Court Opinion

ID: 9790853
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 02:00:26.066863+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:32.214666
License: Public Domain

BISTLINE, Justice,
dissenting.
I am unable to join the opinion which affirms the conviction of the defendant David Kysar for three reasons. But before laying out the reasons for being unable to become part of today’s majority, invitation is extended to an examination of the Court of Appeals opinion in State v. Kysar, 114 Idaho 457, 757 P.2d 720 (Ct.App.1988),5 a companion case to this which for unknown reasons was separated and sent to the Court of Appeals. The Court of Appeals determined that the interrogation techniques used by the police while questioning David’s brother, Dale, rendered his confession involuntary. However, the Court today has blessed, if you will, or at the least approved, the procedures applied by the police to David.
The majority opinion implicitly endorses the improper procedures used by the Idaho Falls Police in the Terry stop, and the improper procedures in the “show up” of David Kysar and his brother, Dale. The record also demonstrates that despite David Kysar’s repeated requests for counsel, he was not afforded the basic protection provided by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966).
I. THE TERRY STOP
There is no doubt that David Kysar was handcuffed and detained for some period of time prior to the show up, and the police admit there was no probable cause to arrest Kysar until after the show up was conducted. The justices of the United States Supreme Court, in their elaboration of Terry stop requirements, have stated that stopping someone for the purpose of investigating criminal activity which has already occurred may be allowed. United States v. Hensley, 469 U.S. 221, 105 S.Ct. 675, 83 L.Ed.2d 604 (1985).6 However, the period of time allowed for purposes of investigation by the police must be limited.7 Normally, handcuffs are not proper during *1001a Terry stop.8 The reason for these limitations is obvious: Without the support of probable cause that a crime has been committed, a person’s dignity and freedom of movement may not be taken away for the purposes of police investigation, unless the police act swiftly to conclude their investigation and come to a final determination as soon as possible on the existence of probable cause to detain the person further.
The holding of Terry v. Ohio does not afford the police a license to detain people at their leisure. Terry is a concession to the practical and everyday problems of law enforcement balanced against the rights of individuals. With that in mind, I now examine the majority’s treatment of the stop of Kysar by the police.
According to the majority, “[sjhortly after the detention began” the persons who viewed the crime were brought together with the suspects for the show up. Later in the majority opinion, it is stated that “the ‘show up’ occurred approximately an hour after the robbery.” The majority finds nothing wrong with allowing the police to handcuff a complacent Terry stop suspect for approximately an hour before the police take the affirmative steps required to either dispel or confirm their suspicions. All that was needed to be done by the police (before the show up could properly be conducted) required a few minutes at the most. First, the police should have written down descriptions provided by the witnesses of the robbers — before the show up. Second, the police had to transport the witnesses to the suspects.9 Apparently, both of these steps were taken. Was it reasonable that these steps would consume an hour? Highly doubtful, and most questionable.
Given the proximity of the scene of the crime to the road where Kysar was stopped, there can be found no justification for the police to have forcefully detained Kysar for an hour. This is not a trivial point, because it is also clear that in the meantime the police were conducting a wide-ranging investigation, which included a warrantless consent search10 of Kysar’s dwelling, and a search of the garage and the car Kysar had been traveling in. The initial efforts by the police to search the duplex apartment and begin questioning the suspect in this case were not appropriately expended, because the first priority of the police should have been the determination of whether further detention of Kysar was warranted. The only way to determine whether further detention of this Terry stop suspect was justified was through a show up. In the future, the use of a Terry stop for investigation purposes will, perhaps and hopefully, be kept short and to the point.11
*1002II. THE SHOW UP
Moreover, it is obvious to the extreme that the show up was utilized to heighten instead of lessen the already suggestive circumstances. A show up is always suggestive because it focuses the witnesses’ attention on the one suspect, without the check afforded by a line up. In a line up, the witnesses must pick the suspect out of a group. During a show up, the suspect is the only “pick” available. The United States Supreme Court recognized this, and noted in Stovall v. Denno, 388 U.S. 293, 87 S.Ct. 1967, 18 L.Ed.2d 1199 (1967):
The practice of showing suspects singly to persons for the purpose of identification, and not as part of a lineup has been widely condemned.
388 U.S. at 302, 87 S.Ct. at 1972 (footnote omitted). Stovall goes on to state that a due process attack on a show up must be analyzed by considering the “totality of the circumstances surrounding [the show up].” Id. In consideration of the totality of the circumstances it is impossible to find or invent a justifiable reason for covering Kysar’s head with a leather jacket before the witnesses were allowed to view the suspect.
