Court Opinion

ID: 9699487
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 20:27:41.293935+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:20:50.573737
License: Public Domain

REID, Associate Judge,
dissenting:
I am unable to agree with my colleagues’ apparent characterization of the matter before us as a simple “request for identification” case. Nor am I able to agree with their application of fundamental legal principles to Mr. Jones’ case. Therefore, like my colleague, Judge Mack, I respectfully dissent.
In this unusual en banc case,1 we are asked to decide whether the police interrogated Mr. Jones without Miranda warnings, and, if so, whether the trial court committed reversible error in denying his suppression motion. Under Miranda, any statements that Mr. Jones made during custodial interrogation are inadmissible “unless he was warned prior to any questioning that he ha[d] the right to remain *285silent, [and] that anything he sa[id] c[ould] be used against him in a court of law.” Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 479, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). In my view, essential to a Miranda analysis is the factual context of this case.
According to Officer Groomes’ testimony, credited by the trial court, three uniformed police officers saw a “panicked” suspect drop drugs on the ground beside him as they approached. Two other men were with Mr. Jones. Officer Groomes, who knew the two other men “real well,” instructed them to go across the street. Another officer picked up the drugs from the ground in full view of Mr. Jones, who remained standing near where the drugs had fallen. The officers surrounded Mr. Jones, and thus, he was isolated from his companions. The officers arranged for field testing and then continued to stand on the street with the appellant for approximately fifteen minutes.
Both the officers and Mr. Jones knew that he was being held pending arrest when the field testing of the drugs was complete. Without giving the Miranda warnings, the officers began to question Mr. Jones, first requesting identification and then attempting to find out about the drugs specifically. Viewed in overall perspective, it seems indisputable that the officers’ actions violated both the spirit and the letter of Miranda.
Based on Officer Groomes’ testimony, the trial court determined that the “timing” of Mr. Jones’ incriminating statement warranted denial of the motion to suppress. Mr. Jones’ statement that he was just “holding” the drugs came just after the identification questioning but before the police began express questioning about the drugs: After picking up the drugs, the officers asked for the suspect’s ID or his name and address. At that point, Mr. Jones “spontaneously]” “volunteered” that he was merely “holding” for the other guys. Only after that point did the officers ask whether Mr. Jones wanted to “volunteer” further information about the drugs. Although the government concedes that the latter questioning was interrogation, the argument is that the later-asked questions cannot taint the statement that Mr. Jones made, whether it is considered as a spontaneous remark or as, at most, a non sequitur response to “what is your name?” For the reasons explained below, I take little comfort in the “timing” analysis.
In its approach to this case, the majority does not reach the issue of whether Mr. Jones was in custody because it finds that his statement was not elicited by interrogation. To reach that conclusion, the majority reasons that Miranda will not ordinarily protect a suspect who is being asked identity questions, because such questions are not, as a rule, reasonably likely to elicit incriminating information. Here the majority relies heavily on the D.C. Circuit’s opinion in United States v. Bogle, 325 U.S.App.D.C. 63, 114 F.3d 1271 (1997). The majority further rejects any suggestion that the overall context was so coercive as to be the functional equivalent of express interrogation. In their view, the officers’ conduct was “routine,” “conventional,” and “altogether appropriate.”
I wholeheartedly disagree with the latter point and would reverse on the basis that the overall context was the functional equivalent of express interrogation. But I am troubled by several other aspects of the majority’s analysis as well.
I note, first, that the majority’s analysis takes Bogle far beyond its specific holding. Bogle itself did not turn on whether a particular type of question might be presumptively excepted from the Miranda requirements. Rather, it was concerned with whether the police could question a *286suspect about what they believed in good faith to be an unrelated crime. In Bogle, the defendant was being held for murder. 325 U.S.App.D.C. at 64, 114 F.3d at 1272. A police detective who was not directly concerned with that murder, but was investigating the murder of Bogle’s brother, wanted to talk with Bogle. Id. Bogle had previously invoked his right not to answer questions about the crime for which he was accused. Id. The detective began by carefully explaining to Bogle that he wanted to discuss the brother’s murder only. Id. Apparently, however, Bogle spontaneously confessed to the murder for which he was being held at the time. Id. The D.C. Circuit determined that the detective had not thought that the two murders were connected, so that the detective would not have foreseen that Bogle might incriminate himself. 325 U.S.App.D.C. at 67, 114 F.3d at 1275. The detective’s questions were not likely to elicit an incriminating response, and, thus, did not constitute interrogation within Miranda’s meaning. Id.
In contrast to our situation, the Bogle court was concerned with questioning about a different and apparently unrelated crime. To the extent that the Bogle court discussed the significance of biographical questions, its views are essentially dicta. As support for its analysis, the Bogle court did reference some cases that involved the narrow “routine booking exception” announced in Pennsylvania v. Muniz, 496 U.S. 582, 110 S.Ct. 2638, 110 L.Ed.2d 528 (1990), but none of the cases cited by Bogle involved fact patterns similar to the instant one.
