Opinion ID: 2675537
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Dickerson’s Application to this Case

Text: Whether police coerced a confession by improperly taking advantage of a defendant’s impaired condition is a fact‐intensive inquiry on which we usually defer to the district court.3 Here, the panel defers to the district court’s finding 3 Thus, while in Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385 (1978), the Supreme Court concluded that hospitalization for serious physical injury, limited consciousness, incoherent responses, and unheeded requests to cease questioning compelled a legal conclusion of involuntariness, see id. at 396–402, after Mincey, we have 6 that Taylor knowingly and voluntarily waived his Miranda rights before his first confession, see Taylor II, 745 F.3d at 23, but then departs from the district court in holding Taylor’s ensuing confession involuntary as a matter of law. In support, the panel cites Dickerson v. United States, 530 U.S. 428, for the conclusion that a Miranda waiver does not guarantee that subsequent statements were constitutionally voluntary. See Taylor II, 745 F.3d at 23. To be sure, Dickerson instructs that “[t]he requirement that Miranda warnings be given does not, of course, dispense with the voluntariness inquiry.” 530 U.S. at 444. But this text is immediately followed by a caution that the panel fails to acknowledge and does not heed: that “cases in which a defendant can make a colorable argument that a self‐incriminating statement was ‘compelled’ repeatedly upheld voluntariness determinations by district judges who found that, despite being hospitalized, restrained, seriously injured, and medicated, persons were sufficiently lucid and coherent to make voluntary admissions to interrogating officers, see United States v. Siddiqui, 699 F.3d 690, 707 (2d Cir. 2012) (upholding district court’s voluntariness finding where, although defendant was hospitalized, restrained, in pain, and not administered Miranda warnings, she was “lucid and able to engage the agents in coherent conversation” and “agents’ conduct was not overbearing or abusive”); United States v. Khalil, 214 F.3d at 121 (upholding district court’s voluntariness finding where, although defendant had been shot, was in pain, and in hospital awaiting surgery, he was alert and responsive to agents’ questions when making challenged statements); Campaneria v. Reid, 891 F.2d 1014, 1020 (2d Cir. 1989) (upholding district court’s voluntariness finding where, although defendant was in intensive care with knife wound, he was “alert and awake despite his pain,” and police had honored earlier requests to defer interview). 7 despite the fact that the law enforcement authorities adhered to the dictates of Miranda are rare.” Id. (internal quotation marks and alterations omitted); accord In re Terrorist Bombings of U.S. Embassies in E. Afr., 552 F.3d 177, 212 (2d Cir. 2008). Implicit in Dickerson’s rarity admonition is the recognition that, among the totality of circumstances that determine voluntariness, Miranda waivers bear considerable weight. See United States v. Williams, 681 F.3d 35, 45 (2d Cir. 2012) (stating that suspect’s knowing and voluntary waiver of rights is “‘highly probative’ of voluntariness” (quoting Oregon v. Elstad, 470 U.S. at 318)); see also McNeil v. Wisconsin, 501 U.S. 171, 181 (1991) (observing that “[a]dmissions of guilt resulting from valid Miranda waivers are more than merely desirable; they are essential to society’s compelling interest in finding, convicting, and punishing those who violate the law” (internal quotation marks omitted)). While the panel accepts Taylor’s valid Miranda waiver, it accords little, if any, weight to the waiver in assessing the voluntariness of his ensuing confession. Rather, the panel focuses almost exclusively on Taylor’s sleepiness during his initial police interview and concludes therefrom that he “was unable to summon the will to make a knowing and voluntary decision” about speaking to the police. Taylor II, 745 F.3d at 24. But this effectively misses Dickerson’s 8 point. The purportedly sleepy Taylor had demonstrated himself able to make just such a “knowing and voluntary decision” moments earlier when, at the start of the interview, he validly waived his Miranda rights. Indeed, this record provides no basis for the panel’s decision to accept the district court’s finding that Taylor was sufficiently competent to waive his Miranda rights but to reject the district court’s same finding of competency with respect to his ensuing confession. Certainly, the district court’s competency finding cannot fairly be construed to apply only to the moment that Taylor executed his written Miranda waiver. The record indicates that the district court viewed the question in dispute to be whether Taylor’s condition throughout the police interrogation cast doubt on the continued validity of his waiver of rights. Thus, it found that Taylor was “sufficiently lucid during the questioning that his waiver of Miranda rights was knowing and voluntary.” Tr. 387:23–25, S.A. 387 (emphasis added). Moreover, unlike the defendant in Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385, 399–400 (1978), Taylor never indicated that he wished questioning to stop. To the contrary, on the few occasions when he was prompted to focus on a question, Taylor stated that he understood what was being asked, repeated the question to demonstrate his comprehension, and then provided a response. 9 Further, the detailed and cogent nature of Taylor’s confessions not only supports the district court’s finding that he was sufficiently awake and lucid to participate voluntarily in the post‐arrest interview but also precludes the panel’s contrary assessment of “stupor” or “trance.” In the absence of any finding of clear error in the district court’s factual determination (which, as noted, the panel does not make here), I respectfully submit it is not possible, consistent with Dickerson, for a reviewing court to conclude as a matter of law that this is one of the “rare” cases in which admissions made after a valid Miranda waiver are, nevertheless, constitutionally involuntary. Thus, en banc review is warranted to ensure our court’s adherence to Dickerson.