By: dmc-admin//September 16, 2002//
“The state courts did note that Youth Officer Geraci was present at the 7:00 and 10:45 p.m. statements, but we agree with the district court that this fact is meaningless. As far as the record shows, Geraci provided about as much assistance to Hardaway as a potted plant. … We wish to make it clear that a state-provided youth officer who functions as nothing more than an observer will not be considered a friendly adult presence for purposes of the totality of the circumstances test.
“The mere fact that two officers questioned Hardaway twice in the morning and two different officers spoke to him at 4:30 p.m., with a total interrogation time prior to the initial confession of less than 90 minutes, presents a markedly different scenario from the five grueling hours of interrogation experienced in Haley. 322 U.S. at 598. The police used no particularly coercive or heavy-handed interview techniques, such as making Hardaway strip and wear jail clothes or handcuffs, questioning him for lengthy periods without a break, misrepresenting evidence, or showing graphic pictures of the murder scene. See Woods v. Clusen, 794 F.2d 293, 296 (7th Cir. 1986) (granting writ on the basis of evidence of such mistreatment); Riley, 653 F.2d at 1162-63 (denying writ where defendant was handcuffed and given jail clothes but there was no evidence of mistreatment and interview only lasted four hours). Instead, the officers merely asked Hardaway a few questions about his whereabouts and truthfully confronted him with the statements of two witnesses whose versions of events contradicted his own. We cannot find that the state court’s determination that this was not unduly coercive behavior on the part of the police was unreasonable, even when dealing with a 14-year-old. One could still argue that leaving a juvenile alone in an interrogation room for eight hours creates enough psychological pressure to render the confession involuntary. Obviously, adolescents are less mature than adults and perhaps such a time lapse, which we would expect an adult to weather, would instead render involuntary the confession of a child, especially one deprived of any adult assistance.
“Because the determination of the Illinois courts that Hardaway’s confession was voluntary under the totality of the circumstances was not an unreasonable application of clearly established federal law, the district court should not have granted the writ of habeas corpus.”
Reversed.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Shadur, J., Wood, J.