Opinion ID: 788327
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Miranda Violation and Voluntariness of Confession

Text: 29 Stewart argues that his confession should have been suppressed for two additional reasons: (1) the police used a two-step interrogation process in which Miranda warnings were initially withheld, in violation of Miranda and the Supreme Court's recent decision in Missouri v. Seibert; and (2) the confession was involuntary because it was induced by a promise of leniency. The latter argument is perfunctory and meritless. Stewart claims he was duped into initially confessing indirect and then direct involvement in the robbery by Detective Nelson's representation that he would not be charged if he had no direct involvement in the crime. The detective's offhand remark that Stewart would be all right if he had no direct involvement in the robbery cannot reasonably be construed as a promise of leniency and was not otherwise coercive. 30 Stewart's challenge to the two-step interrogation is not so easily resolved. The parties agree that Stewart was in custody when he was handcuffed and returned to the back seat of Detective Winters' car after the detectives learned that the cell phone recovered at the crime scene belonged to him. Miranda warnings were not given, but Stewart was questioned by police during the five-minute ride to the police station, and the questioning continued in an interview room at the station for another ten minutes or so. During this unwarned phase of the interrogation, Stewart initially denied involvement, then admitted to assisting the perpetrator (to the extent of providing the gun and the getaway car), and then confessed to robbing the bank alone. At this point the police provided Miranda warnings, obtained a waiver of rights, and elicited a detailed confession which was subsequently tape-recorded. 31 Although he did not raise the issue in the district court, Stewart argued in his opening brief on appeal that the police violated Miranda when they elicited an unwarned confession and then, mid-interrogation, interjected Miranda warnings and secured a postwarning repetition of his confession. His position on this issue was considerably strengthened when the Supreme Court decided Missouri v. Seibert while this appeal was being briefed. At issue in Seibert was the admissibility of a confession obtained by the use of a two-step interrogation strategy that called for the deliberate withholding of Miranda warnings until the suspect confessed, followed by a Miranda warning and a repetition of the confession already given. 32 The interrogating officer in Seibert testified that he made a conscious decision to use an interrogation technique he had been taught: question first, then give the warnings, and then repeat the question `until I get the answer that she's already provided once.' Seibert, ___ U.S. at ___, 124 S.Ct. at 2606. Although five members of the Court held the postwarning confession inadmissible under these circumstances, the case did not produce a majority opinion. When a fragmented Court decides a case and no single rationale explaining the result enjoys the assent of five Justices, `the holding of the Court may be viewed as that position taken by those Members who concurred in the judgments on the narrowest grounds.' Marks v. United States, 430 U.S. 188, 193, 97 S.Ct. 990, 51 L.Ed.2d 260 (1977) (quoting Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153, 169 n. 15, 96 S.Ct. 2909, 49 L.Ed.2d 859 (1976) (opinion of Stewart, Powell, and Stevens, JJ.)); see also Ben's Bar, Inc. v. Village of Somerset, 316 F.3d 702, 715 n. 20 (7th Cir.2003). A close reading of the separate opinions in Seibert reveals at least some common legal ground. 33 A plurality of the Court held that Miranda warnings given mid-interrogation, after a suspect has already confessed, are generally ineffective as to any subsequent, postwarning incriminating statements. 3 Seibert, ___ U.S. at ___, 124 S.Ct. at 2605. The plurality held that the police interrogation technique known as question first did not serve Miranda 's purpose of informing suspects about their constitutional rights: [t]he object of question-first is to render Miranda warnings ineffective by waiting for a particularly opportune time to give them, after the suspect has already confessed. Seibert, ___ U.S. at ___, 124 S.Ct. at 2610. When police question first and warn later, the threshold inquiry, according to the plurality, is whether it would be reasonable to find that in these circumstances the warnings could function `effectively' as Miranda requires. Id. The plurality was skeptical: [I]t is likely that if the interrogators employ the technique of withholding warnings until after interrogation succeeds in eliciting a confession, the warnings will be ineffective in preparing the suspect for successive interrogation, close in time and similar in content. Id. This is because a suspect who had just admitted guilt would hardly think he had a genuine right to remain silent. Id. at 2611. 