Court Opinion

ID: 9474483
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 04:58:26.122207+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:44:06.699529
License: Public Domain

GIBBONS, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
The district court held that the State of Delaware did not carry its burden of establishing a valid waiver by petitioner Ahmad of his rights under Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). United States ex rel. Ahmad v. Redman, 599 F.Supp. 802, 804 (D.Del. 1984). That court nevertheless denied habeas corpus relief on the ground that the admission of an involuntary statement by Ahmad, obtained in the absence of a valid waiver of Miranda rights, was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt. Id. at 806. This appeal followed.
The majority quite properly does not rely on the harmless error ground for denying habeas corpus relief. Such reliance would be misplaced because the prosecutor, in his closing argument, relied heavily upon Ahmad’s incriminating statement as evidence of his involvement in the robbery and therefore of his guilt. Instead, the majority holds that the district court erred in concluding that the state had failed to establish a voluntary waiver of Miranda fights. I respectfully disagree.
My difference with the majority is not over the analytical framework for our review of the district court’s conclusion. The issue of voluntariness is one on which the district court, and this court, must make an independent judgment.1 Like the district *415court, I conclude that the Delaware court record fails to establish a voluntary waiver. Nowhere in that record is it established that Ahmad ever conveyed to the police the information that he understood his Miranda rights and intended not to exercise them. In the state suppression hearing Ahmad testified that the interrogating officer, Detective Corrigan, had threatened to hang him. Thereafter with respect to waiver the testimony is as follows:
Q. Now, when Detective Corrigan came in, did he advise you of your rights?
A. Yes, he did.
Q. How did he advise you of your rights?
A. He said, “You don’t have to say anything unless you have an attorney.”
Q. What else did he say?
A. The other words I can’t — I’m—He run down it.
Q. He run down?
A. The law to me.
Q. Yes. And what did you answer every time he gave you one of these?
A. As-salaam-alaikum.
Q. What do you mean by that?
A. Means peace be upon you.
Q. Okay. Does it mean “yes”?
A. Peace be upon you.
Q. Does it mean “yes”?
A. No, sir.
Q. But there’s no question that you didn’t understand what he was saying?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. And - there’s no question that you understood that you didn’t have to say a thing if you didn’t want to?
A. No.
Transcript at 70-71. It is not apparent that Ahmad actually understood his Miranda rights, since the answers to the last two questions, ambiguously phrased as double negatives, appear to be inconsistent. I am willing to accept the state’s finding that Ahmad was given adequate Miranda warnings. The state also had to establish that he knowingly waived those rights.
A waiver can sometimes be inferred from the suspect’s behavior following Miranda warnings. The Supreme Court has, however, admonished,
As was unequivocally said in Miranda, mere silence is not enough. That does not mean that the defendant’s silence, coupled with an understanding of his rights and a course of conduct indicating waiver, may never support a conclusion that a defendant has waived his rights. The courts must presume that a defendant did not waive his rights; the prosecution’s burden is great; but in at least some cases waiver can be clearly inferred from the actions and words of the person interrogated.
North Carolina v. Butler, 441 U.S. 369, 373, 99 S.Ct. 1755, 1757, 60 L.Ed.2d 286 (1979) (footnote omitted). Ahmad never acknowledged to the interrogator that he understood and waived those rights. His response of “as-salaam-alaikum” is no more helpful to an assessment of either his understanding or of waiver than his complete silence would have been. “[A] valid waiver will not be presumed simply from the silence of the accused after warnings are given or simply from the fact that a confession was in fact eventually obtained.” Miranda, 384 U.S. at 475, 86 S.Ct. at 1628.
The equivocal response “as-salaam-alaikum” is quite different from the oral acknowledgment that the suspect understood her rights, followed by a willingness to answer questions. Thus the facts of this case are distinguishable from the situation dealt with in United States v. Velasquez, 626 F.2d 314, 319-20 (3d Cir.1980). In Velasquez the government established that before the suspect answered questions she unequivocally acknowledged that she understood her rights. The district court fully appreciated the difference between the record in Velasquez and that before us. See United States ex rel. Ahmad, 599 F.Supp. at 804. Furthermore, the Supreme Court has stated that
waivers of counsel must not only be voluntary, but must also constitute a know*416ing and intelligent relinquishment or abandonment of a known right or privilege, a matter which depends in each case “upon the particular facts and circumstances surrounding that case, including the background, experience, and conduct of the accused.”
Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.S. 477, 482, 101 S.Ct. 1880, 1883, 68 L.Ed.2d 378 (1981) (quoting Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U.S. 458, 464, 58 S.Ct. 1019, 1023, 82 L.Ed. 1461 (1938)). The response “as-salaam-alaikum” does not satisfy the prosecutor’s heavy burden of establishing a knowing and intelligent relinquishment of Ahmad's Miranda rights.
Thus I would reverse the judgment dismissing the writ of habeas corpus and remand with a direction that Ahmad should be released unless within a reasonable time Delaware affords him a new trial.

. Thus it is implicit in the majority’s analysis that in light of Miller v. Fenton, — U.S.-, 106 S.Ct. 445, 88 L.Ed.2d 405 (1985), and Holland v. Attorney General, 777 F.2d 150, 153 n. 1- (3d Cir.1985), the interpretation of 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d) (1982) in Patterson v. Cuyler, 729 F.2d 925 (3d Cir.1984), is no longer authoritative.