you know? A. Glen Brock. James Smith's attorney. Q. Okay. Do you know why you would have written down you went into this conversation about agent theory? A. Sure. We were concerned that Mr. Smith not be considered an agent of the State. I was aware that the law was we could not send Mr. Smith in there to take statements from Mr. Johnson because it would have violated his attorneyhe had an attorney. And I wanted to make sure that everybody was on the same page that Mr. Smith was not planted, so to speak, in Mr. Johnson's cell for the purpose of obtaining statements. Q. Okay. And do you recall whether there was an issue as to whether or not he was told to take notes or anything like that? A. I'm sure he was told to listen, to take notes if he had an opportunity to take notes as to anything that Mr. Johnson said. He may have been even told to turn over the notes. .... Q. Wellwell, given on what you just said, let me just call your attention to the lines next toto the name Ben [Wilkerson]. Because there is a line that says Told Smith to make notes, and a line that says, Told Smith to keep his ears open. Is that your understanding of what Mr. Smith would have been told? A. Yes. Q. To take notes and to keep his ears open? A. Correct. Q. And your understanding is that doesn't turn him into an agent? A. Correct. (Emphasis added.) This testimony by Pickard at the 2007 evidentiary hearing is contrary to all the above emphasized passages in the testimony of Smith and Wilkerson and in the closing argument of Pickard at the 1981 suppression hearing. In those emphasized passages, the declarants indicate that Smith, after his initial meeting with Investigator Wilkerson, was acting on his own in gathering information from Johnson and recording it in notes and then disclosing it to the State, whereas in prosecutor Pickard's testimony at the evidentiary hearing, Pickard indicates that Smith was told to go back and gather information (he was told to keep his ears open) and record it in notes (he was told [t]o take notes) and then presumably disclose it to the State (he may have been even told to turn over the notes).