Court Opinion

ID: 9543479
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:45:52.12178+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:10:24.791443
License: Public Domain

DeBRULER, Justice,
concurring in result.
The reliance in the majority opinion upon the new case of Colorado v. Connelly, — U.S. -, 107 S.Ct. 515, 93 L.Ed.2d 473, (1986), warrants a special statement.
Connelly first confessed and made a waiver of counsel and the privilege against self-incrimination before being taken into custody. He let the cat out of the bag. After being taken into custody, he again confessed. The Supreme Court of the United States was presented with the question of whether the pre-custodial confession had been correctly determined inadmissible due to constitutional involuntariness. It determined that the state court had applied an erroneous federal constitutional standard when it concluded that while the pre-custodial confession had not been brought about by police coercion, it was nonetheless inadmissible as involuntary because Con-nelly made the confession in obedience to a command he heard during a psychotic episode, and could not therefore be deemed voluntary as the product of a rational intellect and a free will. The Supreme Court held that elements of police coercion must mingle with other relevant considerations in any determination of such federal constitutional involuntariness.
In the case at bar by contrast, the statement in question was given in a police interrogation in the station house at 5:00 a.m., after appellant’s arrest at about 3:00 a.m. This statement is a post-custodial one. The questioning by trained police interrogators had as its purpose the wresting of self-incriminatory statements from a person who is locked up. The setting contains inherently compelling pressures which undermine the will to resist and compel a person to speak against their better judgment. The pressures are so great that *1032there is a right to a lawyer at such an interrogation.
Here, he had not slept, and there is no doubt that he was to some degree under the influence of alcohol. In my opinion, the interrogation of appellant at this place and time, and under these circumstances satisfies the requirement of Connelly that an element of official coercion be present and operating upon an arrestee when the choice is made to confess or to waive basic rights.
It is also appropriate at this initial visitation with Connelly to express the opinion that the case does not bind this court in applying the protections of the Indiana Constitution, applicable in the police interrogation area. The constitutional test of voluntariness under the Indiana Constitution requires a confession be freely self-determined and the product of a rational intellect and a free will. Robbins v. State (1968), 250 Ind. 219, 235 N.E.2d 199. Even in the absence of coercion on the part of the interrogating officers, a confession may be involuntary where for example the accused’s will, by reason of borderline fee-blemindedness, was easily overborne by experienced interrogating officers. Robbins, id.
Here the trial court heard evidence which it was warranted in crediting, from which it could reasonably be determined beyond a reasonable doubt that appellant’s decision to confess and to waive was voluntary in the constitutional sense. I therefore concur in upholding the conviction.