Posted on 05/26/2009 9:15:52 AM PDT by freedomwarrior998
Syllabus
At a preliminary hearing required by Louisiana law, petitioner Montejo was charged with first-degree murder, and the court ordered the appointment of counsel. Later that day, the police read Montejo his rights under Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436, and he agreed to go along on a trip to locate the murder weapon. During the excursion,he wrote an inculpatory letter of apology to the victim’s widow. Upon returning, he finally met his court-appointed attorney. At trial, his letter was admitted over defense objection, and he was convicted and sentenced to death. Affirming, the State Supreme Court rejected his claim that the letter should have been suppressed under the rule of Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U. S. 625, which forbids police to initiateinterrogation of a criminal defendant once he has invoked his right tocounsel at an arraignment or similar proceeding. The court reasoned that Jackson’s prophylactic protection is not triggered unless the defendant has actually requested a lawyer or has otherwise assertedhis Sixth Amendment right to counsel; and that, since Montejo stoodmute at his hearing while the judge ordered the appointment ofcounsel, he had made no such request or assertion.
Held: 1. Michigan v. Jackson should be and now is overruled. Pp. 3–18.
(a) The State Supreme Court’s interpretation of Jackson would lead to practical problems. Requiring an initial “invocation” of theright to counsel in order to trigger the Jackson presumption, as thecourt below did, might work in States that require an indigent defendant formally to request counsel before an appointment is made, butnot in more than half the States, which appoint counsel without request from the defendant. Pp. 3–6.
(b) On the other hand, Montejo’s solution is untenable as a theoretical and doctrinal matter. Eliminating the invocation requirement entirely would depart fundamentally from the rationale of Jackson, whose presumption was created by analogy to a similar prophylacticrule established in Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U. S. 477, to protect the Fifth Amendment-based Miranda right. Both Edwards and Jackson are meant to prevent police from badgering defendants into changing their minds about the right to counsel once they have invoked it, buta defendant who never asked for counsel has not yet made up his mind in the first instance. Pp. 6–13.
(c) Stare decisis does not require the Court to expand significantly the holding of a prior decision in order to cure its practical deficiencies. To the contrary, the fact that a decision has proved “unworkable” is a traditional ground for overruling it. Payne v. Tennessee, 501 U. S. 808, 827. Beyond workability, the relevant factors include the precedent’s antiquity, the reliance interests at stake,and whether the decision was well reasoned. Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U. S. ___, ___. The first two cut in favor of jettisoning Jackson: the opinion is only two decades old, and eliminating it would not upset expectations, since any criminal defendant learned enough to order his affairs based on Jackson’s rule would also be perfectly capableof interacting with the police on his own. As for the strength of Jackson’s reasoning, when this Court creates a prophylactic rule to protect a constitutional right, the relevant “reasoning” is the weighing of the rule’s benefits against its costs. Jackson’s marginal benefits are dwarfed by its substantial costs. Even without Jackson, few badgering-induced waivers, if any, would be admitted at trial because theCourt has taken substantial other, overlapping measures to exclude them. Under Miranda, any suspect subject to custodial interrogation must be advised of his right to have a lawyer present. 384 U. S., at 474. Under Edwards, once such a defendant “has invoked his [Miranda] right,” interrogation must stop. 451 U. S., at 484. And under Minnick v. Mississippi, 498 U. S. 146, no subsequent interrogation may take place until counsel is present. Id., at 153. These three layers of prophylaxis are sufficient. On the other side of the equation, the principal cost of applying Jackson’s rule is that crimes can go unsolved and criminals unpunished when uncoerced confessions are excluded and when officers are deterred from even trying to obtain confessions. The Court concludes that the Jackson rule does not “pay its way,” United States v. Leon, 468 U. S. 897, 907–908, n. 6, and thus the case should be overruled. Pp. 13–18.
2. Montejo should nonetheless be given an opportunity to contend that his letter of apology should have been suppressed under the Edwards rule. He understandably did not pursue an Edwards objection, because Jackson offered broader protections, but the decision here changes the legal landscape.
06–1807 (La.), 974 So. 2d 1238, vacated and remanded. SCALIA, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C. J., and KENNEDY, THOMAS, and ALITO, JJ., joined. ALITO, J., filed a concurring opinion, in which KENNEDY, J., joined. STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SOUTER and GINSBURG, JJ., joined, and in which BREYER, J., joined, except for n. 5. BREYER, J., filed a dissenting opinion.
I can appreciate your concern, but is it really that hard to say, “Speak to my lawyer.”? At this point that is ALL you have to say. Saying (or writing) anything else is simply stupid and you can’t legislate out STUPID.
The overturning of Michigan v. Jackson means that police have the right to continue to investigate and attempt to collect evidence even after you say, speak to my lawyer. They can ask questions, and I can say, speak to my lawyer.
I just don’t see the big deal of expecting people to take that responsibility.
