Court Opinion

ID: 9647227
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 13:27:08.874603+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:57:50.955900
License: Public Domain

BLACKMAR, Judge,
concurring.
With some hesitation, I concur.
Officer Williams is to be commended only for his frankness.1 If he did not threaten the defendant, he certainly tried to scare him by such statements as “if he went to the penitentiary, he would definitely not survive because he was too small, he couldn’t protect himself” and “if he would prefer to remain in Jeff City, that he wouldn’t survive because of his size, age, and looks.” Even in the absence of an express threat or express promise, the defendant well might get the idea that, somehow, he might avoid the penitentiary if he would implicate his companion.
Had the defendant’s incriminating statements followed Williams’ interrogation, it might have been necessary to exclude them as products of coercion. After studying the transcript, however, I am of the opinion that the possibility of taint presents a pure question of fact, and that the trial judge’s findings are permissible under the circumstances. The defendant had at his command two magic phrases as follows: “I want a lawyer” or “I don’t want to answer any more questions.” With either of these he could have stopped all interrogation. The police are entitled to advise him of his rights and to leave it to him to claim these rights. They have no duty to counsel him as to the course of action which is wisest from his own standpoint. Nor is it of any significance that the defendant may be easily influenced or is of passive disposition, if he is properly informed of his rights and is capable of understanding them.
Officer Glynn also stepped close to the line when (by Craven’s testimony) he told the defendant that, if he knew something, he should tell the officers, and that he could only help himself by doing this, and when he told him: “If you’re involved in *918this thing, you need to get it off your chest; you need to tell us about it.” The trial judge well might have found a promise of leniency in these words, but such a finding is not inevitable in the language used, and again we should defer to the finding of the trier of the fact.
The rules for interrogation are simple and should be followed. The officers of the law should not skirt the edges. But I am persuaded that the evidence supports the trial judge’s denial of the motion to suppress, and so concur in the order of retransfer.

. I am repelled by the State’s suggestion that the trial judge did not have to believe the officer’s testimony. Where constitutional duties are involved, the State should normally be bound by the testimony of its own officials responsible in the premises.