Court Opinion

ID: 9537098
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:12:30.513634+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:56:01.771331
License: Public Domain

Utter, J.
(dissenting) — The majority’s judgment rests on its determination, devoid of support in the record, that the appellants were not placed under arrest where they were stopped, but were “simply directed or requested ... to accompany [the officers ] . . . 3 miles south ... to which request [they] acceded.” To draw this conclusion the majority must review the record de novo, overturn a finding of fact made by the trial court and never challenged by the State, and ignore the only testimony there was on the subject of the arrest, that of the arresting officer. Its unprecedented refusal to defer to the trial court’s findings in order to justify a restriction of constitutional privileges is explained through citation of a doctrine designed to insure those privileges against abuse. Its reliance on a reassessment of the facts in this manner obscures the central issues raised by this appeal. I thus cannot join either in the approach the majority takes to this case or the result it reaches.
The court that tried appellants found, as a matter of fact, that they “were arrested on Lummi Shore Drive . . .” This finding, drawn from an assessment of live testimony we have not heard and undisputed by the parties at all stages of this litigation, should be upheld if based on substantial evidence. Boise Cascade Corp. v. Pierce County, 84 Wn.2d 667, 529 P.2d 9 (1974); State v. Smith, 84 Wn.2d 498, 527 P.2d 674 (1974); State v. Chapman, 84 Wn.2d 373, 526 P.2d 64 (1974); House v. Erwin, 83 Wn.2d 898, 524 P.2d 911 (1974).
*792The majority’s statement that the facts here should be reviewed de novo because constitutional rights are at stake turns the rule of Haynes v. Washington, 373 U.S. 503, 10 L. Ed. 2d 513, 83 S. Ct. 1336 (1963) on its head. Appellate courts’ careful scrutiny of the record in constitutional cases is necessary to insure “that constitutional privileges have not been abused” (State v. Hoffman, 64 Wn.2d 445, 451, 392 P.2d 237 (1964)), not to guard against the unwarranted protection of them. But even if an extraordinary standard of appellate review were appropriate here, the majority’s reversal of the trial court would be incorrect, for all of the evidence in the record supports the conclusion that the appellants were arrested when and where they were stopped.
Sergeant Franklin, the arresting officer and the only witness who testified on the subject of the arrest, acknowledged that he “told” the defendants to come with him to the scene of the suspected burglary. He said that “[t]hey were brought back,” that he “returned them to the scene.” When pressed by defense counsel for more detail, he made clear exactly what appellants’ situation was when they were told to follow him:
Q. Now, at the time you stopped Mr. Byers, he was not free to say, “Thank you, Sergeant Franklin” and leave, was he? A. No. Q. He was under arrest at that time? A. Yes.
I am completely baffled by the majority’s statement that the “record reveals” that the appellants were given a “request” to accompany the officers and “acceded” to that request. The above-quoted testimony constitutes everything in the record of this case which in any way describes the circumstances under which appellants were returned to the scene of the burglary. There is no hint in it that anything short of a full-fledged arrest accounts for their failure to continue on their way after being questioned by the officers. Nor can I understand the characterization of Sergeant Franklin’s statement as an expression of what he “subjectively considered” the situation to be. The sergeant *793said appellants were not free to go; presumably he meant that he would have stopped them, by force if necessary, if they had tried. This was a statement of fact, not opinion, as is underscored by the fact that at the time Deputy Eherenfieldt had his car pulled in front of appellants “so they could not leave.”
There is no basis on which calling the events here anything other than an arrest can be justified. Certainly the appellants’ status was not altered by the fact that they did not test the officers’ resolve by attempting to escape and being subdued.
A person is restrained or imprisoned when he is deprived of either liberty of movement or freedom to remain in the place of his lawful choice; and such restraint or imprisonment may be accomplished by physcial force alone, or by threat of force, or by conduct reasonably implying that force will be used.