34 The plurality distinguished Oregon v. Elstad, 470 U.S. 298, 105 S.Ct. 1285, 84 L.Ed.2d 222 (1985), essentially limiting it to its facts. Id. at 2611-12. Elstad addressed the admissibility of a Mirandized station-house confession that was preceded by an earlier, unwarned inculpatory remark by the defendant at the scene of his arrest. The defendant in Elstad was arrested at his home in connection with a recent neighborhood burglary. As police were executing the arrest warrant, and while still in the defendant's living room, one of the officers explained to the defendant that he was suspected of being involved in burglarizing his neighbor's home. Elstad, 470 U.S. at 301, 105 S.Ct. 1285. The defendant told the officer, Yes, I was there. Id. He had not yet received Miranda warnings. Later, at the sheriff's headquarters, the defendant was fully Mirandized, waived his rights, and gave an incriminating statement. Id. 35 The Supreme Court held in Elstad that the failure to administer Miranda warnings prior to the defendant's initial inculpatory statement did not require suppression of his subsequent Mirandized confession. Elstad, 470 U.S. at 300, 105 S.Ct. 1285. Because the Fourth Amendment exclusionary rule is different in purpose and effect from the Miranda suppression rule, the Court refused to extend the Fourth Amendment fruits doctrine to the Fifth Amendment Miranda context: 36 It is an unwarranted extension of Miranda to hold that a simple failure to administer the warnings, unaccompanied by any actual coercion or other circumstances calculated to undermine the suspect's ability to exercise his free will, so taints the investigatory process that a subsequent voluntary and informed waiver is ineffective for some indeterminate period. Though Miranda requires that the unwarned admission must be suppressed, the admissibility of any subsequent statement should turn in these circumstances solely on whether it is knowingly and voluntarily made. 37 Id. at 310, 105 S.Ct. 1285. 38 The Court also refused to attribute constitutional significance to the psychological effects of a voluntary unwarned admission, reiterating that [t]he failure of police to administer Miranda warnings does not mean that the statements received have actually been coerced, but only that courts will presume the privilege against compulsory self-incrimination has not been intelligently exercised. Id. at 310-11, 105 S.Ct. 1285. If a prior statement has actually been coerced, the time that passes between confessions, the change in place of interrogations, and the change in identity of the interrogators all bear on whether that coercion has carried over to the second confession. Id. at 310, 105 S.Ct. 1285. However, absent deliberately coercive or improper tactics in obtaining the initial statement, the mere fact that a suspect has made an unwarned admission does not warrant a presumption of compulsion as to the second statement. Id. at 314, 105 S.Ct. 1285. Where the initial unwarned statement was voluntary, the admissibility of the second statement depends only on whether it, too, was voluntary, and obtained in compliance with Miranda. Id. at 318, 105 S.Ct. 1285. Thus, a suspect who has once responded to unwarned yet uncoercive questioning is not thereby disabled from waiving his rights and confessing after he has been given the requisite Miranda warnings. Id. 39 The Seibert plurality followed Elstad to the extent that it rejected application of the Fourth Amendment fruits doctrine to the testimonial fruits of a Miranda violation. 4 Seibert, ___ U.S. at ___ n. 4, 124 S.Ct. at 2610 n. 4. However, the plurality distinguished the police conduct at issue in Elstad from the deliberate use of a question-first interrogation strategy: Although the Elstad Court expressed no explicit conclusion about either officer's state of mind, it is fair to read Elstad as treating the living room conversation as a good-faith Miranda mistake, not only open to correction by careful warnings before systematic questioning in that particular case, but posing no threat to warn-first practice generally. Id. at 2612. The plurality characterized the facts in Seibert as presenting the opposite extreme ... which by any objective measure reveal a police strategy adapted to undermine the Miranda warnings. 5 Id. The plurality distilled from these extremes a list of factors that may inform a court's judgment on whether mid-interrogation Miranda warnings are effective in individual cases: 40 The contrast between Elstad and this case reveals a series of relevant facts that bear on whether Miranda warnings delivered midstream could be effective enough to accomplish their object: the completeness and detail of the questions and answers in the first round of interrogation, the overlapping content of the two statements, the timing and setting of the first and the second, the continuity of police personnel, and the degree to which the interrogator's questions treated the second round as continuous with the first. 41 Id. at 2612. Applying these factors to the case before the Court, the plurality concluded that the delayed Miranda warnings were ineffective and the statements made after they were delivered were inadmissible. Id. at 2613. 