Court Opinion

ID: 9450578
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 16:52:14.463362+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:22.929185
License: Public Domain

BAZELON, Chief Judge
(concurring, in part and dissenting in part):
Appellant was arrested just past midnight, October 5, 1963, moments after a nearby Western Union office had been robbed. The arresting officer at once took appellant -to the office where appellant was positively identified by one of the robbery victims. Appellant was then taken to the Third Precinct Police Station. “The next step in the proceeding is to arraign the arrested person before a judicial officer as quickly as possible * * Mallory v. United States, 354 U.S. 449, 454, 77 S.Ct. 1356, 1359, 1 L. Ed.2d 1479 (1957). But appellant was not taken before a committing magistrate until about 11:30 a. m., more than eleven hours after his arrest; earlier, at 8:30 a. m., appellant was placed in a police line-up, where Detective Evanoff saw him. Evanoff took appellant from the line-up because he suspected that appellant might be implicated in a paint store robbery which had taken place a month earlier. Evanoff questioned appellant from about 8:45 to 9:30. At about 9:00, appellant confessed to Evanoff that he had robbed the paint store. Appellant remained at Evanoff’s desk while the latter transcribed the confession. At about 9:20, Mr. Kuck, the paint store robbery victim, arrived at the police station in response to a telephone call from Evanoff. Appellant had been told by Ev-anoff that Kuck was coming to the station, and when Kuck did arrive appellant recognized him. According to Evan-off’s testimony, “The defendant said, There is the man now'. I turned around and there was Mr. Kuck * * *. I then motioned Mr. Kuck forward and the defendant said he would like to talk to him and I allowed him to talk to Mr. Kuck.” As Kuck walked toward Evanoff’s desk, appellant stood and “put out his hand and apologized * * * ” for shooting during the paint store robbery.
The confession to Evanoff was obtained in violation of Rule 5(a), Fed.R.Crim.P. Detective Evanoff testified that his questioning of appellant did not “interfere with [appellant’s] progress” in being presented to a Commissioner since appellant was not scheduled to be arraigned until 9:30. But, whether or not Evanoff’s questioning took place during “unnecessary delay” in taking appellant before a magistrate, “[t]here always remains the question whether the time was utilized to obtain a confession by secret police interrogation after arrest and prior to a magistrate’s hearing. For a confession so obtained * * * is not admissible under Mallory.” Spriggs v. United States, 118 U.S.App.D.C. 248, 251, 335 F.2d 283, 286 (1964).
*293The Government did' not offer in evidence the confession to Evanoff. Testimony was admitted, however, regarding appellant’s apology to Kuck. The court assumes arguendo that the confession was inadmissible but holds that the apology was sufficiently distinguishable to be free of any “taint of primary illegality.” I disagree. In determining; that appellant’s apology was not the product of police “exploitation” the court has ignored the possible effects on appellant of his over-night imprisonment, the morning line-up, the questioning by Evanoff and the fact that such questioning produced a confession moments before the apology to Kuck. The court also disregards the fact that no event intervened — no warning by a judicial officer, no advice of counsel, not even “time for deliberate reflection”1 2 — between appellant’s confession to Evanoff and apology to Kuck. We stated in Spriggs v. United States, “In the varying circumstances affecting different persons, with differences in their experience, education and other individual- attributes, it is impossible to measure accurately the pressures in a Police Station upon prisoners under secret interrogation without counsel, relative or friend.” 118 U.S.App.D.C. at 250, 335 F.2d at 285. The confession to Evanoff and the apology to Kuck “were simply parts of one continuous process.” Leyra v.Denno, 347 U.S. 556, 561, 74 S.Ct. 716, 719, 98 L.Ed. 948 (1954). To admit testimony regarding the apology “obtained * * * so soon after the illegally procured and inadmissible confessions” would defeat the purpose of Mallory. Killough v. United States, 114 U.S.App.D.C. 305, 308, 315 F.2d 241, 244 (1962) (en banc).2
The court’s holding is inconsistent with Ricks v. United States, 118 U.S.App.D.C. 216, 334 F.2d 964 (1964). In that case, defendant had been in police custody for three hours, had admitted one offense and apologized to the victim, and had been told by police that they had evidence incriminating him in a second offense so that he “might as well tell the truth.” To this injunction “Ricks said nothing, but a few moments later he passed [the second victim’s] son-in-law in the corridor and said, ‘You’re the man that chased me out of the house when the woman on the second floor screamed.’ ” 118 U.S. App.D.C. at 218, 334 F.2d at 966. This statement as well as the prior confession and apology were excluded on Mallory grounds. The detention, confession and confrontation with a victim in Ricks closely parallel the circumstances here. The apology to Kuck is no more “a spontaneous, unsolicited and unexpected comment addressed only to a victim” — as characterized by the majority — than the excluded statement in Ricks 3
I concur in the affirmance of. No. 18496 involving the Western Union robbery.

. Jackson v. United States, 106 U.S.App.D.C. 396, 398, 273 F.2d 521, 523 (1959).. See Goldsmith v. United States, 107 U.S.App.D.C. 305, 277 F.2d 335, cert. denied, 364 U.S. 863, 81 S.Ct. 106, 5 L. Ed.2d 86 (1960); Killough v. United States, 114 U.S.App.D.C. 305, 315 F.2d 241 (1962) (en banc).

. The court suggests that apologies reaffirming inadmissible confessions should be governed by standards different from —and apparently more permissive than— those applying to reaffirming confessions. 1 see no meaningful distinction which would justify different standards.

. The court holds that the admissibility of the apology does not depend on the legality of the questioning. Since the questioning was so immediately connected with the line-up, it would follow that the admissibility of the apology also would not depend'on the legality of the line-up. Thus the court’s consideration of the liné-up is unnecessary and its decision rests solely on. the ground that the apology was a “spontaneous, unsolicited and unexpected comment addressed only to a victim.”