The interview lasted for between five and seven hours in the evening and continued well past the hour when respondent generally went to bed; the deputies who questioned respondent were armed; and one of the deputies, according to respondent, “[u]sed a very sharp tone,” ... and, on one occasion, profanity."
He was offered food and water, and the door to the conference room was sometimes left open. ...“All of these objective facts are consistent with an interrogation environment in which a reasonable person would have felt free to terminate the interview and leave.”
These circumstances, however, were offset by others. Most important, respondent was told at the outset of the interrogation, and was reminded again thereafter, that he could leave and go back to his cell whenever he wanted... Moreover, respondent was not physically restrained or threatened and was interviewed in a well-lit, average-sized conference room,where he was “not uncomfortable.”...
...Because he was in prison, respondent was not free to leave the conference room by himself and to make his own way through the facility to his cell. Instead, he was escorted to the conference room and, when he ultimately decided to end the interview, he had to wait about 20 minutes for a corrections officer to arrive and escort him to his cell. But he would have been subject to this same restraint even if he had been taken to the conference room for some reason other than police questioning; under no circumstances could he have reasonably expected to be able to roam free. And while respondent testified that he “was told . . . if I did not want to cooperate, I needed to go back to my cell,” these words did not coerce cooperation by threatening harsher conditions. (“I was told, if I didn’t want to cooperate, I could leave”). Returning to his cell would merely have returned him to his usual environment.
Taking into account all of the circumstances of the questioning—including especially the undisputed fact that respondent was told that he was free to end the questioning and to return to his cell—we hold that respondent was not in custody within the meaning of Miranda
Glenn Greenwald's reaction is here, and BMAZ at Empty Wheel is here.
My reaction: This is just the next, but not the last nail, in the Miranda coffin. See this Supreme Court 2010 decision in a case called Berghuis v. Thompkins, available here. And the Obama Administrations 2011 rules on delaying Miranda rights. Or the feds successful attempt to use the "Public safety exception" to avoid Mirandizing people like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. Another one: In 2010, the Supreme Court decided Maryland v. Shatzer (08-680), with Scalia writing the majority opinion. It held that a “break in custody” permits the police to resume questioning a suspect two weeks after he had refused and asked for a lawyer --without repeating Miranda rights. In 2004, the Court held only the statements obtained after a Miranda violation, not physical items obtained, such as drugs or guns, must be suppressed.
We've now moved from a test of whether a reasonable person would feel free to leave to a new test for inmates -- whether a reasonable person would feel free to stop the interrogation.
These facts are consistent with an environment in which a reasonable person would have felt free to terminate the interview and leave, subject to the ordinary restraints of life behind bars.
Background music: Hotel California, "You can check out any time you'd like but you can never leave."
The inmate in yesterday's case had every right to refuse to speak to these agents. He just didn't know it. