Court Opinion

ID: 9693768
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-25 16:59:28.608777+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:19:50.185651
License: Public Domain

*334PAPADAKOS, Justice,
dissenting.
I must respectfully dissent from the continued expansion by my colleagues of the principles set forth in the O’Connell and McFadden cases regarding the obligation of the police to explain to an arrestee that his Miranda warnings and rights do not apply in breathalyzer matters.
In both O’Connell and McFadden, the defendant had been advised of his Miranda rights and the defendant had taken affirmative action to execute those rights. O’Connell asked for a lawyer and McFadden asked to make a telephone call. Thereafter, each refused to take a breathalyzer test and neither was advised that his Miranda rights did apply.
In this case, Appellant never manifested a desire to exercise any of his rights under Miranda. He simply refused to take the breathalyzer test without giving any reason or showing any confusion about anything. Yet, the majority gleans from this vacuum that Appellant was confused. In this vacuum, the majority now demands that the police guess, as they have done, as to the state of mind of the defendant and give him a full course in criminal law.
I read the majority to be laying down a per se rule to the effect that the police, in all cases where Miranda has been given, must explain to the defendant that the Miranda rights do not apply to the imposition of breathalyzer and/or blood testing, whether the defendant stands mute or attempts to exercise any of his rights under Miranda. The rule is now very simple. If Miranda warnings are given before the defendant is directed to take the test, the police must explain that the rights granted under Miranda are not applicable to the imposition of the test, and the police must dispel any manifestation of confusion on the part of the defendant.
NIX, C.J., and McDERMOTT, J., join this dissenting opinion.