Kysar and his brother were the only two people the witnesses would view during the show up. Where two people committed the robbery the obvious conclusion for the witnesses to draw could only be that the two individuals surrounded by three policemen were the robbers. The witnesses had stated, prior to the show up, that they had been unable to see the robbers’ faces. Apparently the police decided the show up would be less suggestive to the witnesses if the two suspects were viewed with their faces veiled. Yet, if the witnesses could not see the robbers’ faces, there would be no reason to cover the suspects’ faces during the show up. During a show up, suspects should be allowed to appear as naturally as possible, to dispel as much of the suggestiveness of the show up as possible. During this show up, the already suggestive circumstances were improperly exacerbated by the actions of the police.12
III. MIRANDA WARNINGS
Even more egregious than the unnecessary force used in making the Terry stop, and the improper and suggestive show up, was the police’s denial of Kysar’s right to counsel. Before the government can use any incriminating statement made by a detained defendant it must administer a timely Miranda warning, and where that has been done, a defendant’s statements cannot be used without proving an intelligent and knowing waiver of the accused’s Miranda rights. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). If an accused indicates, either before or at any time during interrogation, his desire to remain silent, then all questioning must cease. The United States Supreme Court has consistently reiterated the protection available to a suspect who exercises in any manner his or her right to the presence of counsel:
[A]n accused____ having expressed his desire to deal with the police only through counsel, is not subject to further interrogation by the authorities until counsel has been made available to him, unless the accused himself initiates further communication, exchanges, or conversations with the police.
*1003Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 484-485, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 1885, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981). The Supreme Court recently reaffirmed this rule when it held that post-Miranda responses to further interrogation cannot cast retrospective doubt on an earlier, unambiguous request for the presence of counsel. Smith v. Illinois, 469 U.S. 91, 105 S.Ct. 490, 83 L.Ed.2d 488 (1984).
This Court, with prompting from a directive of the Supreme Court of the United States,13 applied that rule of law in State v. Monroe, 103 Idaho 129, 131, 645 P.2d 363, 365 (1982):
The case before us is also similar to Edwards in that the defendant requested counsel but the confession was obtained without the benefit of counsel being present and only after the police officer initiated further interrogation by asking the defendant if he would like to give his side of the story. Therefore, following Edwards, we find that because the defendant asked for counsel three times and was not given the opportunity to deal with the police through counsel, the confession that was a result of police-initiated interrogation must be suppressed. We reverse and remand for a new trial with directions to suppress the confession obtained in violation of the defendant's right to counsel.
In the present case, defendant David Kysar unequivocally and expressly invoked his right to counsel on at least three occasions. First, Sergeant Codding, after reciting the Miranda warnings to Kysar, asked whether Kysar understood them. Kysar replied “I’d like to see my lawyer.” Sergeant Codding testified that he heard Kysar utter these words. Detective Forrest was also aware, from conversations with the other officers at the scene, that Kysar had asked for an attorney out in the alley prior to his being taken to Forrest’s detective unit.
Second, Mr. Kysar renewed his request for an attorney when he was placed in the back seat of Detective Forrest’s vehicle. After some questioning, which included Forrest’s statement that he would go to prison for sure if he didn’t cooperate, Kysar told the detective “all I wanted was to see my lawyer.” Detective Forrest’s testimony does not contradict Kysar’s testimony on this point. Detective Forrest also verified Kysar’s testimony that after he had expressed his desire to see his lawyer for a second time, Forrest told Kysar about a jacket lying on the side of the road with hair in it that could be matched to Kysar’s hair, and result in a conviction. It would be, according to Forrest, to Kysar’s advantage to cooperate.
The third occasion Kysar invoked his right to counsel occurred at the police station after Kysar was returned to a small interrogation room. Kysar recalled that Detective Forrest asked him if he would like to talk to Forrest about the case, to which he replied: “No. I want to see a lawyer.” What transpired after Kysar’s repeated and unequivocal requests for counsel reveals other instances of improper police conduct. Kysar was improperly subjected to the functional equivalent of interrogation after he invoked his right to counsel. The United States Supreme Court addressed the question of what constitutes interrogation in Rhode Island v. Innis, 446 U.S. 291, 100 S.Ct. 1682, 64 L.Ed.2d 297 (1980). The court in Innis held that:
[T]he Miranda safeguards come into play whenever a person in custody is subjected to either express questioning or its functional equivalent. That is to say, the term “interrogation” under Miranda refers not only to express questioning, but also to any words or actions on the part of the police (other than those normally attendant to arrest and custody) that the police should know are reasonably likely to elicit an incriminating response from the suspect. The latter portion of this definition focuses primarily upon the perceptions of the suspect, rather than the intent of the police. This focus reflects the fact that the Miranda safeguards were designed *1004to vest a suspect in custody with an added measure of protection against coercive police practices, without regard to objective proof of the underlying intent of the police. A practice that the police should know is reasonably likely to evoke an incriminating response from a suspect thus amounts to interrogation.