My reading of Muniz, moreover, reveals little support for treating identification questions as presumptively exempt from Miranda’s concerns. Muniz involved a motorist who was stopped for driving under the influence. 496 U.S. at 585, 110 S.Ct. 2638 (plurality opinion). A central issue before the Muniz Court was whether booking questions about name, address, height, weight, eye color, date of birth, and current age were subject to Miranda’s protections. Id. at 586-87, 110 S.Ct. 2638. There were three views among the justices. One four-justice plurality adopted the routine booking exception “which exempts from Miranda’s coverage questions to secure the biographical data necessary to complete booking or pretrial services.” Id. at 601-02, 110 S.Ct. 2638. The plurality justices rejected the argument, however, that those questions would never constitute custodial interrogation “merely because the questions were not intended to elicit information for investigatory purposes.” Id. Another group of four justices saw no need to invoke a “routine booking exception” because the Mun-iz’ answers were not “testimonial”: The questions did not put Muniz in the position of deciding between the options of lying, remaining silent, or giving incriminating testimony about his name or address, for example. Id. at 608, 110 S.Ct. 2638 (Rehnquist, C.J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). Rather, they simply probed his impaired ability to answer, analogous to a blood alcohol test. Id. These four justices did not comment on whether they would recognize a routine booking exception in a different case. One justice disagreed entirely that there should be any categorical exemption for such biographical questions. Id. at 608, 110 S.Ct. 2638 (Marshall, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). Among these diverse views, however, none even suggests that the questions’ status under Miranda should be analyzed primarily from the standpoint of their subject matter. Rather, each group of justices focused on the context in which the questions were asked.
*287Here, of course, the issue is not whether Mr. Jones was illegally compelled to divulge his name and address. Nor is this even a case in which the suspect’s name or address would likely have given away some incriminating detail. Thus, it seems more appropriate to analyze this case under the rubric of “spontaneous” or “volunteered” statements. If it were indeed clear that Mr. Jones’ statement was not improperly compelled by psychological pressures, it would undoubtedly be admissible. The Supreme Court in Miranda stated that “[vjolunteered statements of any kind are not barred by the Fifth Amendment and their admissibility is not affected by our holding today.” 384 U.S. at 478, 86 S.Ct. 1602; see also Mitchell v. United States, 746 A.2d 877, 890-91 (D.C.2000). All other things equal, courts will deem a nonre-sponsive answer to an officer’s question to be “volunteered” and therefore admissible, notwithstanding a lack of Miranda warnings. For example, the statement “But you didn’t catch me driving” is not responsive to an officer’s request that a suspect undergo field sobriety testing, nor is such a request likely to elicit an incriminating response. State v. Messner, No. 00-1420-CR, 2001 WI App. 146, 630 N.W.2d 275, at ¶¶ 5, 17 (2001) (“[T]he only response an officer could reasonably anticipate ... is ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ ”); see also, e.g., United States v. Castro, 723 F.2d 1527, 1530-31 (11th Cir.1984); United States v. Thomas, 961 F.Supp. 43, 45-46 (W.D.N.Y.1997); cf. State v. Mitchell, 167 Wis.2d 672, 686-90, 482 N.W.2d 364, 369-71 (1992). Thus, if it were not for the larger context, which my colleagues discount as the product of “routine, conventional and altogether appropriate conduct on the part of law enforcement officers,” I would agree that the refusal to suppress Mr. Jones’ statement should be affirmed.
This analytical approach must give way, however, when it becomes apparent that the situation “reflect[s] a measure of compulsion above and beyond that inherent in custody itself.” Rhode Island v. Innis, 446 U.S. 291, 301, 100 S.Ct. 1682, 64 L.Ed.2d 297 (1980). In such a case, it begs the question to observe that the suspect’s answer was nonresponsive. Cf. United States v. Espinal-Cardona, 635 F.Supp. 330, 334-35 (D.N.J.1986). The issue becomes whether the police improperly “us[ed] the coercive nature of confinement to extract [an admission] that would not be given in an unrestrained environment.” Arizona v. Mauro, 481 U.S. 520, 529-30, 107 S.Ct. 1931, 95 L.Ed.2d 458 (1987). “[C]ourts must be alert to the subtle forms that interrogation may assume....” Mitchell, 746 A.2d at 891. “The test for whether police remarks are the functional equivalent of express questioning is an objective one, which ‘focuses primarily upon the perceptions of the suspect, rather than the intent of the police.’ ” Mitchell, 746 A.2d at 891.
Here, Mr. Jones, already in a “panicked” state, was isolated as a result of police instruction to the other two men to go across the street. Mr. Jones was surrounded by several officers. He had just seen one officer pick up the drugs next to his feet, and hold them in his hand. This might be a different case if the officers had asked only for identification and not proceeded to conduct an express interrogation. But they did continue to pose questions while Mr. Jones stood in the street. We may infer from the officers’ further questions that the request for identification signaled the beginning of a conversation to investigate the crime that they had witnessed. Considering the totality of the circumstances, it is difficult to characterize the overall situation as anything other than an inquisitorial session in which Mr. Jones felt compelled to explain himself, and, consequently, made an admission that *288he would not willingly have made under less coercive circumstances. I would conclude that the government has failed to carry its burden of persuasion that Mr. Jones was not being subjected to interrogation before the express questions about the drugs were put to him.
In analyzing this case, I deem it important that the Supreme Court recently observed in Dickerson v. United States that: “Miranda has become embedded in routine police practice to the point where the warnings have become part of our national culture.” 530 U.S. 428, 443, 120 S.Ct. 2326, 147 L.Ed.2d 405 (2000) (reference omitted). Judge Mack also recognizes the quintessential place of Miranda in our jurisprudence. In light of the fundamental importance of Miranda, I am constrained to recognize that the cost to the police of giving the Miranda warnings would have been minimal in this case, as it usually is. I therefore conclude that, in the context of this case, Mr. Jones should have received the Miranda warnings prior to the initiation of identification questioning that signaled the beginning of a conversation to investigate the crime that the police had witnessed. Consequently, I respectfully dissent.

. I believe that the difficulties presented by this case are a function of the state of the record before us rather than of a gap in the controlling law. More than in most cases, close study of this record leaves one with unanswered questions and a sense of frustration.