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Pre-custodial Miranda warnings effective

By: dmc-admin//June 22, 2009//

Pre-custodial Miranda warnings effective

By: dmc-admin//June 22, 2009//

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Police are not required to reissue Miranda warnings to a suspect when the questioning crosses from a non-custodial interview to a custodial one.

Rejecting a bright-line rule that the warnings must be given again after an interrogation becomes custodial, the Wisconsin Supreme Court instead adopted a totality of the circumstances test. The test includes a variety of factors regarding who does the questioning, where it is done, the nature of what is being asked and how much time has elapsed since the original warning was given.

Writing for the court, Justice Michael J. Gableman observed, “The Miranda warnings would tend to go ‘stale’ sooner, that is, they would be more likely to be forgotten by the suspect, if the suspect has had little familiarity with the warnings than if the suspect has had experience with the warnings.”

Homicide

After Allen Jemison was found dead in his apartment in 2005, police suspected his roommate, Marcus Ward, was the guilty party.

Marchand Grady, who knew Ward, was questioned as a witness. The police told him he was not under arrest, but he was given Miranda warnings anyway.

Two-and-a-half hours later, the questioning became custodial when Ward told police that Grady was the one who shot and killed Jemison. The police did not re-administer the Miranda warnings, although a detective slid a card with the warnings printed on it and asked Grady if he knew the rights it contained. After almost two more hours of questioning, Grady began making inculpatory statements regarding Jemison’s death.

Grady was charged with first-degree intentional homicide, among other charges, and the circuit court, Court of Appeals, and the Supreme Court, all held that his confessions were admissible.

Grady argued in favor of a bright-line rule requiring administration of Miranda warnings after a person is placed in official custody, and holding Miranda warnings prior to custody ineffective.

ImageNo Bright-Line Rule

However, the court adopted a totality of the circumstances test, consistent with every other jurisdiction to consider the issue, save one.

The court noted that the Miranda opinion itself sets no requirement as to when the warnings must be given, except that they be given “prior” to any custodial questioning. Where the warnings are given prior to the suspect being taken into custody, they are necessarily given prior to custodial questioning.

The court also defended its holding as consistent with the purpose of the Miranda warnings.

“A rule that says warnings given one minute before custody are ineffective per se because they were not given when the suspect was actually in custody is manifestly unreasonable,” Gableman wrote.

Applying the totality of the circumstances test to Grady, the court held that his statements were voluntary.

The court found that the postcustodial interrogation was merely a continuation of the precustodial questioning, that the questioning did not become coercive after custody, and that Grady was given frequent breaks and food both before and after he was arrested.

In addition, only two-and-a-half hours had elapsed since he was given the Miranda warnings, and the officers had reminded him of his rights informally before beginning custodial interrogation.

“Grady knew and understood his rights before he was arrested mid-interrogation,” Gableman wrote. “Grady still knew and understood his rights after his arrest. Nothing in the record demonstrates any diminishment of that understanding.”

Carl W. Chesshir, of Chesshir Law Office, in Eagle, who represented Grady, said, “The way I read Miranda, it created a bright-line rule, but there’s not a lot I can do about it now.”

In Miranda, the U.S. Supreme Court wrote, “when an individual is taken into custody … [h]e must be warned prior to any questioning …” Miranda, 284 U.S. 436, 478-79 (1966).

Chesshir said that the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s opinion ignores the beginning of the statement, which does state when the warnings must be given, and looks only to that part that said warnings must be given “prior to any questioning.”

In a press release, Attorney General J.B. Van Hollen said, “Miranda warnings protect a suspect’s constitutional right to be free from compelled self-incrimination. Here, Milwaukee police fully informed Grady of his right to remain silent. Grady knew what he was doing. The circuit court properly admitted his statements.”

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