Court Opinion

ID: 9716989
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:55:41.092012+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:50.534546
License: Public Domain

Mr. JUSTICE JIGANTI, dissenting: I believe that the defendant’s confession was involuntary because it was obtained as a direct result of police deception. The decision in Miranda v. Arizona (1966), 384 U.S. 436, 16 L. Ed. 2d 694, 86 S. Ct. 1602, was intended to abolish interrogation practices which are likely to exert such pressure upon an individual as to disable him from making a free and rational decision. In determining the voluntariness of a confession, the test is whether it was made freely and without compulsion, or whether the defendant’s will was overcome at the time he confessed. (People v. Boyd (1980), 88 Ill. App. 3d 825, 410 N.E.2d 931.) While police deception in eliciting a confession does not render it involuntary as a matter of law, such deception is a factor which should be considered in evaluating whether or not the confession was voluntary. Frazier v. Cupp (1969), 394 U.S. 731, 22 L. Ed. 2d 684, 89 S. Ct. 1420; People v. Tanser (1979), 75 Ill. App. 3d 482, 394 N.E.2d 616; Robinson v. Smith (W.D.N.Y. 1978), 451 F. Supp. 1278; People v. Boerckel (1979), 68 Ill. App. 3d 103, 385 N.E.2d 815; cert. denied (1980), 447 U.S. 911. In the case at bar, the police obtained Diane Bradford’s statement that she had beaten her son by misrepresenting to her that the defendant had confessed. Then, before advising the defendant of his right to remain silent, they informed him that Diane Bradford said there had been a beating. At that point, he was given the Miranda warnings and he confessed. I believe that the police deception practiced here had the effect of overcoming the defendant’s will and undermining his ability to freely determine the risks and benefits of cooperating with the authorities. Until he learned of Diane Bradford’s statement, the defendant clung steadfastly to the exculpatory account he had given at his home. He maintained that that version was true even after Officer Ridges expressed the opinion that it was unbelievable in light of the body’s advanced stage of rigor mortis. It was only after hearing of Diane Bradford’s statement, which was obtained through deceit, that the defendant confessed to beating his son. According to these facts it appears as though the defendant’s confession was a direct product of the police misconduct involved rather than an exercise of his own free will. The State should not be allowed to obtain confessions by the use of deliberate lies or trickery. “Such deception clearly has no place in our system of justice.” Robinson v. Smith (W.D.N.Y. 1978), 451 F. Supp. 1278, 1291.