Opinion ID: 1533871
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 8

Heading: Admission of Guilt to Police

Text: On September 7, 1993, Appellant moved to suppress his statement to police. The trial court held a hearing to determine whether the statement of Appellant would be admissible at trial. After listening to the testimony of witnesses for the Commonwealth and Appellant, including the testimony of psychological experts for Appellant, Judge Stout denied the suppression motion on September 23, 1993. On cross-examination during the suppression hearing, Detective Devlin testified that several times during the interview Appellant had said: I want to get this right. Be patient with me. Suppression N.T. at 41. Appellant also stated, This is going to be hard for me. Suppression N.T. at 87. The Detective admitted that the written statement of questions and answers did not include these comments but that he recorded verbatim everything said by Appellant concerning the murder of Barbara Jean. The counsel for Appellant asked Detective Devlin whether he thought Appellant was someone who would falsely implicate himself in a crime he did not commit. Id. at 98. Detective Devlin responded that he had no indication of that. Id. Appellant's counsel also brought out that his client had initialed some crossed-out words on the statement that were misspellings or errors by the Detectives. Id. at 102. Before this Court, Appellant objects to the admission of his statement. He argues that it was not a verbatim recording of what Appellant said to the Detectives and not voluntary and, therefore, should be excluded. These arguments are without merit, but we address them. Detective Devlin testified at the suppression hearing that he wrote down all of the statements of Appellant concerning the murder of Barbara Jean. Id. at 88. The fact that the statement does not reflect that Appellant said that giving the statement was going to be hard for him, that he asked the Detectives to be patient because he wanted to get this right, or that he was crying during certain parts of the confession does not invalidate the statement. It is also clear that Appellant gave his statement voluntarily. As we have often stated, the standard for determining whether a statement is voluntary is based on the totality of the circumstances and considers, among other things, whether the defendant was coerced or manipulated or promised something in exchange for his confession; essentially, we attempt to determine whether the defendant freely made the decision to give the statement. Commonwealth v. Nester, 551 Pa. 157, 709 A.2d 879 (1998). We have observed that: When deciding a motion to suppress a confession, the touchstone inquiry is whether the confession was voluntary. Voluntariness is determined from the totality of the circumstances surrounding the confession. The question of voluntariness is not whether the defendant would have confessed without interrogation, but whether the interrogation was so manipulative or coercive that it deprived the defendant of his ability to make a free and unconstrained decision to confess. The Commonwealth has the burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant confessed voluntarily. Id. at 882 (internal footnote and citation omitted). In this case, the Commonwealth has clearly met its burden. The Detectives properly provided Appellant with Miranda warnings; they determined that Appellant understood those warnings; but, nevertheless, wanted to give a statement; they provided Appellant with time to compose himself when he became upset prior to giving his statement; and, they allowed Appellant to tell his story. In fact, the Detectives told Appellant that he did not have to give a statement and that, even if he chose to give one, he could stop at anytime. Detectives also did not force Appellant to come to meet with them. Instead, Appellant called the Detectives in response to their leaving their card with his landlord. We, therefore, hold that Appellant gave the statement voluntarily. [18]