Court Opinion

ID: 9444627
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-03 21:06:54.114941+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:29:56.471808
License: Public Domain

CLARK, Chief Judge
(concurring in the result).
Since the coercion here was so much more direct and extensive than that in Leyra v. Denno, 347 U.S. 556, 74 S.Ct. 716, 98 L.Ed. 948, I agree that we must reverse on the authority of that case. But however much I support in the abstract the severe criticisms of police methods voiced in the opinion, I do not believe it helpful so to stress them here in derogation of a great state court which has the primary responsibility for law administration in this community. Since no court really rejects altogether evidence by way of confession or from the informer, the question becomes one of degree; and I can respect the views of the state judges as rationally developed, even though I must disagree. Nor do I have basis for selectivity among law enforcement agencies or among forms of crimes in reaching the result or apportioning criticism. Therefore I prefer to limit myself to the facts here and eschew the more general admonitions.
I am led more readily to this caution because I doubt the utility for dignified or effective law enforcement of review and overturn by any federal judge of the reasoned conclusions reached by a whole hierarchy of state tribunals. We are properly charged with supervising the trials in the federal district courts, but our sphere of superintendence should not extend to state police activities; there the state courts should have the burden, subject only to certiorari by the Supreme Court in the few cases where needed. Consequently the pending legislation to that end, drafted by a committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States and supported by the Conference of State Chief Justices, seems wise policy. Meanwhile, however, our duty in premises such as these is clear, and needs no particular amplification or embroidery.