Court Opinion

ID: 9725853
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 12:15:33.008302+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:25:20.624913
License: Public Domain

MR. JUSTICE SIMON, dissenting: I believe that this case was correctly appraised in the appellate court dissent of Justice Craven: “Although the record might support the finding that the defendant’s confession was the product of a rational intellect, the record does not support a finding that the defendant’s confession was a product of a free will.” (87 Ill. App. 3d 552, 559.) The majority here has committed the same error as the trial court. It confuses the product of a rational mind with the product of a free will and consequently has applied an improper test of voluntariness. The confession, correctly viewed, was not voluntarily given and therefore fundamental due process required that it be suppressed. It has long been settled that an involuntary confession is inadmissible. (For the common law antecedents of the constitutional rule, see Bram v. United States (1897), 168 U.S. 532, 42 L. Ed. 568, 18 S. Ct. 183.) The fifth amendment’s ban on compelling defendants to be witnesses against themselves has been viewed as embracing all forms of compulsion, both physical and mental. Because the courts realized that the ingenuity of zealous interrogators would usually outstrip judicial formulations of the coercive devices that were banned, the focus in determining if confessions were voluntarily obtained was shifted from the tools that produced the confessions to the effects defendants’ circumstances had on their minds. (Bram v. United States (1897), 168 U.S. 532, 548, 42 L. Ed. 568, 575, 18 S. Ct. 183, 189.) Thus, the court was asked to determine if the confession was made freely, voluntarily, and without inducement of any sort. Wilson v. United States (1896), 162 U.S. 613, 623, 40 L. Ed. 1090, 1096, 16 S. Ct. 895, 899. Similar tests have been formulated under the fourteenth amendment’s guarantee of due process. (Brown v. Mississippi (1936), 297 U.S. 278, 285, 80 L. Ed. 682, 687, 56 S. Ct. 461, 465 (“Because a State may dispense with a jury trial, it does not follow that it may substitute trial by ordeal”).) The question is whether the defendant’s confession was voluntary; there is no per se rule, but instead a case-by-case analysis of the totality of the circumstances is employed, and the truth or falsity of the confession cannot influence that determination. (Jackson v. Denno (1964), 378 U.S. 368, 377, 12 L. Ed. 2d 908, 916, 84 S. Ct. 1774, 1781.) A voluntary confession must be the product of a free and rational choice (Mincey v. Arizona (1978), 437 U.S. 385, 401, 57 L. Ed. 2d 290, 306, 98 S. Ct. 2408, 2418; Greenwald v. Wisconsin (1968), 390 U.S. 519, 20 L. Ed. 2d 77, 88 S. Ct. 1152); put another way, it must be the product of a rational intellect and a free will (Blackburn v. Alabama (1960), 361 U.S. 199, 208, 4 L. Ed. 2d 242, 249, 80 S. Ct. 274, 280-81). The distinction between an intellect that is rational and a will that is free must not be blurred. It is possible to have one without the other, but both are necessary for a statement to be voluntary. For example, one operating under insane delusions, as in Blackburn v. Alabama, may freely choose, without any external compulsion, to confess participation in a crime in great detail. The defendant may seem to give “sensible” answers to questioning. But the mental disease afflicting the defendant robs the defendant of any rational choice. Although there is volition, it cannot be said that there is any “meaningful volition.” Thus, the confession must be suppressed. (Blackburn v. Alabama (1960), 361 U.S. 199, 211, 4 L. Ed. 2d 242, 250, 80 S. Ct. 274, 282.) On the other hand, a defendant being tortured on the rack or under more modern third-degree methods may be perfectly rational, concise and consistent in confessing. It is even readily believable that a defendant would try to hedge a confession under such pressures, in order to say as little damning as possible while avoiding harsher physical or psychological pain. (See e.g., Mincey v. Arizona (1978), 437 U.S. 385, 57 L. Ed. 2d 290, 98 S. Ct. 2408.) But a rational confession of that type lacks free will. It too must be suppressed. With this understanding of what is voluntary, I turn to the circumstances of this case — a confession obtained while the defendant was in police custody, stripped naked and under the influence of the mood-altering drug Haldol. Unlike the experience in some other countries, our police do not normally receive confessions induced by involuntarily administered drugs, and so the case law governing the admissibility of such confessions is meager. In People v. Heirens (1954), 4 Ill. 2d 131, 141, this court expressed its belief that a confession induced by the unauthorized use of sodium pentothal was a flagrant violation of defendants’ rights and any conviction obtained from such a confession could not stand. In People v. Muniz (1964), 31 Ill. 2d 130, 138, there was no evidence to support the defendant’s claim that materials he had swallowed would tend to affect his confession. In People v. Townsend (1957), 11 Ill. 2d 30, 37, a divided court held that a confession obtained after the defendant was injected with hyoscine (which the majority opinion in this case notes is also known as scopolamine and often characterized as a truth serum) could be admitted at trial because the confession was so coherent that the defendant’s “performance in making it was incompatible with a mind devoid of discernment or of a will of its own.” The court analogized to confessions obtained while the defendant was intoxicated, which are admissible if the defendant “is capable of making a narrative of past events or of stating his own participation in the crime.” 