Court Opinion

ID: 9759404
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 00:15:11.299667+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T10:04:07.066899
License: Public Domain

LARSEN, Justice,
dissenting.
I dissent. First, I cannot agree with the majority’s conclusion that the detective’s questions “constituted interrogation”. Appellant was merely asked if he was “all right”; if “he was under the influence [of] drugs or alcohol”; and if “he knew why he had been picked up”. Such questions do no more than inform the police of whether a defendant is suffering discomfort and in control of his faculties, and whether he has been advised of the charges against him. They are preliminary to determining whether a defendant is able to knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily waive his rights and answer questions concerning the crime charged; they are not “likely to or expected to elicit a confession.”1 Accordingly, I would hold that appellant’s statement was not the product of custodial “interrogation” and did not, therefore, require a waiver of constitutional rights.2
*236Moreover, even if these questions constitute interrogation, appellant had been advised of his constitutional rights shortly before answering them and, as the Supreme Court recently held in North Carolina v. Butler, 441 U.S. 369, 99 S.Ct. 1755, 60 L.Ed.2d 286 (1979), a defendant’s responses to questioning can support a finding that he has waived his constitutional rights notwithstanding the absence of an express waiver. The majority, however, declines to follow this precedent and holds that an express waiver is required because it “will promote certainty in knowing an accused has waived his rights and will avoid a mountain of litigation which might otherwise result . . .
While an express waiver of constitutional rights is certainly more desirable than a waiver implied from conduct, I do not believe that the rule adopted by the majority is necessary to insure that an accused’s rights have been protected. There are cases where “waiver can be clearly inferred from the actions and words of the person interrogated.” North Carolina v. Butler, supra, at 373, 99 S.Ct. at 1757. Further, I believe that society’s interests in justice and effective law enforcement outweigh judicial convenience. The question of waiver should be addressed in terms of substance, and not in terms of “which of its forms are thé most judicially manageable.” And, finally, I note that every other court which has considered the inflexible per se rule adopted by the majority has rejected it.3
Accordingly, I dissent from the majority opinion and would, for the foregoing reasons, affirm the judgment of sentence.

. See, Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 478, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 1630, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, 726 (1966):
In dealing with statements obtained through interrogation, we do not purport to find all confessions inadmissible. Confessions remain a proper element in law enforcement. Any statement given freely and voluntarily without any compelling influences is, of course, admissible in evidence. The fundamental import of the privilege while an individual is in custody is not whether he is allowed to talk to the police without the benefít of warnings and counsel, but whether he can be interrogated, (emphasis supplied)

. The question has been addressed by ten of the eleven United States Courts of Appeals and the courts of at least seventeen states. See, Id. 441 U.S. at 375, n. 5, n. 6, 99 S.Ct. 1755.