Kilcup v. McManus, 64 Wn.2d 771, 777, 394 P.2d 375 (1964). Nor does the fact that appellants were not formally “advised” that they were under arrest change what their circumstance was and what they knew it to be. Henry v. United States, 361 U.S. 98, 4 L. Ed. 2d 134, 80 S. Ct. 168 (1959); United States v. Strickler, 490 F.2d 378 (9th Cir. 1974); Jackson v. United States, 408 F.2d 1165, 1169 (8th Cir. 1969); State v. Sullivan, 65 Wn.2d 47, 395 P.2d 745 (1964); Seattle v. Sage, 11 Wn. App. 481, 523 P.2d 942 (1974). Even if it were shown that Sergeant Franklin’s statements to appellants were couched in terms amounting to a “request,” the coercion implicit in the situation appellants confronted would compel us to hold they were arrested. See United States v. Guana-Sanchez, 484 F.2d 590 (7th Cir. 1973) (defendant “invited” to follow officers’ car in his); United States v. Jones, 352 F. Supp. 369 (S.D. Ga. 1972), aff’d, 481 F.2d 1402 (5th Cir. 1973) (defendant “asked” to get in police car); Commonwealth v. Richards, ............ Pa. ............, 327 A.2d 63 (1974) (defendant “asked” to go to police headquarters).
*794Under any established test, appellants were under arrest from the moment they were not, and knew they were not, free to go. United States v. See, 505 F.2d 845, 855 (9th Cir. 1974). “When the officers interrupted the two men and restricted their liberty of movement, the arrest, for purposes of this case, was complete.” Henry v. United States, supra at 103. When they went further and forced the defendants and their companions to drive 3 miles and wait there while the reported incident was investigated, the fact of arrest was placed beyond question. United States v. Selby, 407 F.2d 241 (9th Cir. 1969); cf. Plazola v. United States, 291 F.2d 56, 60 (9th Cir. 1961):
[TJhere can be no doubt that when a car is stopped, the occupant required to get out, then required to leave his vehicle to get into an officer’s car and be transported to another spot located two miles away . . . being required to await a search of another’s vehicle . . . his liberty of movement has been sufficiently restricted to constitute an arrest.
The constitutional significance of appellants’ arrest cannot be altered by relabeling it an “investigative detention.”
“Nothing is more clear than that the Fourth Amendment was meant to prevent wholesale intrusions upon the personal security of our citizenry, whether these intrusions be termed ‘arrests’ or ‘investigatory detentions.’ ”
Cupp v. Murphy, 412 U.S. 291, 294, 36 L. Ed. 2d 900, 93 S. Ct. 2000 (1973), quoting Davis v. Mississippi, 394 U.S. 721, 726-27, 22 L. Ed. 2d 676, 89 S. Ct. 1394 (1969). The rule of Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 32 L. Ed. 2d 612, 92 S. Ct. 1921 (1972) and Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 20 L. Ed. 2d 889, 88 S. Ct. 1868 (1968), that momentary “stops” can be made without full probable cause, simply has no application in the situation presented here. The cases cited by the majority provide no basis for extending the limited holding of Terry to a full-scale and prolonged seizure such as appellants were subjected to in this case. Three of them involved stops which, like those in Terry and Adams, lasted no more than a few moments. See Gaines v. Craven, 448 F.2d 1236 *795(9th Cir. 1971) and People v. Gaines, 265 Cal. App. 2d 642, 644, 71 Cal. Rptr. 468 (1st Dist. 1968); United States v. Brown, 436 F.2d 702, 703-04 (9th Cir. 1970); Gilbert v. United States, 366 F.2d 923, 928 (9th Cir. 1966). The fourth, United States v. Richards, 500 F.2d 1025, 1029 (9th Cir. 1974), upheld a stop which lasted almost as long as that in the case at bar, but which was found justified — by a divided court — only because of the time needed to investigate the evasive and implausible answers the arrestees gave to police questions. Many other cases which did not involve such special circumstances and thus more closely resemble this one, have held that detention of such scope and duration amounts to arrest and thus cannot be permitted absent full preexisting probable cause. See, e.g., Henry v. United States, supra (stop of car on street restricting freedom to leave — held, arrest); United States v. McDevitt, 508 F.2d 8 (10th Cir. 1974) (defendant “requested” to get in police car and not told he was free to go for 20 minutes — held, arrested) ; United States v. Johnson, 495 F.2d 378 (4th Cir.), cert. denied, 419 U.S. 860 (1974) (defendants “escorted” by agents to room for questioning — held, arrested); United States v. Murray, 492 F.2d 178 (9th Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 419 U.S. 942 (1974) (defendant moved 50 yards by policeman who testified he was not free to leave — held, arrested) ; United States v. Guana-Sanchez, supra (defendant “invited” to follow police car to station — held, arrested); In re Winkle, 372 Mich. 292, 125 N.W.2d 875 (1964), cert. denied, 379 U.S. 645 (1965) (car stopped by two police cars with sirens and lights going — held, arrest); State v. Sullivan, 65 Wn.2d 47, 395 P.2d 745 (1964) (car stopped by policeman who testified he intended to arrest occupant— held, arrest) ,1
