Court Opinion

ID: 9755739
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 20:49:08.752378+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:10.590407
License: Public Domain

STEIN, J.,
concurring.
I concur in the judgment of the Court. I write separately to advance a related but distinct basis for the requirement that the police inform a suspect of the presence or availability of “an attorney when the suspect’s family or friends have retained the attorney or where the attorney has represented or is representing the suspect on another matter * * * and the attorney has communicated a desire to confer with the suspect * * Ante at 262, 627 A.2d at 643. In my view, if the police withhold from the suspect information that a retained attorney is present and available, the suspect’s subsequent waiver of the privilege against self-incrimination, absent special circumstances, would be invalid. Without the suspect being informed of the attorney’s presence and availability, the waiver of the privilege ordinarily could not satisfy the requirement that a waiver be knowingly and intelligently exercised.
I
To be valid, a waiver of the right to counsel during a custodial interrogation must be voluntary, knowing, and intelligent. State v. Hartley, 103 N.J. 252, 260, 511 A.2d 80 (1986). The validity of the waiver depends on “the particular facts and circumstances surrounding [the] case, including the background, experience, and conduct of the accused.” Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 464, 58 S.Ct. 1019, 1023, 82 L.Ed. 1461, 1466 (1938). The totality of the circumstances must demonstrate that the waiver was made “with a full awareness both of the nature of the right being abandoned and the consequences of the decision to abandon it.” Moran v. *271Burbine, 475 U.S. 412, 421, 106 S.Ct. 1135, 1141, 89 L.Ed.2d 410, 421 (1986).
As the majority notes, ante at 247, 627 A.2d at 635, the United States Supreme Court in Moran, supra, held that a suspect’s waiver was valid even though the police did not inform the suspect of an attorney’s efforts to reach him. 475 U.S. at 434, 106 S.Ct. at 1147, 89 L.Ed.2d at 429. With respect to the validity of the waiver, the Court concluded:
Events occurring outside of the presence of the suspect and entirely unknown to him surely can have no bearing on the capacity to comprehend and knowingly relinquish a constitutional right. * * * No doubt the additional information would have been useful to respondent; perhaps even it might have affected his decision to confess. But we have never read the Constitution to require that the police supply a suspect with a flow of information to help him calibrate his self-interest in deciding whether to speak or stand by his rights.
[Id. at 422, 106 S.Ct. at 1141, 89 L.Ed.2d at 421.]
The majority decision in Moran stands in sharp contrast to “[t]he near-consensus of state courts,” id. at 442, 106 S.Ct. at 1152, 89 L.Ed.2d at 434 (Stevens, J., dissenting), that prior to Moran had excluded from evidence any statement obtained after a suspect had waived his rights when the police had kept from the suspect the fact that an attorney had been retained or had attempted to reach him. Of those state courts, a great many determined that informing a suspect of the presence or availability of an attorney was necessary for the waiver to be knowing and intelligent. Moran, supra, 475 U.S. at 454-55 nn. 40-41, 106 S.Ct. at 1159 nn. 40-41, 89 L.Ed.2d at 442-43 nn. 40-41 (Stevens, J., dissenting). As expressed by the Oregon Supreme Court:
To pass up an abstract offer to call some unknown lawyer is very different from refusing to talk with an identified attorney actually available to provide at least initial assistance and advice, whatever might be arranged in the long run. A suspect indifferent to the first offer may well react quite differently to the second.
[State v. Haynes, 288 Or. 59, 602 P.2d 272, 278 (1979), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 945, 100 S.Ct. 2175, 64 L.Ed.2d 802 (1980).]
Justice Stevens, dissenting in Moran, supra, was “deeply disturbed]” by the majority’s perfunctory rejection of the widely held view of the state courts. 475 U.S. at 439, 106 S.Ct. at 1150, 89 L.Ed.2d at 432. Justice Stevens agreed with those state *272decisions that had invalidated a waiver given in ignorance of the presence or availability of an attorney. Id. at 454-55, 106 S.Ct. at 1158-59, 89 L.Ed. 2d at 442-43. In his view, the presence of an attorney was a “critical fact,” id. at 453, 106 S.Ct. at 1157, 89 L.Ed.2d at 441, that had a “direct bearing on the knowing and intelligent waiver of constitutional rights.” Id. at 456, 106 S.Ct. at 1159, 89 L.Ed. 2d at 443.