446 U.S. at 300-301, 100 S.Ct. at 1689-90 (footnotes omitted; emphasis added). So for example, by continuing the interrogation of Kysar, after his second request to see his lawyer, the police did not honor Miranda v. Arizona,14
Kysar was also improperly shuffled from room to room, and was not promptly booked into jail after he arrived at the police station. Sergeant Codding testified that he did not take Kysar directly to the jail as is the normal procedure, but instead took him to a small room where he was handcuffed to a table. The reason Kysar was not booked into the jail at the time he was brought to the Law Enforcement building is readily apparent: The police wanted the confession which they ultimately obtained. Because Kysar had repeatedly invoked his right to counsel, he was not initially interrogated at the station, but handcuffed to a table in a small interrogation room, then in the large report room, and then, finally, in a small interrogation room again, at all times restrained from mobility by handcuffs tethering him to furniture. Meanwhile, the officers were interrogating his brother, Dale Kysar, until a break in the case might be achieved. In time Detective Forrest told David Kysar that Dale had written a statement implicating him. Notwithstanding the fact that Kysar, only minutes before, for the third time, expressly and unequivocally invoked his right to counsel, Detective Forrest became angry, according to Kysar, whereupon Kysar relented, asking “what is it you want me to do.” Thereupon Forrest advised him that he should write a statement, which he did. After Kysar wrote the statement, Detective' Forrest presented him with a Rights Waiver Form which he signed. As soon as the statement and waiver were signed, at approximately 1:30 or 2:00 a.m., the 5th of February, 1987, Kysar was taken to jail — some five hours after his initial detention, and four and one-half hours after the time he first invoked his right to counsel.
This combination of circumstances constitutes inherently coercive custodial interrogation and warrants suppression of the confession. See Ashcraft v. Tennessee, 322 U.S. 143, 64 S.Ct. 921, 88 L.Ed. 1192 (1944). In Haley v. Ohio, 332 U.S. 596, 68 S.Ct. 302, 92 L.Ed. 224 (1948), the United States Supreme Court held that a period of five hours prior to confession was enough to constitute an extended period of incommunicado interrogation, the confession coming at the end of that period of time. The United States Supreme Court has also found the procedure of moving a suspect from room to room could vitiate the voluntariness of a confession, as being “shuttled back and forth” between interrogation rooms tends to have a disorienting affect. Reck v. Pate, 367 U.S. 433, 81 S.Ct. 1541, 6 L.Ed.2d 948 (1961).
The teaching of Miranda is clear and readily understood: An accused’s or a suspect’s fifth amendment privilege is protected from the inherently coercive effects of custodial interrogation. Contrary to the Miranda mandate, and contrary to the rule of Monroe, it is clear that the police elected to intimidate, threaten and attempt to elicit incriminating responses from David Kysar notwithstanding that he thrice invoked his right to counsel. In short, the police did not respect his request. Moreover, they made no excuse for holding him incommunicado and immobile for some four and one-half hours, thereby diminishing his, or anyone’s, resolve to steadfastly remain silent until an attorney appeared to counsel him. There was no valid reason for not booking him into jail, at which point *1005he would have had access to a telephone. Thereafter he would have been safely in a cell, no longer handcuffed, and free from the not-too-subtle tactics which finally did break his resolve. While chained to a table or chair for the entire time, he was kept advised that his brother had submitted to an interrogation which was going on in another room. Such blatant violations of constitutional rights as occurred in this case demand that the written confession and other oral statements made by David Kysar should be suppressed and that the conviction be reversed, and the cause be remanded for further proceedings.
APPENDIX
State of Idaho, Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
Dale James KYSAR,
Defendant-Respondent.
No. 17039.
Court of Appeals of Idaho.
July 5, 1988.
BURNETT, Judge.
Dale Kysar stands accused of robbery. The case comes to us on appeal by the state from an order suppressing inculpatory statements made by Kysar during custodial police interrogation. The sole question presented is whether the staements were made voluntarily. For reasons explained below, we conclude that they were not. Accordingly, we affirm the suppression order and remand the case for further proceedings.
The underlying facts may be stated briefly. Dale Kysar and his brother David were charged with robbing a Pizza Hut restaurant in Idaho Falls. After Dale was booked into the local jail, he was placed in an interrogation room. He was crying and visibly upset. At some point, he asked to speak with the detective in charge of the investigation. The detective agreed to meet with Kysar. They engaged in a thirty-minute conversation during which Kysar made statements admitting his involvement in the robbery. The conversation was recorded. Kysar also gave a written statement concerning the crime. Subsequently, Kysar filed a pretrial motion to suppress his statements because they had been induced by promises of leniency by the interrogating detective. The district judge agreed and granted the motion. This appeal followed.
