Opinion ID: 658545
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Rosa's Jailhouse Statement to a Cooperating Witness

Text: 29 The government introduced testimony by cooperating witness Joseph Ukperaj, a participant in the Organization's gun smuggling operation, that, while he and Rosa were being detained at the Manhattan Correctional Center (MCC), Rosa stated that he had been arrested with a gun he had bought from Ukperaj. Rosa contends that the admission of this statement violated his Sixth Amendment right to counsel. This contention need not detain us long. 30 Although once the right to counsel has attached, the Sixth Amendment imposes on the government an affirmative obligation not to solicit incriminating statements from the defendant in the absence of his counsel, see, e.g., Massiah v. United States, 377 U.S. 201, 206, 84 S.Ct. 1199, 1203, 12 L.Ed.2d 246 (1964); see also Maine v. Moulton, 474 U.S. 159, 171, 106 S.Ct. 477, 484, 88 L.Ed.2d 481 (1985), that obligation is not breached unless the government has taken some action that was designed deliberately to elicit incriminating remarks. Kuhlmann v. Wilson, 477 U.S. 436, 459, 106 S.Ct. 2616, 2629, 91 L.Ed.2d 364 (1986). The Sixth Amendment is not violated by the merely fortuitous receipt of incriminating statements: 31 [A] defendant does not make out a violation of that right simply by showing that an informant, either through prior arrangement or voluntarily, reported his incriminating statements to the police. Rather, the defendant must demonstrate that the police and their informant took some action, beyond merely listening, that was designed deliberately to elicit incriminating remarks. 32 Id. 33 In the present case, Ukperaj testified that after he agreed to become a cooperating witness, the government did not ask him to have conversations with any of the defendants while in custody. He testified that thereafter, at MCC, he ran into Rosa unexpectedly. Ukperaj had not discussed Rosa with the government and was unaware that Rosa had been arrested. He asked Rosa why Rosa was at MCC, and Rosa responded, in part, that Ukperaj had better be careful because Rosa had been arrested with one of the guns Ukperaj sold him. 34 The district court, crediting Ukperaj's testimony, found that Ukperaj didn't seek out [Rosa] and try to solicit information from him. (Trial Transcript (Tr.) 2927.) This finding is not clearly erroneous, and Rosa accordingly did not establish a violation of his Sixth Amendment rights. 35