Michigan v. Jackson was overruled. In that original ruling, the SCOTUS said that once you have a lawyer, the police cannot talk to you or anything else unless you initiate the conversation.
The Louisiana Supreme Court ruled that the letter WAS admissible (opposite of the Michigan v. Jackson ruling) because he had not specifically requested his lawyer. The SCOTUS agreed that this guy did not specifically ask for his lawyer and therefore the evidence IS admissible and that Michigan v. Jackson is overreaching in it’s application of the Sixth Amendment.
If I am wrong, please correct me, but I just reread both this decision and the Michigan v. Jackson rulings.
Because they are liberals who claim the wisdom of god.
I read the briefs. It is a VERY narrow ruling. If not for requiring a hearing on the admittance of the so-called confession, the case would have gone the other way.
If you read the briefs, any reqasonable person would see that the cops screwed this guy over. It wsa a travesty of justice and there is a reasonable argument the guy is actually innocent.
When that happens, states will be justified (on the basis of breach of contract) if they the choose to succeed.
This ruling over turns that statement, and suppresses the letter as obtained without counsel
That's the direction I'm leaning. I could be wrong, and it probably varies from state to state, but once you have an attorney of record (like after your arraignment), don't you have to sign something to acknowledge you're waiving advice of counsel? And, doesn't that signature have to be signed in front of your counsel or some other officer of the court?
To me, this is an important issue. I don't think people should wrongly go to prison because they aren't as smart or as well-informed as to their constitutional rights as others.
Interrogations are designed to be coercive, and with this in mind, I'm not sure what the problem is with a black and white rule that requires a defendant's attorney to be informed of an interrogation that occurs after arraignment. It seems to me to be a very low hurdle for police.
Don’t know the answer to that, but it’s an interesting thought.
We actually agree completely. I think some of those posts ran together, or I wasn't as clear as I should have been in articulating why we dodged a bullet. I was dreading a Kagan or even worse a Sullivan or Karlan.
That is definitely the best course of action. However, many people think they talk their way out of legal trouble and so we end up with cases such as this one.
It is a very narrow ruling, limited pretty much to the facts of this case. In my jurisdiction, at an initial hearing the court asks “do intend to retain counsel or do you wish for the court to appoint counsel for you?” On those facts, Edwards would still apply and the police could not interrogate.
I’ll bet that in my jurisdiction, police will now believe that they can talk to defendants after counsel is appointed because of Montejo. It will make for some interesting litigation.
And, yes, dear Freepers, there are such things as false confessions. Once the police decide that a crime has been committed and that a certain person committed it, they do everything they can to get evidence against that person, including inducing confessions by any means necessary (short of KGB methods). And the police will disregard (and often discard) any evidence which is contrary to their pre-supposed beliefs. Being a government bureaucrat, including a cop, means never having to admit you’re wrong.
For my left-wing criminal defense colleagues, I ask “How can you vote democrat, to increase the power of the State over the individual’s property rights, the very same State that you swear habitually abuses the individual liberty rights of your clients?” For my fellow Freepers, the argument goes the other way: “How can you support the State’s habitual denial of the individual liberty rights of defendants, the same state that you otherwise abhor when it grows in power at the expense of individual property rights?”
The liberal defense attorney and “law and order conservative” are feeding the same monster, in my opinion.
Fixed it. The SCOTUS rejected the distinction made by the Louisiana Supreme Court between appointment of counsel upon request of the defendant versus a judge doing so sua sponte. The reason why the appointment was made is irrelevant. Jackson applied in either case and, now that Jackson has been overruled, Montejo does apply in either case.
“It seems to me to be a very low hurdle for police.”
You mean like the reading of the Miranda rights and the confirmation that the police get from the culprit? I mean he was told - keep your mouth shut or else!
He CHOSE “or else”! No law is going to fix that!
Also, more justices could be appointed. The constitution makes no mention of how many memebers it should have. Nine is traditional, not legal.
the State Supreme Court rejected his claim that the letter should have been suppressed under the rule of Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U.S. 625, which forbids police to initiate interrogation of a criminal defendant once he has invoked his right to counsel at an arraignment or similar proceeding.
Later that day, the police read Montejo his rights under Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436, and he agreed to go along on a trip to locate the murder weapon. During the excursion,he wrote an inculpatory letter of apology to the victim’s widow.
He was told (warned) and he still spoke and wrote.
I don't see that the police did anything wrong.
I don’t either.
That is true. Once you've been read your rights, the police can't just railroad you whenever they feel like it and say it's legal or justified. You still have the right not to be a witness against yourself.
In a more practical sense, if the police read you Miranda, you are in big trouble already, so keep your mouth shut and say nothing without your attorney present.
He was told that he had a right to have an attorney present during any questioning.
That does not mean that the police can't ask him any more questions. If they ask him and he still answers after that, that is wholly his decision.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.