The issue before us is governed by the constitutional standard of voluntariness under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. See generally State v. Hiassen, 110 Idaho 608, 716 P.2d 1380 (Ct.App.1986). No additional question has been raised as to the procedural safeguards established in Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). Voluntariness in the constitutional sense must be shown by the totality of circumstances surrounding police efforts to obtain incriminating statements. See 2 W.E. RINGEL, SEARCHES & SEIZURES, ARRESTS AND CONFESSIONS § 25.1 (2d ed. 1988) (hereinafter cited as RINGEL). A statement is voluntary if it is the product of a free will. State v. Powers, 96 Idaho 833, 537 P.2d 1369 (1975). Under this standard, it must be determined that the statement was not extracted “by any sort of threats or violence, nor obtained by any direct or implied promises____” Bram v. United States, 168 U.S. 532, 18 S.Ct. 183, 42 L.Ed. 568 (1897).
When this standard is applied on appeal our task is two-fold. First, we defer to the lower court’s findings of fact, if they are not clearly erroneous. See State v. Moulds, 105 Idaho 880, 673 P.2d 1074 (Ct. App.1983). Second, we exercise free review over the question whether the facts found are constitutionally sufficient to show voluntariness. Davis v. North Carolina, 384 U.S. 737, 86 S.Ct. 1761, 16 L.Ed.2d 895 (1966); State v. Blevins, 108 Idaho 239, 697 P.2d 1253 (Ct.App.1985). In the present case, the facts surrounding Kysar’s confession are undisputed. Therefore, our analysis consists solely of determining whether the confession was voluntary as a matter of law.
*1006The recorded conversation in the interrogation room included two exchanges which form the basis of Kysar’s challenge to the voluntariness of his ensuing statements. The pertinent portions are excerpted below.
[Detective]: Why don’t you start from the beginning and tell me what happened?
Kysar: What can you do for me?
[Detective]: Well, it depends on what you tell me. You know, like I say, it’s always best to cooperate and tell the truth. And the judge looks at that and the prosecutor looks at that and say, hey, you know, this guy’s got a good attitude. He might be worth rehabilitating. A guy that sits back and says “up yours” and “screw you guys” and “I don’t want to talk to you or nothin’ ” you know, they figure, hey, this guy’s a lost cause, you know. So you kind of see where we’re at and where the judge is at, so he can ...
Kysar: Will I be out of jail by the time my baby is bom?
[Detective]: When will your baby be born?
Kysar: Well, you know, say, five months.
[Detective]: Five months? I’d, say that’s a pretty safe bet. Like I say, what they do is tomorrow morning there’d be an arraignment, okay? They would set a bond. Depending on how the case would go, if you were to come out and admit to it and plead guilty what they would do is do a background investigation on you.
Kysar: I’m a good guy, you know, that’s just the problem.
[Detective]: Yeah, I think you have a good attitude. I don’t think you’re a lost cause or anything like that. I think you’re just under some stress, like you say, and just pushed into doing something, you know.
Kysar: (Inaudible.)
[Detective]: When I talk to the prosecutor, I’ll tell him that you’re totally cooperative with me and didn’t give us a bad time about it or nothing, he just wanted to come clean and clear it all up. And when it comes around to the sentencing and stuff that’ll make a big difference I’m sure. So let’s go ahead and we’ll have you do a real quick written statement, basically where you planned to go over and did the so-called surveillance on the business. [Emphasis added.]
As the emphasized portions indicate, the detective represented that Kysar probably would be out of custody in time to see his child born and that the detective would inform the prosecutor of Kysar’s cooperation.
In his ruling on the motion to suppress, the trial judge focused solely upon the second assertion. He concluded that it was impermissible “[t]o assure a suspect that the prosecutor will be informed of his [the defendant’s] cooperative nature____” With this conclusion we cannot agree. A mere representation of intent to inform a prosecutor of the defendant’s cooperation, when not connected to any promise of a specific benefit, is not an implied promise of leniency requiring suppression of an inculpatory statement. See, e.g., United States v. Curtis, 562 F.2d 1153 (9th Cir.1977). However, such a representation is one significant factor to be considered in analyzing the totality of circumstances. See RINGEL § 25.2(c).
The other emphasized portion of the conversation, where the detective said it would be a “safe bet” that Kysar would be out of jail in time to see his baby born — is more problematic. Although the detective’s statement could be rationalized on the technical ground that Kysar might have received a pretrial release on bond within the time indicated, we do not view voluntariness through a filter of technicality. We focus on the meaning that reasonably would be ascribed by a lay person to the words spoken. So understood, we think the detective’s statement amounted to an implied promise that if Kysar cooperated, his incarceration for the offense would be completed before the child was born. Furthermore, regardless of which interpretation were adopted, the detective making the assurance did not have the authority to *1007fulfill it — and Kysar was not apprised of that fact.
Based upon our independent review of the totality of the circumstances surrounding the confession, we conclude that the detective’s representations, taken together, were sufficient to undermine Kysar’s free will. Therefore, his confession was not voluntary. It correctly was suppressed.
The order of the district court is affirmed.
WALTERS, C.J., and SWANSTROM, J., concur.

