Opinion ID: 854149
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Doctrinal and practical considerations

Text: There are good reasons not to stray from the historical focus on testimonial compulsion. This case presents no claim of compulsion, but rather turns on whether alleged misconduct outside the interrogation room can nullify an otherwise valid confession. Ajabu's proposed construction of Section 14 would transfer to the bar and others the right to terminate an interrogation that was proceeding voluntarily. Miranda warnings are intended to give the suspect some control over the circumstances surrounding the interrogation. They do not give a lawyer control over the interrogation unless the suspect requests it. Moreover, the warnings are not designed to suggest to suspects otherwise speaking without compulsion that they should have a lawyer present when they have explicitly declined one, or that they should not talk at all. Because the federal and state rights serve the same goals, the reasoning with respect to the right to be free from self-incrimination expressed in Burbine is also applicable to Article I, Section 14 of the Indiana Constitution. In Burbine, the Supreme Court rejected a similar invitation to expand the self-incrimination right under the federal constitution. Writing for a six-to-three majority, Justice O'Connor dismissed the notion that a lawyer's efforts to contact a suspect could render a Miranda waiver invalid: Events occurring outside of the presence of the suspect and entirely unknown to him surely can have no bearing on the capacity to comprehend and knowingly relinquish a constitutional right. Burbine, 475 U.S. at 422, 106 S.Ct. at 1141. In essence, the Court held that the protections Miranda and subsequent cases provide were adequate to ensure that the waiver was voluntary as a matter of law. Id. at 422-23, 106 S.Ct. at 1141-42. And as a matter of Fifth Amendment doctrine, Burbine emphasized the elemental and established proposition that the privilege against compulsory self-incrimination is, by hypothesis, a personal one that can only be invoked by the individual whose testimony is being compelled. Id. at 434 n. 4, 106 S.Ct. at 1147 n. 4. The Court was equally unequivocal that the conduct of the police towards counsel had no bearing on the waiver analysis: [W]hether intentional or inadvertent, the state of mind of the police is irrelevant to the question of the intelligence and voluntariness of respondent's election to abandon his rights. Although highly inappropriate, even deliberate deception of an attorney could not possibly affect a suspect's decision to waive his Miranda rights unless he were at least aware of the incident. Id. at 423, 106 S.Ct. at 1142 (citation omitted). In concluding in Burbine that the Fifth Amendment had not been offended, Justice O'Connor made several points consistent with the result we reach today: (1) because Miranda warnings are prophylactic and not themselves constitutionally required, the warnings did not provide a license for molding police conduct so long as they served their purpose of protecting the self-incrimination right; (2) how police treated an attorney whose representation was unknown to the suspect is unrelated to Miranda's purpose of dissipating the coercion inherent in police interrogation; (3) Miranda is a bright-line rule whose case of application would be jeopardized if the validity of the waiver hinged on events occurring outside the stationhouse; (4) expanding Miranda would upset the careful balance that decision struck between the objective of preventing coerced confessions and the need to enable police to gather truthful information through non-coercive questioning; and (5) the benefit to the suspect of knowing of the attorney's unsolicited efforts would be marginal and the costs to society great, because counsel's inquiry would actively encourage the suspect not to speak at all. Id. at 424-27, 106 S.Ct. at 1142-44.