After Moran, state courts continued to hold that the police were obligated to inform a suspect of an attorney’s efforts to reach him or her. The majority accurately notes that varying rationales have been offered to support that obligation. Ante at 253-254, 627 A.2d at 638-639. Several courts, however, even when relying on other grounds, have expressed the view that the information is critical to whether the suspect’s waiver was knowing and intelligent. See Bryan v. State, 571 A.2d 170, 176 (Del.1990) (“Our holding simply recognizes that to knowingly, voluntarily and intelligently waive this right a defendant must be informed that his counsel has attempted or is attempting to render legal advice or perform legal services on his behalf.”); State v. Stoddard, 206 Conn. 157, 537 A.2d 446, 453 (1988) (relying on State Constitution’s due process clause and stating that “[w]e are unwilling, however, to dismiss counsel’s effort to communicate as constitutionally insignificant to the capacity of the suspect to make a knowing and intelligent choice whether he or she will invoke the right to counsel.”); People v. Houston, 42 Cal.3d 595, 230 Cal.Rptr. 141, 724 P.2d 1166, 1174 (1986) (relying on State constitutional right to counsel during custodial interrogation and during “critical stage” of proceedings against defendant, and adhering to reasoning of Moran dissent and “overwhelming majority of state courts which have addressed the issue”) (overruled by constitutional amendment, see People v. Ledesma, 204 Cal.App.3d 682, 251 Cal.Rptr. 417, 420-22 (1988)).
II
In Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 479, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 1630, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, 726 (1966), the United States Supreme Court *273imposed on law-enforcement officials the obligation of informing suspects subject to custodial interrogation of the “right to the presence of an attorney.” Informing the suspect of that right was thought to be necessary “to dispel the compulsion inherent in custodial surroundings * * Id. at 458, 86 S.Ct. at 1619, 16 L.Ed.2d at 714. The attorney possesses the “unique ability to protect the Fifth Amendment rights of a client undergoing custodial interrogation.” Fare v. Michael C., 442 U.S. 707, 719, 99 S.Ct. 2560, 2568-69, 61 L.Ed.2d 197, 208 (1979) (discussing Miranda, supra, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694). The attorney’s presence guards against overreaching by law-enforcement officials and insures that any statements that the suspect offers are accurately recorded. Id., 442 U.S. at 719, 99 S.Ct. at 2569, 61 L.Ed.2d at 208-09. Moreover, the attorney is “uniquely prepared to assist a suspect in making an intelligent and knowing decision whether to speak or stand mute * * Stoddard, supra, 537 A.2d at 452.
Those principles apply with equal force to our State’s common-law privilege against self-incrimination and the concomitant right to the presence of an attorney. See State v. Kennedy, 97 N.J. 278, 285, 478 A.2d 723 (1984). Because the attorney plays a vital role during a custodial interrogation, the administration of the Miranda warnings is a minimum safeguard imposed to ensure that the suspect’s rights are not violated. The Miranda warnings do not guarantee that a subsequent waiver will be valid. See, e.g., Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981); Hartley, supra, 103 N.J. 252, 511 A.2d 80. The warnings must convey to the suspect information necessary to provide a “full awareness” of the nature of the right being relinquished. Moran, supra, 475 U.S. at 421, 106 S.Ct. at 1141, 89 L.Ed.2d at 421.
That “any lawyer worth his salt will tell the suspect in no uncertain terms to make no statement to police under any circumstances,” Watts v. Indiana, 338 U.S. 49, 59, 69 S.Ct. 1357, 1358, 93 L.Ed. 1801, 1809 (1949) (Jackson, J., concurring), does not oblige the police to advise the suspect to remain silent. The police are *274not required to probe the suspect’s subjective expectations and understanding, State v. Adams, 127 N.J. 438, 449, 605 A.2d 1097 (1992), nor are they required to provide “a flow of information to help him calibrate his self-interest * * Moran, supra, 475 U.S. at 422, 106 S.Ct. at 1141, 89 L.Ed.2d at 421.
However, informing a suspect of the right to the presence of an attorney is qualitatively different from informing a suspect of both the right to the presence of an attorney and that the attorney is already in the stationhouse. In the first instance, the suspect may reject the offer out of fear that the police will interpret the request for an attorney as an acknowledgment of guilt, or the suspect may view with skepticism the offer by police to provide an unknown attorney. But if the attorney is already present, the same suspect may conclude that consultation with the attorney outweighs any risk of antagonizing the police, particularly if the suspect has had a prior relationship with the attorney or if friends or family have retained the attorney. Thus, the presence and availability of a retained attorney is critical information that qualitatively affects the exercise by a suspect of the right to consult with counsel. When that information is withheld, the suspect’s waiver of the right to counsel and to remain silent is more abstract than real, becoming, in effect, a waiver of a theoretical right that is uninformed by the material knowledge that retained counsel, present and available to assist the suspect in the full exercise of his or her rights, is just outside the door. That the suspect may ultimately reject the offer and waive his or her right is irrelevant to whether the uninformed waiver is knowing and intelligent. Cf. Kennedy, supra, 97 N.J. at 287-89, 478 A.2d 723 (holding that defendant who consulted with attorney may subsequently waive right to presence of that attorney during custodial interrogation).
