Court Opinion

ID: 9720126
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 08:16:56.769286+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:24:13.332818
License: Public Domain

STUART, Justice
(dissenting).
After more “soul searching” than should be necessary in an appellate decision, I reluctantly dissent from the majority opinion. This conclusion was made doubly difficult because the evidence so clearly connects defendant with this most reprehensible crime and because I personally believe there is nothing morally or legally wrong in permitting police officers to use psychology to secure incriminating statements from a defendant without counsel.
Since Miranda v. Arizona (1966), 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, however, the United States Supreme Court has held otherwise and I cannot escape the conclusion that when the totality of the circumstances test is applied to this evidence, accepting the officer’s version of the trip from Davenport, the spirit, if not the letter of Miranda and subsequent decisions has been violated here. I do not believe the state sustained the burden of showing defendant knowingly and intelligently waived his privilege against self incrimination and his right to have counsel present.
I doubt if the majority would have reached this result if defendant’s crime had been less reprehensible. There is a natural tendency to make a tenuous finding of fact to avoid the application of a rule of law in a hard case. It seems to me the rule of law is unsound and that in the long run justice would best be served by applying it in accordance with its spirit and exposing the perverse result of its application.
I accept the statement of the law as set out in division I of the majority opinion, but cannot agree the evidence shows a knowing and intelligent waiver of the constitutional rights referred to therein.
Let us examine the circumstances under which defendant’s incriminating statements were made. Defendant, an escapee from a mental institution with a deeply religious, nature, called his attorney from Davenport. On advice of counsel he agreed to surrender himself to the Davenport police. Counsel advised the Des Moines police of these arrangements. After defendant turned himself in he talked to Mr. McKnight who advised defendant not to talk until he had talked with him. The officer heard that admonishment. The trial court found an agreement was made between defense counsel and police officials that defendant was not to be questioned on the return trip to Des Moines. Defendant was also advised by Mr. Kelly, a Davenport attorney, not to talk until he arrived in Des Moines. Mr. Kelly was denied permission to ride to Des Moines in the police car with defendant.
Captain Learning, of the Des Moines city police, picked defendant up in Davenport. He testified that after he gave defendant the Miranda warnings, he reminded him he was represented by counsel and “that I wanted him to remember this because we would be visiting between here and Des Moines.” He also stated defendant told him several times during the trip: “When I get to Des Moines and see Mr. McKnight I am going to tell you the whole story.”
He also testified: “I did not question Mr. Williams on the ride to Des Moines; * * * that I had considerable conversation with Mr. Williams as to religion and what the people thought of him in Des Moines. * * *
“Well, Mr. Williams was very talkative, and he was asking me who we had talked to that were friends of his, if we talked to the Reverend from the church, if we talked to Mr. John Searcy, if we had checked for *407fingerprints in his room at the YMCA, and we discussed religion. We discussed intelligence of other people. We discussed police procedures, organizing youth groups, singing, playing a piano, playing an organ, and this sort of thing.
“Eventually, as we were traveling along there, I said to Mr. Williams that, ‘I want to give you something to think about while we’re traveling down the road.’ I said, ‘Number one, I want you to observe the weather conditions, it’s raining, it’s sleeting, it’s freezing, driving is very treacherous, visibility is poor, it’s going to be dark early this evening. They are predicting several inches of snow for tonight, and I feel that you yourself are the only person that knows where this little girl’s body is, that you yourself have only been there once, and if you get a snow on top of it you yourself may be unable to find it. And, since we will be going right past the area on the way into Des Moines, I feel that we could stop and locate the body, that the parents of this little girl should be entitled to a Christian burial for the little girl who was snatched away from them on Christmas eve and murdered. And I feel we should stop and locate it on the way in rather than waiting until morning and trying to come back out after a snow storm and possibly not being able to find it at all.’
“At that point Mr. Williams asked me why I should feel that we would be going right by it. I told him that I knew it was somewhere in the Mitchellville area and I didn’t know exactly where, but I did know that it was somewhere in the Mitchellville area, and I felt that we should stop and look.