*796I thus find it impossible to escape the conclusion that appellants were “arrested” in the constitutional sense. The lawfulness of their arrest and the admissibility of its fruits therefore turns on the question that is central to the legality of any arrest: whether there was probable cause to justify it at the time it occurred. Probable cause to arrest for a crime, like this one, committed outside the presence of the arresting officer,2 requires a reasonable belief that the *797person arrested has committed an offense. RCW 10.31.100; Giordenello v. United States, 357 U.S. 480, 485, 2 L. Ed. 2d 1503, 78 S. Ct. 1245 (1958); Cerny v. Smith, 84 Wn.2d 59, 524 P.2d 230 (1974); Kilcup v. McManus, 64 Wn.2d 771, 777, 394 P.2d 375 (1964). That is, the arresting officer must have reason to believe two things: that an offense has been committed (Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 96, 13 L. Ed. 2d 142, 85 S. Ct. 223 (1964); Kalkanes v. Willestoft, 13 Wn.2d 127, 124 P.2d 219 (1942)), and that the person to be arrested is the person who committed it (Hill v. California, 401 U.S. 797, 28 L. Ed. 2d 484, 91 S. Ct. 1106 (1971); Whiteley v. Warden, 401 U.S. 560, 568, 28 L. Ed. 2d 306, 91 S. Ct. 1031 (1971); State v. Todd, 78 Wn.2d 362, 474 P.2d 542 (1970)). To hold the arrest of the appellants lawful, then, it would be necessary that Sergeant Franklin and Deputy Eherenfieldt had reasonable grounds, when they ordered appellants to return with them to the scene of the burglary, to believe that a felony or serious misdemeanor had been committed there and that appellants had committed it. The record does not show that the two officers had sufficient reason to believe either of these things.
The few bits of information available when they arrested the appellants fell far short of giving the officers adequate cause to believe a felony had been committed. Deputy Eherenfieldt admitted this in his testimony: when asked whether he had, at that time, “any evidence that a break-in had actually occurred,” he said “not to my knowledge.” Sergeant Franklin, on the other hand, testified he was “sure that a burglary had occurred.” The foundation of his certainty, however, does not appear in the record. The sergeant knew only what the deputy knew: that an unknown caller had reported hearing the sound of breaking glass at an unoccupied house and seeing a person nearby and an automobile leave the scene. This knowledge hardly forced the conclusion that a burglary had taken place. Without *798knowing who the caller was, without an opportunity to inquire as to exactly what he heard and saw, any fixed belief that Sergeant Franklin had that there had been a burglary or criminal break-in, was something less than reasonable. Cf. State v. Lesnick, 84 Wn.2d 940, 530 P.2d 243 (1975).
Even less strong were the indications' the officers had that, if a crime had been committed, appellants and their companions had committed it. All that they knew was that a car had been reported leaving the scene of the suspected crime,3 on the same road and in the same direction that, 3 miles away, appellants’ car was later seen traveling. This may well, as the trial court held, have justified stopping appellants’ car; but it fell far short of providing an adequate basis for an arrest. The investigation and questioning of the car’s occupants at the scene of the stop provided nothing to augment the grounds for suspecting they had been involved in a burglary. Sergeant Franklin testified that the presence of liquor added to his suspicions, but at that time neither he nor anyone else knew that liquor had been taken in the break-in. Indeed, as the trial court noted, the presence in the car of some liquor and two young couples should have, if anything, allayed any suspicion that arose from its being on the road so late at night.
The record in this case compels me to agree with the trial court that the arrest here was unfounded and illegal. The answers to remaining questions on this appeal, those primarily dealt with in both the State’s and the appellants’ *799arguments, follow hard upon this conclusion, as the confessions did upon the arrest. The physical evidence seized from appellants linking them with the burglary and the statements they made confessing it, the only bases on which their convictions could stand, were obtained only as a result of their arrest. By any existing rule of law, both the evidence and the confessions were therefore infected with its illegality and should have been suppressed. Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 9 L. Ed. 2d 441, 83 S. Ct. 407 (1963); McNear v. Rhay, 65 Wn.2d 530, 398 P.2d 732 (1965). The trial court so ruled as to the physical evidence, but not as to their confessions, which it held untainted because “voluntary.”