42 Justice Breyer wrote separately to state his preference for a fruits rule and a good-faith exception to two-stage interrogations: Courts should exclude the `fruits' of the initial unwarned questioning unless the failure to warn was in good faith. Seibert, ___ U.S. at ___, 124 S.Ct. at 2613 (Breyer, J., concurring). He joined the plurality in full, however, predicting that the plurality's approach in practice will function as a `fruits' test, in that the truly `effective' Miranda warnings on which the plurality insists ... will occur only when certain circumstances — a lapse in time, a change in location or interrogating officer, or a shift in the focus of the questioning — intervene between the unwarned questioning and any postwarning statement. Id. 43 Justice Kennedy also concurred, but took a different approach to the analysis of Mirandized confessions that follow unwarned incriminating statements. Justice Kennedy viewed the plurality's test for admissibility as too broad, calling for a multifactor objective inquiry into the effectiveness of midstream Miranda warnings in all cases involving two-stage interrogations. Seibert, ___ U.S. at ___, 124 S.Ct. at 2614 (Kennedy, J., concurring). He rejected the general proposition that a Miranda violation in connection with one statement necessarily threatens the admissibility of other statements taken in full compliance with Miranda: [I]t would be extravagant to treat the presence of one statement that cannot be admitted under Miranda as sufficient reason to prohibit subsequent statements preceded by a proper warning. Id. at 2615. 44 Justice Kennedy narrowed the focus to the deliberate circumvention of Miranda. The Miranda warning was withheld [from Seibert] to obscure both the practical and legal significance of the admonition when finally given. Id. He favored the following rule: When an interrogator uses this deliberate, two-step strategy, predicated upon violating Miranda during an extended interview, postwarning statements that are related to the substance of prewarning statements must be excluded absent specific, curative steps. Id. The sufficiency of the curative measures would depend upon their capacity to ensure that a reasonable person in the suspect's situation would understand the import and effect of the Miranda warning. Id. at 2616. Justice Kennedy suggested that a substantial break in time and circumstances between the prewarning statement and the Miranda warning may suffice in most circumstances, as it allows the accused to distinguish the two contexts and appreciate that the interrogation has taken a new turn. Id. He added that providing the suspect with an explanation of the likely inadmissibility of the unwarned statement may be sufficient as a curative measure. Id. 45 Justice Kennedy made it clear, however, that he would apply this test only in the infrequent case, such as we have here, in which the two-step interrogation technique was used in a calculated way to undermine the Miranda warning. Id. That is, [t]he admissibility of postwarning statements should continue to be governed by the principles of Elstad unless the deliberate two-step strategy was employed. Id. On the facts before the Court, he concluded that the question-first tactic represented an intentional misrepresentation of the protection that Miranda offers and does not serve any legitimate objectives that might otherwise justify its use. Id. at 2615. Because no curative steps were taken, Justice Kennedy joined the plurality in concluding that the defendant's postwarning statement was inadmissible. Id. at 2615-16. 46 Justice O'Connor dissented in Seibert, joined by Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justices Scalia and Thomas. The dissenting justices would have evaluated the two-step interrogation under the voluntariness standard established in Elstad.  Elstad commands that if Seibert's first statement is shown to have been involuntary, the court must examine whether the taint dissipated through the passing of time or a change in circumstances. Seibert, ___ U.S. at ___, 124 S.Ct. at 2619 (O'Connor, J., dissenting). Under Elstad, if the first statement was voluntary (or if involuntary, the change in time and circumstances removed the taint), then the second statement is admissible unless it was involuntary despite the Miranda warning. Id. 47 What emerges from the split opinions in Seibert is this: at least as to deliberate two-step interrogations in which Miranda warnings are intentionally withheld until after the suspect confesses, the central voluntariness inquiry of Elstad has been replaced by a presumptive rule of exclusion, subject to a multifactor test for change in time, place, and circumstances from the first statement to the second. According to the plurality, the multifactor test — timing and location of interrogations, continuity of police personnel, overlapping content of statements, etc. — measures the effectiveness of midstream Miranda warnings and applies in all cases involving sequential unwarned and warned admissions. In Justice Kennedy's view, however, an inquiry into change in time and circumstances between the prewarning and postwarning statements — what he called curative steps — is necessary only in cases involving the deliberate use of a two-step interrogation strategy calculated to evade the requirements of Miranda. Justice Kennedy thus provided a fifth vote to depart from Elstad, but only where the police set out deliberately to withhold Miranda warnings until after a confession has been secured. Where the initial violation of Miranda was not part of a deliberate strategy to undermine the warnings, Elstad appears to have survived Seibert. 