“I stated further, T do not want you to answer me, I don’t want to discuss it any further. Just think about it as we’re riding down the road.’ * * *
“Well, we had further discussions about people and religion and intelligence and friends of his, and what people’s opinion was of him and so forth. And, oh, some distance still east of the Mitchellville turnoff he said, ‘I am going to show you where the body is.’ He said, ‘How did you know. that it was by Mitchellville?’ I told him that this was just part of our procedure, that this was our job to find out such things and I just knew that it was in that area. * * *
“Q. Now let me ask you this: When you said to him, you say you said to him it’s snowing out here, bad weather, isn’t that what you said to him? A. Yes, sir.
“Q. He didn’t ask you that, did he? A. No.
“Q. Didn’t you say that to him to induce him to show you where the body was? A. I was hoping he would.
“Q. You was hoping he would? A. Yes, sir.
“Q. So you wanted to make it appear to him that it might be harder or impossible to get out there the next day, you told him there was going to come a big snow, didn’t you? A. No, I didn’t tell him there was going to come a big snow. I asked him to observe the weather, observe the visibility, observe it sleeting and it raining and they’re predicting snow for tonight.
“Q. And that was for the purpose of inducing him to talk, wasn’t it? A. Telling the truth.
“Q. Well, I said, wasn’t that for the purpose of getting Mr. Williams to talk? A. Well, I was hoping he would tell me where the body was, Mr. McKnight, absolutely. * * *
“Q. In fact, Captain, whether he was a mental patient or not, you were trying to get all the information you could before he got to his lawyer, weren’t you? A. I was sure hoping to find out where that little girl was, yes, sir. * * *
“Q. Well, I’ll put it this way: You was hoping to get all the information you could before Williams got back to McKnight, weren’t you ? A. Yes, sir.”
*408It seems to me the only reasonable conclusion is that Captain Learning embarked on a psychological campaign to obtain as much information from this mentally weak defendant as possible before letting him talk to his counsel. The fact that he was able to get the information by implanting ideas in defendant’s mind without direct questioning is unimportant. If it were not for the agreement made with defendant’s counsel, I personally would have no objection to this technique. However, I believe the law to be otherwise. There was no claim of verbal waiver of counsel. I do not think it was shown by the totality of the circumstances.
The aspect of the case which gives me the most concern was the obvious effort of the police officers to evade the good faith attempt of defendant’s counsel to cooperate with the police department. While I can understand and sympathize with Captain Learning’s desire to recover the little girl’s body as soon as possible, actions like those taken here can only cause defense counsel to lose confidence in the trustworthiness of police officers and discourage reasonable and sound approaches to criminal practice.
In my opinion the majority position in State v. Hancock (1969, Iowa), 164 N.W. 2d 330, 337, has more application to this case than the majority is willing to concede. There defendant’s counsel agreed to a polygraph test and its admissibility into evidence. Defendant signed a waiver of her constitutional rights in the presence of the operator. After the test was completed defendant under the urging of the operator made certain admissions. A majority of the court in a brief concurring opinion held the state overreached defendant in offering the testimony as to admissions made after the test. The Miranda waiver was not proper because it was taken in the absence of defendant’s attorney after a limited stipulation for a different specific purpose.
I would not favor a rule which would make it impossible for a defendant to waive his constitutional rights in counsel’s absence, but when counsel and police have agreed defendant is not to be questioned until counsel is present and defendant has been advised not to talk and repeatedly has stated he will tell the whole story after he talks with counsel, the state should be required to make a stronger showing of intentional voluntary waiver than was made here.
I would agree with the statement in State v. Johns (1970), 185 Neb. 590, 177 N.W.2d 580, 584-585:
“We hold that where the police or prosecutors know that a defendant, formally charged with a felony, is represented by counsel who has requested that no statements be taken from the defendant; and where the defendant, after being advised of his Miranda rights, has unequivocally asked for his attorney; statements deliberately elicited from the defendant by custodial interrogation designed to produce incriminating statements, and undertaken before the defendant has been given an opportunity to consult with his lawyer, are inadmissible, in the absence of an effective waiver.
“Where both the defendant and his counsel have previously attempted to invoke the defendants’ constitutional right to counsel; then at the very least, a ‘heavy burden’ rests on the state to demonstrate that the defendant knowingly and intelligently waived his right to counsel. On the facts in this case, that burden was not met.”
I believe this case must be reversed under the law as it now stands in the decisions of the United States Supreme Court.