In focusing on the “voluntariness” of appellants’ confessions, the trial court misconceived the issue before it. Voluntariness is a test of the admissibility of a confession under the common-law prohibition of compulsory self-incrimination. State v. McCullum, 18 Wash. 394, 51 P. 1044 (1897); 3 J. Wigmore, Evidence § 826 (Chadbourne rev. 1970). Its federal constitutional relevance is to the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments. See, e.g., Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U.S. 568, 6 L. Ed. 2d 1037, 81 S. Ct. 1860 (1961); Bram v. United States, 168 U.S. 532, 42 L. Ed. 568, 18 S. Ct. 183 (1897). It does not affect the issue here, the Fourth Amendment question of whether a confession is a “fruit of the poisonous tree” rooted in an arrest made without probable cause. Wong Sun v. United States, supra at 488.4 Whether or not they were “voluntary,” appellants’ *800confessions were clearly born of their arrest, and therefore must fall with it.
The basic link between the appellants’ arrest and their confessions inheres in the simple fact that, but for the one the other could not have been obtained. The very presence of appellants in police custody to make their statements was made possible only through the device of illegally arresting them. Under such circumstances, the Fourth Amendment forbids that their confessions be admitted. Wong Sun v. United States, supra at 485; Hale v. Henderson, 485 F.2d 266 (6th Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 415 U.S. 930 (1974); United States v. Burhannon, 388 F.2d 961 (7th Cir. 1968); Collins v. Beto, 348 F.2d 823 (5th Cir. 1965). If an arrest is illegal, a confession following it is admissible only if obtained . . by means sufficiently distinguishable to be purged of the primary taint’ ” rather than “c. . . by the exploitation of that illegality’ ” (Wong Sun v. United States, supra at 488), such as when a significant intervening event5 or a considerable lapse of time6 sepa*801rates the two. Wong Sun v. United States, supra at 485-91; United States v. Owen, 492 F.2d 1100, 1107 (5th Cir. 1974); United States ex rel. Gockley v. Myers, 450 F.2d 232, 236 (3d Cir. 1971), cert. denied, 404 U.S. 1063 (1972). Here, however, the causal chain is short and unbroken. There was no great lapse of time or noteworthy intervening event between the seizure and the statements, but only a short, continuous period of investigation and interrogation. There can thus be no basis for segregating the two, no justification for upholding the one while denouncing the other.
The second medium through which appellants’ confessions were linked to and infected by their illegal arrest was their knowledge of the evidence against them seized incident to it. The appellants testified that they confessed because they “thought we were had” since “[t]he evidence was there.” They confessed after watching the police gather evidence against them for almost 2 hours, and immediately upon being told that their female companions had made statements to the police.7 The State has offered no alternative explanation for their action and has not met its burden of proving that the confessions were not produced by confronting appellants with the illegally seized evidence. United States v. Falley, 489 F.2d 33, 41 (2d Cir. 1973); People v. Johnson, 70 Cal. 2d 541, 555, 450 P.2d 865, 75 Cal. Rptr. 401, cert. denied, 395 U.S. 969 (1969). The illegality of the seizure of this evidence, which must be taken to have in turn produced appellants’ confessions, would therefore preclude their admission even if the illegality of the arrest which preceded them did not.8
*802Through either of two channels, then, the seized evidence or the very presence of appellants, the illegality of appellants’ arrests tainted their subsequent confessions. The majority does not deny that the taint extends so far, the sole argument by which the State and the courts below have sought to justify admission of the confessions. Instead it attempts to deny that the taint exists at all, by claiming that the arrests never took place. Clearly they did, and appellants’ confessions followed from them. The statements therefore should have been excluded and the convictions should be reversed.