48 As we have noted, Stewart did not raise the two-step interrogation argument in the district court. This forfeiture means we review the district court's admission of the postwarning confession for plain error. United States v. Olano, 507 U.S. 725, 731-32, 113 S.Ct. 1770, 123 L.Ed.2d 508 (1993); United States v. Westmoreland, 240 F.3d 618, 635 (7th Cir.2001). We will not correct a forfeited error unless it is plain (that is, clear under current law) and affects substantial rights, which usually equates to a finding of prejudice. Olano, 507 U.S. at 732-34, 113 S.Ct. 1770. Satisfaction of this standard permits but does not require reversal. We will exercise remedial discretion to correct a plain forfeited error affecting substantial rights only when the error `seriously affect[s] the fairness, integrity or public reputation of judicial proceedings.' Olano, 507 U.S. at 736, 113 S.Ct. 1770. An error may be plain for purposes of the Olano test if it is clear at the time of appellate review: [W]here the law at the time of trial was settled and clearly contrary to the law at the time of appeal — it is enough that the error be `plain' at the time of appellate consideration. Johnson v. United States, 520 U.S. 461, 468, 117 S.Ct. 1544, 137 L.Ed.2d 718 (1997). 49 Seibert was decided while this appeal was being briefed. Both parties cited and analyzed the case — Stewart in his reply brief, the government by supplemental submission — and discussed it during oral argument. If Stewart's post-warning confession was inadmissible under either Seibert or what remains of Elstad (more on this in a moment), then its use against him at trial was plain error under Johnson, 520 U.S. at 468, 117 S.Ct. 1544 (it is enough that the error be `plain' at the time of appellate consideration). 50 We also conclude that the error — if there was one — affected Stewart's substantial rights. A confession is powerful evidence in any case; in the circumstances of this case, the admission of the confession was clearly prejudicial. Stewart confessed in considerable detail, explaining how he stole the getaway car, acquired the rifle from an illegal gun seller in Kentucky, and bought the clothing and skeleton mask at local discount stores. He provided a thorough description of his actions before, during, and after the robbery. The tape-recorded confession was played for the jury and a transcript provided so jurors could better follow what Stewart is heard saying on the tape. The confession most certainly had a profound effect on the verdict. There was other evidence against Stewart, to be sure: the partial identification by Officer Sitzman; his cell phone at the crime scene; his strange story of having walked twenty-five blocks to get a ride to nowhere. Still, the admission of Stewart's taped confession substantially affected the outcome of the trial; if it was admitted improperly, it seriously affected the fairness and integrity of the trial. 6 51 On the record before us, however, we cannot determine whether the admission of Stewart's confession was improper under Seibert, or, if not improper under Seibert, whether the initial unwarned confession would flunk the voluntariness standard of Elstad such that the taint would carry over to the second warned confession. More specifically, the record does not speak to whether the two-step interrogation in this case was deliberately used in circumvention of Miranda. If it was, then the analysis of the Seibert plurality and Justice Kennedy's concurrence merge, requiring an inquiry into the sufficiency of the break in time and circumstances between the unwarned and warned confessions. 52 Much of this evidence is already in the record, and it does not point to a separation of time and circumstances between the two confessions. We know, for example, that the unwarned questioning occurred in the squad car on the way to the police station, continued at the station, and was conducted primarily by Detective Nelson, initially with the assistance of Detective Winters and then two FBI agents. We know that it was Nelson who delivered the Miranda warnings and continued the interrogation after Stewart's waiver. But the record does not include the content of the hour-long postwarning interrogation that preceded the tape-recorded confession or the actual content of Stewart's unwarned confession. We therefore can only speculate about the extent to which the three statements overlap and the extent to which the questions treated the interrogation as continuous, although continuity and overlap seem likely. If the sequential interrogation process was used in deliberate circumvention of Miranda and there is insufficient separation in time and circumstances between the unwarned and warned confessions, then the warned confession was improperly admitted and Stewart's conviction cannot stand. Cf. United States v. Aguilar, 384 F.3d 520, 2004 WL 2026780 (8th Cir.2004) (treating the plurality in Seibert as the decision of the Court but finding enough evidence in the record to determine violation of Miranda under both the plurality opinion and Justice Kennedy's concurrence.) 53 If, on the other hand, the interrogation process at work here was not a deliberate end run around Miranda, then Stewart's first statement must be evaluated for voluntariness under Elstad. If involuntary, then the same sort of inquiry into change in time and circumstances between the first and subsequent statements will determine whether Stewart's tape-recorded confession was properly admitted.