5th Amendment Violation

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Anthony Johnson v. Edward Winstead, et al.

Case No.: 16-2372

Officials: BAUER, FLAUM, and SYKES, Circuit Judges.

Focus: 5th Amendment Violation

On December 5, 2003, Chicago Police Detectives James Las Cola and Edward Winstead questioned Anthony Johnson in separate interviews about his involvement in the shooting death of Brandon Baity two months earlier. Johnson admitted to each detective that he drove the shooter to and from the scene but claimed not to know anything about his plan to kill Baity. State prosecutors charged Johnson for Baity’s murder under an accountability theory. He was twice tried and convicted.

Johnson moved to suppress his statements based on noncompliance with Miranda. The trial judge denied the motion. The case proceeded to trial in October 2007, and Detectives Las Cola and Winstead testified about Johnson’s statements. The jury found him guilty, but the Illinois Appellate Court reversed based on an instructional error and remanded for a new trial. At the second trial in March 2012, the detectives repeated their testimony about Johnson’s statements. Once again Johnson was convicted, but the appellate court again reversed, this time based on insufficient evidence to support accountability liability.

We reverse in part. Heck blocks a § 1983 claim that necessarily implies the invalidity of a criminal conviction unless the plaintiff can show that the conviction has already been invalidated. As a corollary to that rule, if a claim is Heckbarred, accrual is deferred until the conviction is overturned. An officer’s failure to give Miranda warnings is not itself a constitutional violation; rather, a Fifth Amendment violation occurs when an accused’s unlawfully obtained confession is introduced as evidence to convict him in a criminal case. Johnson seeks damages arising from the admission of his (allegedly) unwarned statements at trial, resulting in two wrongful convictions. Claims of this kind necessarily imply the invalidity of the convictions, so Heck’s rule of deferred accrual applies.

Even so, to the extent Johnson seeks damages stemming from the first conviction, the claims are time-barred. That conviction was reversed in 2010, starting the two-year limitations clock. So the suit is untimely as to those claims. But the claims for alleged Fifth Amendment violations in the second trial are timely. That conviction was reversed in 2014, and Johnson sued less than a year later.

Reversed and Remanded

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.