11 Ill. 2d 30, 43. The Townsend analysis was faulty in two respects. First, the diminished capacity of one who brings on his own drunken condition does not render acts involuntary. (See Ill. Rev. Stat. 1979, ch. 38, par. 6 — 3.) This should be contrasted with the defendant who is drugged by police without consent. As Mr. Justice Schaefer noted in dissenting in Townsend, none of the cases the majority relied upon in that case involved intoxication induced by the police. (11 Ill. 2d 30, 49.) Second, the “coherence” test for voluntariness addresses only the question of whether the defendant was operating rationally. It does nothing to assure that the confession was the product of a free will. Townsend was reversed in Townsend v. Sain (1963), 372 U.S. 293, 9 L. Ed. 2d 770, 83 S. Ct. 745. The court focused on the medical effects of the drugs given to the defendant, noting that they would pacify and quiet him. The court rejected the “coherence” test and said that it was difficult to imagine a situation in which a confession was less the product of a free intellect, less voluntary, than when the defendant was given a truth serum whose general property was to debilitate the defendant’s power of resistance. 372 U.S. 293, 307-08, 322, 9 L. Ed. 2d 770, 782, 791, 83 S. Ct. 745, 754. A scopolomine injection was also examined in Jackson v. Denno (1964), 378 U.S. 368, 12 L. Ed. 2d 908, 84 S. Ct. 1774, but there the court remanded the case for a determination of whether the drugs administered to the defendant had had a chance to take effect. In Beecher v. Alabama (1967), 389 U.S. 35, 19 L. Ed. 2d 35, 88 S. Ct. 189; (1972), 408 U.S. 234, 33 L. Ed. 2d 317, 92 S. Ct. 2282, the court suppressed two confessions obtained after the defendant, who had been seriously wounded in a gunfight with police and then threatened with immediate execution if he did not talk, was given morphine in the hospital. The drug took the pain away and relaxed the defendant, who said it made him want to love somebody. The court said that the circumstances made it clear the confessions were not voluntary. See also, e.g., State v. Allies (1979),_Mont--, 606 P.2d 1043 (confession induced by sodium amytal held involuntary); State v. Linn (1969), 93 Idaho 430, 462 P.2d 729 (exculpatory statement induced by sodium amytal held inadmissible because unreliable); State v. Jones (1954), 73 Wyo. 122, 276 P.2d 445 (confession held involuntary after Demerol was given to calm the hysterical defendant); Edwardson v. State (1951), 225 Ala. 246, 51 So. 2d 233 (confession obtained after narcotics administered to kill pain held involuntary); State v. Graffam (1943), 202 La. 869, 13 So. 2d 249 (confession obtained after morphine administered to kill pain held involuntary). From these drug-induced confession cases has come the principle that the defendant’s will may not be overborne by the effects of injected drugs at the time of the confession. (Townsend v. Sain (1963), 372 U.S. 293, 307, 9 L. Ed. 2d 770, 782, 83 S. Ct. 745, 754.) A review of the effects of the drug Haldol in general and the circumstances of this defendant before and after the injection reveals that this was precisely what happened to Kincaid. Haldol is a mood-altering drug which blocks the body’s first line of hormonal defense by neutralizing the adrenalin released into the blood stream at times of physical or emotional stress. It calms people, allowing them to act more rationally. It is clear that, without the Haldol injection, Kincaid was in no mood to act rationally or cooperate with police. Kincaid denied involvement in the crime when interrogated after his arrest; then, when left alone in his cell, his patience was exhausted and he tried to hang himself. Taken to a hospital, he was angry, upset and extremely uncooperative. The treating physician said he gave Kincaid an injection of 5 milligrams of Haldol at 10:20 p.m. “because of his extreme anger and restlessness in an attempt to reduce some of his angry feelings so that he could be dealt with more easily.” Kincaid was returned to his cell and stripped naked. After the injection, Kincaid appeared calmer and quieter to those who had seen him before. The police officer in charge of the prisoner said that Kincaid was more cooperative. Almost 2 hours after the injection, at 12:09 in the morning, when the effect of the drug was at its maximum, Kincaid was again interrogated. He signed a waiver of rights form, but his signature had become almost illegible. At this time Kincaid made his confession. Kincaid’s later recollection of his arrest and questioning was limited. He remembered waking and being taken to the hospital. He was depressed and angry there, but after the injection his mood switched; he felt sleepy and high. Kincaid did not recall talking to