Under different circumstances, courts have limited the scope of the information that police are required to give to a suspect contemplating a waiver of the right to remain silent. For example, in Colorado v. Spring, the United States Supreme Court held that a suspect’s waiver was not invalid simply because the police *275failed to inform the suspect of the subject matter of the interrogation. 479 U.S. 564, 572-75, 107 S.Ct. 851, 856-58, 93 L.Ed.2d 954, 964-66 (1987). Nor is a suspect necessarily entitled to be informed prior to a custodial interrogation that he or she is a target of the investigation. See State v. Hollander, 201 N.J.Super. 453, 483-84, 493 A.2d 563 (App.Div.), certif. denied, 101 N.J. 335, 501 A.2d 983 (1985); see also Oregon v. Elstad, 470 U.S. 298, 317, 105 S.Ct. 1285, 1297, 84 L.Ed.2d 222, 237 (1985). (“[W]e have not held that the sine qua non for a knowing and voluntary waiver of the right to remain silent is a full and complete appreciation of all of the consequences flowing from the nature and the quality of the evidence in the case.”).
Similarly, police do not have a “duty to probe for a defendant’s unstated misconceptions about the effect of the waiver of Fifth Amendment rights.” Adams, supra, 127 N.J. at 449, 605 A.2d 1097; see also Oregon v. Elstad, supra, 470 U.S. at 316, 105 S.Ct. at 1297, 84 L.Ed.2d at 237 (“This Court has never embraced the theory that a defendant’s ignorance of the full consequences of his decisions vitiates their voluntariness.”). In Adams, the defendant, whom the police were about to interrogate, wrote on a consent form that he did not wish to give a written statement at that time, but indicated that he would talk about the incident in question, and then described his involvement in the crime. 127 N.J. at 442, 605 A.2d 1097. The police officer had informed defendant that the oral statement would be included in his report. Id. at 443, 605 A.2d 1097. We concluded that the officer was not obligated to dispel defendant’s misunderstanding regarding the effect of defendant’s waiver. Id. at 449-150, 605 A.2d 1097; see also State v. McKnight, 52 N.J. 35, 46-47, 243 A.2d 240 (1968) (rejecting defendant’s claim that waiver was invalid because he thought statement could not be used against him unless written and signed); cf. State v. Freeman, 223 N.J.Super. 92, 104, 538 A.2d 371 (App.Div.1988) (concluding that waiver was voluntary and knowing even though defendant thought that by crossing out words “accused or suspect” on waiver card, he could not have been waiving any constitutional rights); State v. Canola, 135 N.J.Super. *276224, 231, 343 A.2d 110 (App.Div.) (describing as “untenable” defendant’s claim that waiver was not knowing and intelligent because he did not understand felony-murder doctrine), certif. denied, 69 N.J. 82, 351 A.2d 10 (1975), modified on other grounds, 73 N.J. 206, 374 A.2d 20 (1977).
Those cases dealt with issues significantly different from the one before us. The presence or availability of an attorney is not simply information that a defendant might find useful in “calibrat[ing] his self-interest [and] deciding whether to speak or stand by his rights.” Moran, supra, 475 U.S. at 422, 106 S.Ct. at 1141, 89 L.Ed.2d at 421. As Justice Stevens stated, an attorney’s actual presence or availability is a critical fact “that has a direct ‘bearing’ on the knowing and intelligent waiver of constitutional rights.” Id. at 456, 106 S.Ct. at 1159, 89 L.Ed.2d at 443. Nor is this a case in which the suspect “stub[bed] his toe,” McKnight, supra, 52 N.J. at 52, 243 A.2d 240, by waiving a right under the misapprehension of the effect of that waiver, Adams, supra, 127 N.J. at 449-50, 605 A.2d 1097, or by waiving the right to counsel after a consultation, Kennedy, supra, 97 N.J. at 289, 478 A.2d 723. The police’s misrepresentation to Reed related not to extrinsic facts that might affect matters of strategy, but instead to facts that directly affected the availability of his right to consult with counsel before talking with the police. By withholding from Reed that objective information — the attorney’s efforts to reach the suspect — the police deprived Reed of “a full awareness both of the nature of the right being abandoned and the consequences of the decision to abandon it.” Moran, supra, 475 U.S. at 421, 106 S.Ct. at 1141, 89 L.Ed.2d at 421.
Because I would focus essentially on whether the suspect’s waiver of the privilege against self-incrimination was knowing and intelligent if exercised when information about the presence of retained counsel has been withheld, I would avoid the imposition of a bright-line rule holding that waivers tendered under such circumstances are invalid per se. Ante at 261-262, 627 A.2d at 642-643. Preferably, the Court should adhere to the settled principle that the waiver’s validity “depend[s], in each case, upon *277the particular facts and circumstances surrounding that case, including the background, experience, and conduct of the accused.” Johnson v. Zerbst, supra, 304 U.S. at 464, 58 S.Ct. at 1023, 82 L.Ed. at 1466. Applying that standard, I would conclude that defendant’s waiver was not knowing and intelligent because the police officers did not inform him of his attorney’s presence.
Accordingly, I concur in the judgment of the Court reversing defendant’s conviction and remanding the case for retrial.