Opinion ID: 1356669
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Improper Questioning Necessitates Reversal in Present Case

Text: Applying the foregoing legal principles to the present case, it seems to me self-evident that the police were entitled to ask defendant booking questions. They were not obliged to preface those questions with any Miranda warning nor were they, before the conclusion of the booking interview, obliged to honor defendant's request for an attorney. However, it seems equally evident that the numerous questions asked regarding defendant's military service and his past and present educational experience exceeded the scope of any valid booking interview. These questions were, therefore, improper in the absence of an admonition regarding defendant's constitutional rights and his waiver of those rights. Distilled from those questions impermissibly asked and included in the material presented to the jury were defendant's repeated request for an attorney, arguably an improper comment on his exercise of his constitutional rights ( Griffin v. California (1965) 380 U.S. 609 [14 L.Ed.2d 106, 85 S.Ct. 1229]), admissions that he engaged in various forms of petty illegal conduct, and, perhaps most damaging, a transcript containing 10 deletions, which may have suggested to the jury the presence of additional inculpatory evidence not presented to the jury. Because it is not clear that the admission of this evidence, obtained in violation of defendant's constitutional rights, was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt ( Chapman v. California (1967) 386 U.S. 18 [17 L.Ed.2d 705, 87 S.Ct. 824, 24 A.L.R.3d 1065]), in my view, the conviction must be reversed.