The majority would have it that such a holding would declare unlawful a model of proper police behavior, and make the conduct of criminal investigations unduly difficult if not impossible. But this arrest and holding of four persons, two of them innocent, on the simple basis of their presence on a public highway, reportedly the route taken by possible burglars, hardly amounts to ideal police work. Here this precipitant action was no more necessary than it was proper. Having justifiably stopped appellants’ car, taken their identification and ascertained their local residence, the officers were possessed of a lead which almost certainly would have enabled them to trace the burglary to them without prematurely taking them into custody. Allowing appellants to return home — after noting their presence and the visible fact of the liquor they had in the car — would hardly have jeopardized the case against them, as illegally arresting them did. Later — when it was ascertained that a burglary had, in fact, occurred, that appellants’ car was the only one on the road, and that liquor was what was taken in the burglary — the occupants of the car could have been contacted and confronted with virtually *803the same damning evidence and information against them that was used here, without the taint of illegality.
I thus find no escape from the conclusion, applying established law to undisputed facts, that the arrest of appellants was improper and illegal, and that consequently the admission of their confessions violated the Fourth Amendment. Relabeling of the events or rebalancing of the interests involved cannot change that fact. Their convictions should therefore be reversed. I dissent.
Stafford, C.J., and Rosellini and Horowitz, JJ., concur with Utter, J.
Petition for rehearing granted January 21, 1976.

See also United States v. See, 505 F.2d 845 (9th Cir. 1974) (defendants told not to leave, to move 200 yards to sheriff’s office — held, arrested); Jackson v. United States, 408 F.2d 1165 (8th Cir. 1969) (defendant confronted, told to stop when he tried to move — held, arrested); United States v. Selby, 407 F.2d 241 (9th Cir. 1969) (defendants escorted by police to border to “sign some papers” — held, arrested) ; Moran v. United States, 404 F.2d 663 (10th Cir. 1968) (defend*796ant approached, told not to move — held, arrested); United States v. Williams, 351 F.2d 475 (6th Cir. 1965) (defendant “asked ... to accompany [officers] to bathroom” — held, arrested); United States v. Boston, 330 F.2d 937 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 377 U.S. 1004 (1964) (police approached defendant, showed badges, asked him to disclose contents of box — held, arrested); United States v. Jones, 352 F. Supp. 369 (S.D. Ga. 1972), aff’d, 481 F.2d 1402 (5th Cir. 1973) (defendant “asked” to get into police car — held, arrested); State v. Edwards, 111 Ariz. 357, 529 P.2d 1174 (1974) (car stopped on street, not free to leave —held, arrest); Strong v. State, 231 Ga. 514, 202 S.E.2d 428 (1973) (defendant moved from scene of accident by policeman — held, arrested); State v. Delmondo, 54 Hawaii 552, 512 P.2d 551 (1973) (defendant moved across room, made to stand by wall — held, arrested); Commonwealth v. Richards, ........ Pa. ........, 327 A.2d 63 (1974) (defendant “asked” to go with police to station — -held, arrested); Hardinge v. State, 500 S.W.2d 870 (Tex. Crim. App. 1973) (defendant told he could not leave police car, though he was not under arrest — held, arrested).

The majority seems to suggest that the arrest of appellants and their companions might be validated because three of them were underage and there was liquor in their vehicle. Understandably, it does not rely on this proposition, however. Neither of the arresting officers ever claimed that they acted on the basis of a suspected violation of the Alcoholic Beverages Control Act. Sergeant Franklin stated clearly that he “felt that a burglary had occurred and that possibly one or all of the subjects in the vehicle were involved and that is why I returned them to the scene.” (Italics mine.) An arrest is valid only if the arresting officer actually believes there are grounds for it, and if he has a reasonable basis for that belief. Reese v. Seattle, 81 Wn.2d 374, 381, 503 P.2d 64 (1972); State v. Todd, 78 Wn.2d 362, 365, 474 P.2d 542 (1970); State v. Hughlett, 124 Wash. 366, 368, 214 P. 841 (1923). The arresting officers here did not claim that they believed that an alcohol-related misdemeanor was being committed in their presence, and this court cannot simply ascribe that belief to them. Further, the record here does not unequivocally indicate that reasonable grounds existed to support such a belief. The record is unclear as to when the fact that at least one of the bottles of liquor was open became known to the officers, and it does not show whether the liquor was in the .actual or *797constructive possession of any of the minor passengers in the vehicle, rather than simply in close proximity to them. Cf. State v. Callahan, 77 Wn.2d 27, 459 P.2d 400 (1969).