. A copy of this opinion follows in the appendix to this opinion.

. Recall that in Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968), the stop was justified in that case as a reasonable step taken by the police to prevent an imminent crime.

.See Florida v. Royer, 460 U.S. 491, 103 S.Ct. 1319, 75 L.Ed.2d 229 (1983); and United States v. Richards, 500 F.2d 1025 (9th Cir.1974). In Richards the Court explained that in reviewing the duration of a Terry stop, the Court should ask whether the police are swiftly pursuing an investigation which will determine if the suspect’s continued detention is justified.

.In this case, not only handcuffs were used, but the complacent Kysar brothers were also, prior to any show of resistance or recalcitrance, subject to the drawn service revolver of one officer and the shotgun of another. As LaFave and Israel explain:
Another important issue is whether the police conduct may still qualify as a lesser intrusion and thus a Terry stop if it includes force or a threat of force. Though it has occasionally been held that such action as surrounding the suspect or drawing weapons converts the police conduct into an arrest because the ‘restriction of * * * "liberty of movement” was complete,’ this is in error, for a stopping differs from an arrest not in the incompleteness of the seizure but in the brevity of it. The better view, therefore, is that surrounding the suspect will sometimes be an appropriate way of making the stop and maintaining the status quo, just as the drawing of weapons will sometimes be a reasonable precaution for the protection of officers and bystanders. Handcuffing ordinarily is improper, but may be resorted to when necessary to thwart the suspect’s attempt 'to frustrate further inquiry.’ [Footnotes omitted.]
W. LaFave and J. Israel, I Criminal Procedure 297 (1984). The record is void of any indication that the Kysars gave the police reason to believe they would "frustrate further inquiry." In fact, it appears from the record that the Kysars were ready to communicate and comply with the officers’ requests in a complacent manner.

. Transporting and detaining the suspects (on less than probable cause) to the police station before the show up would have been illegal. See Hayes v. Florida, 470 U.S. 811, 105 S.Ct. 1643, 84 L.Ed.2d 705 (1985).

. The common law wife of David’s brother consented to the police search of the duplex apartment.

. It seems that the idea of conducting a show up as the appropriate next step came slowly to the police. As one officer later described it, *1002after a handcuffed Dale Kysar had been escorted into his rented duplex:
About this time I realized that without some kind of an identification we didn't have anything, we were just going to identify the people and release them once they found out who they were, so I decided that I would have the officer that was currently talking to the witnesses to bring the people that could possibly I.D. somebody to the scene to see if we could set some kind of an identification of these individuals.
R., Vol. 2, 267.

. Not too long ago, the Court was considerably more concerned about the suggestive circumstances surrounding show ups. See State v. Sadler, 95 Idaho 524, 511 P.2d 806 (1973). Justice Bakes, writing the majority opinion, stated: “[W]e cannot sustain the police identification procedure in this case. See Stovall v. Denno, supra. Both appellants were displayed ... shackled by handcuffs and accompanied by police officers." 95 Idaho at 529, 511 P.2d at 811.

. 451 U.S. 1014, 101 S.Ct. 3001, 69 L.Ed.2d 385 (1981). The high court vacated the judgment, and remanded the case for further consideration in light of Edwards.

. The bright line rule that an accused who has exercised his right to presence of counsel may not be subjected to further interrogation by the authorities until counsel has been made available to him was reaffirmed in Smith v. Illinois, 469 U.S. 91, 93, 105 S.Ct. 490, 491, 83 L.Ed.2d 488 (1984), where the accused merely responded: "Uh yeah. I’d like to do that,” in response to being informed of his right to the presence of an attorney.