Opinion ID: 2633125
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Defendant's Cultural Background and Limited Intellectual Ability

Text: Finally, similar to Jiminez but distinguishable from Al-Yousif, Redgebol's cultural background and limited intellectual ability contributed, along with the other factors detailed above, to his inability to make a knowing and intelligent waiver of his rights. While the defendant in Jiminez was found to function at a very low cognitive level, here, Redgebol, although oriented in time and place to his situation and surroundings, was similarly limited in his ability to understand the Miranda advisement as it was explained to him by Abyei and Detective Frederickson. Both defendants never went to school and were presumably functionally illiterate. Further, Redgebol, like Jiminez, appeared to struggle with complex concepts. His native language Dinka does not include the abstract ideas that form the basis of our Miranda rights. The trial court heard conflicting evidence about how much Arabic Redgebol actually understood. It is likely that Redgebol understands some Arabic but it is undisputed that he has not been taught in that language, thus limiting his ability to understand complex concepts in Arabic any better than in Dinka. Redgebol's limited understanding of Arabic was confirmed by Rieang's testimony that Redgebol had not understood the announcement in Arabic on Sudanese television about the government's plan to conscript young males, a plan that presumably would have affected both brothers. Rieang explained at the suppression hearing that Redgebol could only understand the announcement after Rieang explained it to him in Dinka. Therefore, in the past, Redgebol had experienced difficulty understanding other abstract concepts when spoken in Arabic, even when the topic had a direct impact on him. Further, our reasoning in Al-Yousif does not support a finding in this case of a knowing and intelligent waiver. In that case, the defendant, although communicating in English at a fifth-grade level, was enrolled in college after several years of schooling in the United States and was found to understand numerous complex English concepts. 49 P.3d at 1167, 1171, 1179. We thus found that he had sufficient educational knowledge to grasp the three Miranda rights, notwithstanding his cultural background. Id. at 1167, 1171-72. Here, however, Redgebol's length of time in the country, education, and functioning intelligence level did bear on his depth of understanding such that he could not comprehend his three basic Miranda rights as explained by Abyei and Detective Frederickson. Contrary to the college-educated Al-Yousif, Redgebol has never been to school. Instead, until a very short time before the interrogation, he lived in a pastoral society with an entirely different cultural conception of legal disputes as a disagreement between families where punishment is normally meted out in the form of the party at fault giving cows to the prevailing party. This cultural background explains why throughout the attempted advisement, Redgebol asked seemingly nonsensical questions about his family and how they would know to come and defend him because that would have been the normal practice in the Dinka legal system. Redgebol's knowledge of the Dinka customs and practices further explains why he wanted to speak with the victim's family, whom Redgebol believed was the other party to this dispute, rather than the state. His questions during the interrogation indicated that his cultural background significantly affected his ability to understand his Miranda rights, as we acknowledged could happen in Al-Yousif. See id. at 1172. In the Dinka culture, one only has a right to tell the truth. Speaking to an investigating authority is compulsory in the Dinka legal system, a concept completely contrary to our notion of the right to remain silent. The Dinka system has no lawyers, and thus, Redgebol labored under a substantial misunderstanding of a lawyer's role in the interrogation. The concept that he could ask for an attorney to represent him and that he could refuse to speak to the police would have been completely foreign to Redgebol. In sum, the trial court was correct in following our past case law and finding that Redgebol did not knowingly and intelligently waive his Miranda rights. First, the interpreter Abyei did not have adequate training or experience to explain the Miranda rights to Redgebol. Second, Detective Frederickson did not resolve the substantial misconceptions regarding the three rights that Redgebol's nonsensical answers revealed, choosing instead to interrupt Redgebol or ignore his questions. Finally, because of his cultural background and limited intellectual functioning, Redgebol could not understand an advisement of such abstract concepts in Arabic.