Opinion ID: 1616293
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: impact of suppression of pre- miranda statements on post- miranda confession

Text: Ray argues that his post- Miranda confession could not be considered voluntary because it followed his pre- Miranda custodial statements, the latter of which were suppressed. Ray claims that his original counsel was ineffective for failing to argue that Ray's pre- Miranda statements impermissibly tainted [Ray's] subsequent confession. Brief for appellant at 10. Ray's argument presumes that a Mirandized statement made subsequent to unwarned suppressed statements must invariably be suppressed. This presumption is incorrect as a matter of law, and we reject Ray's argument. Ray asserts, and the State does not dispute, that Ray was in custody during the time both the statements and the confession were made. The record reflects that at the onset of police questioning, prior to being given his Miranda warnings, Ray made statements essentially disavowing any involvement in the crimes. At trial, these statements were suppressed. Following these exculpatory statements, the police advised Ray that he was a suspect, and he was given his Miranda warnings. Thereafter, Ray confessed, which confession was tape-recorded and played to the jury at trial. In arguing that the taped confession was tainted by the pre- Miranda statements, Ray invokes the tainted fruit of the poisonous tree language taken from cases such as Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963), in which Fourth Amendment violations have led to the suppression of evidence, including the suppression of confessions. See Taylor v. Alabama, 457 U.S. 687, 102 S.Ct. 2664, 73 L.Ed.2d 314 (1982). Ray's argument confuses the role of the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule designed to deter unreasonable searches, no matter how probative their fruits, and the function of Miranda in guarding against the prosecutorial use of compelled statements as prohibited by the Fifth Amendment. See Oregon v. Elstad, 470 U.S. 298, 105 S.Ct. 1285, 84 L.Ed.2d 222 (1985). The U.S. Supreme Court has recognized that `a living witness is not to be mechanically equated with the proffer of inanimate evidentiary objects illegally seized [and that] the living witness is an individual human personality whose attributes of will, perception, memory and volition interact to determine what testimony he will give.' United States v. Ceccolini, 435 U.S. 268, 277, 98 S.Ct. 1054, 55 L.Ed.2d 268 (1978) (quoting Smith v. United States, 324 F.2d 879 (D.C.Cir.1963)). It is an unwarranted extension of Miranda to say that an unwarned statement so taints the investigatory process that a subsequent voluntary and informed waiver is ineffective for some indeterminate period. Oregon v. Elstad, 470 U.S. at 309, 105 S.Ct. 1285. Thus, although Miranda requires that the unwarned [statement] must be suppressed, the admissibility of any subsequent statement should turn in these circumstances solely on whether it is knowingly and voluntarily made. Id. See, also, State v. Escamilla, 245 Neb. 13, 511 N.W.2d 58 (1994). We therefore conclude that the taped confession was not required to be suppressed solely because it was given subsequently to the suppressed unwarned statements. Accordingly, where original counsel made no such legal argument urging suppression, which argument would have been unavailing, counsel's performance was not deficient on this basis.