police officers after his return to the jail. Considering merely the effect of the Haldol on the admissibility of the confession, I believe the confession must be suppressed. Unlike Jackson v. Denno, the injection was given plenty of time to take effect. Before the injection Kincaid not only denied his involvement, he sought, through suicide, eternal refuge from any further discussion of his conduct. After the injection, cooperation was pharmacologically forced upon him, as in Beecher v. Alabama, to the point where he was made “the deluded instrument of his own conviction.” That the law of this land and its antecedent has never allowed. (Bram v. United States (1897), 168 U.S. 532, 547, 42 L. Ed. 568, 575, 18 S. Ct. 183, 188, citing 2 Hawkins’ Pleas of the Crown, ch. 46, § 3, n.2 (Leach 6th ed. 1787).) It is ironic that one of the interrogating officers realized what the majority apparently does not accept — that the effect of the drug on Kincaid stripped the confession of all reliability. The officer said that he would not have questioned Kincaid if he had known about the effect of the drug. This testimony exonerates the officer from any intentional wrongdoing, but does nothing to render Kincaid’s statement voluntary. My belief that this confession was not voluntary hardens into certainty when the other circumstances of Kincaid’s treatment are considered. First, Kincaid was in jail, isolated in a hostile environment. Compulsion is inherent in custodial situations. (Beckwith v. United States (1976), 425 U.S. 341, 346, 48 L. Ed. 2d 1, 7, 96 S. Ct. 1612, 1616; Miranda v. Arizona (1966), 384 U.S. 436, 458, 16 L. Ed. 2d 694, 714, 86 S. Ct. 1602, 1619.) Second, he was stripped naked. Without even going into the physical discomfort inherent in being in a jail cell naked, the humiliation of facing interrogators in that condition was itself psychological compulsion directed at Kincaid. It should be noted that in Bram the court emphasized, in finding the defendant’s statements to the police involuntary, that he was interrogated after being stripped naked. (Bram v. United States (1897), 168 U.S. 532, 561, 42 L. Ed. 568, 580, 18 S. Ct. 183, 194.) “Subtle pressures [citations] may be as telling as coarse and vulgar ones.” (Garrity v. New Jersey (1967), 385 U.S. 493, 496, 17 L. Ed. 2d 562, 565, 87 S. Ct. 616, 618.) Finally, Kincaid’s deteriorated signature indicated that the entire course of events had a physical effect upon him which cannot be overlooked. In People v. O’Leary (1970), 45 Ill. 2d 122, 125, the court said that where the defendant because of his obstreperous behavior was tear gassed in his cell, he had brought it on himself. Nevertheless, the court could not escape the conclusion that a confession, only half an hour after the gassing, was involuntary. (45 Ill. 2d 122, 126.) The police and medical procedures here may have been reasonable responses to Kincaid’s attempted self-destruction, but they rendered his confession involuntary and inadmissible. The finding that the confession was voluntary was against the manifest weight of the evidence. Despite lip service to the proper rule of law, the trial court and the majority have resurrected the Townsend coherence test to determine voluntariness, stating that it seems unlikely that had the defendant’s will been overborne he would have been able to limit the incriminating effect of his statement. (87 Ill. 2d at 119-20.) Far from unlikely, this effect was in keeping with the medical testimony about Haldol’s effects. It enhanced rationality but enervated anger and resistance like the scopolomine in Townsend. It proves nothing to discuss the defendant’s attempts to dodge the tenor of the interrogators’ questions; the real question is whether Kincaid wanted to talk to the interrogators at all. His conduct before the injection was clearly uncooperative; it therefore strains credulity to find that his new-found cooperation within such a short time after the injection was merely a coincidence. This is not a case involving the well-known “truth serum” sodium pentothal, and to look for that drug’s effects here is to blind oneself to the facts of this case. Sodium pentothal attacks both free will and rational intellect; it renders the subject unable to critically survey responses or to associate, select or inhibit the subject’s remarks. (People v. Heirens (1954), 4 Ill. 2d 131, 135.) The effect of Haldol is more subtle; it attacks only the free will, altering the defendant’s mood from a natural state of anger and obstinacy to one of calmness and cooperation. A subject so pacified is undoubtedly more malleable in the hands of questioners, and the use of this drug is at least as efficient a way to break a suspect’s spirit as the thumbscrew or rack. Nevertheless, efficiency in law enforcement is no substitute for constitutionality. Our fundamental law forbids the use of involuntary confessions, and that fundamental law was violated here. The behavior in question is too dangerous and too reminiscent of the type of interrogation we abhor in repressive institutions to rationalize or tolerate it in any way. In my view the conviction must be reversed, the defendant’s drug-induced, involuntary statements suppressed, and the case returned to the circuit court for a new trial. I respectfully dissent.