The evidence is conflicting on whether, as the majority claims, the officers were informed that the car - leaving the scene of the reported incident had a loud exhaust, before they arrested appellants. Sergeant Franklin testified that they were so informed, but Deputy Eherenfieldt said he believed they were not. The police dispatcher agreed with Sergeant Franklin’s claim, but Mr. Ellis, the person who reported the incident to the dispatcher, said that he did not mention the loud exhaust when he called. Sergeant Franklin’s recollection is subject to some doubt, too, as he misremembered that he had also been told that the departing vehicle had no license plate light, though both the dispatcher and Mr. Ellis :said that no such information had been conveyed to him.

In State v. Carpenter, 63 Wn.2d 577, 388 P.2d 537 (1964) and State v. Keating, 61 Wn.2d 452, 378 P.2d 703 (1963), this court upheld convictions based on confessions which immediately followed illegal arrests on the grounds that they were “voluntary.” Though Carpenter and Keating postdated Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 9 L. Ed. 2d 441, 83 S. Ct. 407 (1963), unaccountably neither decision cited or mentioned it or in any way justified their clear departure from the controlling federal rule. See Note, 39 Wash. L. Rev. 185, 190 n.24 (1964). Perhaps the inconsistency stemmed from lingering confusion over the extent to which federal Fourth Amendment law had been extended to the states by Ker v. California, 374 U.S. 23, 33, 10 L. Ed. 2d 726, 83 S. Ct. 1623 (1963). But whatever the reason for this oversight *800there can be no doubt now that the holding of Wong Sun, like other Fourth Amendment decisional law, applies to state action to the same extent it does federal. Johnson v. Louisiana, 406 U.S. 356, 365, 32 L. Ed. 2d 152, 92 S. Ct. 1620 (1972); Traub v. Connecticut, 374 U.S. 493, 10 L. Ed. 2d 1048, 83 S. Ct. 1899 (1963); State v. Traub, 151 Conn. 246, 248, 196 A.2d 755 (1963). We are therefore bound to follow it here.

See, e.g., Wong Sun v. United States, supra at 491 (defendant released on own recognizance between arrest and confession); United States v. Owen, 492 F.2d 1100 (5th Cir. 1974) (defendant released on bail, returned voluntarily to give statement); Commonwealth ex rel. Craig v. Maroney, 348 F.2d 22 (3d Cir. 1965) (defendant spoke with attorney before confession); State v. Vangen, 72 Wn.2d 548, 433 P.2d 691 (1967) (defendant confronted with legally seized evidence against him after refusing to confess); cf. Johnson v. Louisiana, 406 U.S. 356, 365, 32 L. Ed. 2d 152, 92 S. Ct. 1620 (1972) (defendant arraigned between arrest and lineup).

See, e.g., Wong Sun v. United States, supra at 491 (“several days”); United States v. Owen, supra (4 days); United States v. Cassity, 471 F.2d 317 (6th Cir. 1972) (26 days); State v. Traub, 151 Conn. 246, 196 A.2d 755 (1963) (3 days); State v. Vangen, 72 Wn.2d 548, 433 P.2d 691 (1967) (24 hours); but see Hale v. Henderson, 485 F.2d 266 (6th Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 415 U.S. 930 (1974) (42-hour interval, confession suppressed); Collins v. Beto, 348 F.2d 823 (5th Cir. 1965) (36-hour interval, confession suppressed).

The young women’s statements did not, in fact, implicate appellants, but the interrogating officers apparently suggested to them that they did. The statements were, like the physical evidence taken from the car, evidence against appellants seized in violation of their Fourth Amendment rights and inadmissible against them. United States v. Beasley, 485 F.2d 60, 64 (10th Cir. 1973), cert. denied, 416 U.S. 941 (1974) (dictum); United States v. Guana-Sanchez, 484 F.2d 590 (7th Cir. 1973); United States v. Mallides, 473 F.2d 859 (9th Cir. 1973).

Like the question of the taint running from the arrest to the confessions following therefrom, the impact of the confrontation of the *802appellants with illegally seized evidence is not affected by the “voluntariness” of their decision to confess. United States v. Basurto, 497 F.2d 781, 790-91 (9th Cir. 1974); McCloud v. Bounds, 474 F.2d 968, 970 (4th Cir. 1973); People v. Johnson, 70 Cal. 2d 541, 552, 450 P.2d 865, 75 Cal. Rptr. 401, cert. denied, 395 U.S. 969 (1969); McNear v. Rhay, 65 Wn.2d 530, 535, 398 P.2d 732 (1965).