Opinion ID: 2101401
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Was the juvenile defendant arrested?

Text: The State concedes that when Officer McFarlane and Sergeant Ptak first went to defendant's home they had no probable cause to arrest her. The State claims, however, that because she voluntarily accompanied the police officers to the station she was not seized in the fourth amendment sense. In United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 100 S.Ct. 1870, 64 L.Ed.2d 497 (1980), the case relied upon by the State, the Supreme Court upheld the search and seizure by federal agents of a female defendant who fit a drug profile. The agents had no probable cause, but the Court found that no arrest had occurred because at the moment when she was approached by the federal agents there was no objective reason for her to believe she was not free to leave. The Court, in acknowledging the need for police questioning as a tool for effective law enforcement, found that a person is `seized' only when, by means of physical force or a show of authority, his freedom of movement is restrained. Id. at 553, 100 S.Ct. at 1877. The test developed by the Mendenhall court was an objective one; a person has been `seized' within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment only if, in view of all of the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have believed that he was not free to leave. Id. (footnote omitted). The court described some examples of circumstances that might indicate a seizure. They included: [T]he threatening presence of several officers, the display of a weapon by an officer, some physical touching of the person of the citizen, or the use of language or tone of voice indicating that compliance    might be compelled. Id. at 554, 100 S.Ct. at 1877. The State contends that several factors support the conclusion that no seizure occurred. First, the police officers in this case were dressed in plain clothes and displayed no weapons. Second, no mention of an arrest was made. Third, the officers did not consider defendant to be a suspect but a material witness to a homicide. And finally, the officers stated at trial that had defendant refused to talk with them they would not have arrested her. The latter two arguments are clearly without merit. In a footnote to Mendenhall the Supreme Court unequivocally stated that the subjective intention of the officers to detain or not to detain the defendant was irrelevant except insofar as it was conveyed to the defendant. Id. at 555, n. 6, 100 S.Ct. at 1877, n. 6. As in Mendenhall, defendant here was not told she was free to decline to cooperate. Id. at 556, 100 S.Ct. at 1878. Even if she was, the Mendenhall court made it clear that the voluntariness of her responses does not depend upon her having been so informed. Id. at 556, 100 S.Ct. at 1878 (citing Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218, 93 S.Ct. 2041, 36 L.Ed.2d 854 (1973)). Whether or not a reasonable person would have believed there was no choice but to accompany the police officers largely depends upon the message conveyed by Officer McFarlane's words at the time. The trial court was able to judge the credibility of the witnesses and accepted the version of the facts as given by the police officers. We do not find this decision to have been clearly erroneous. It may be that a reasonable 14 year old would have been sufficiently impressed by the show of authority presented to believe she had no choice but to go to the station. Since the mother at that point had no idea what defendant's involvement in the crime had been and the police officers gave her no information, her presence when defendant agreed to go to the police station the first time is of little import. We need not decide this issue though because we find that she went to the station voluntarily the second time and the second statement was sufficiently attenuated from the first trip to the station to have been purged of the taint, if any, of the first trip.