Opinion ID: 349677
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Appellant's Admission While Incarcerated.

Text: 35 James Hendrickson, appellant's cellmate in the Dakota County Jail, testified that while he and Lambros were incarcerated Lambros made the following statement: 36 Well, he mentioned that if I had boughten some heroin from Joe Standish it would have probably have been his. 37 At trial, defense counsel objected to the admission of this statement and was overruled. Later, counsel requested the judge to submit the following instruction, adapted from E. Devitt and C. Blackmar, Federal Jury Practice & Instructions § 15.06 (3d ed. 1977), which the trial judge refused:Evidence relating to any statement, claimed to have been made by the defendant outside of court, and after the defendant is incarcerated, should always be considered with caution and weighed with great care; and all such evidence should be disregarded entirely, unless the evidence in the case convinces the jury beyond a reasonable doubt that: 38 The defendant made the statement; and that the statement was made knowingly, voluntarily and intentionally. 39 Appellant now argues that both of the above rulings by the trial judge constituted error because (1) the statement should not have been admitted because of the absence of adequate corroboration and (2) that 18 U.S.C. § 3501(a) (1970), reproduced below, 5 required the reading of the requested instruction. 40 We find no merit in appellant's contention that the statement should not have been admitted. Substantial independent evidence corroborated it, including the surveillance accounts of Lambros' transactions with Standish and his arrest with mannitol and the marked money in his possession. 41 Similarly, appellant was not entitled to the instruction that he requested. Section 3501(d) of Title 18 provides that: 42 (d) Nothing contained in this section shall bar the admission in evidence of any confession made or given voluntarily by any person to any other person without interrogation by anyone, or at any time at which the person who made or gave such confession was not under arrest or other detention. 43 Appellant volunteered the information to his cellmate. Informal statements of this kind, although incriminating in effect, by terms of § 3501(d) do not trigger the procedures mandated by § 3501(a). 44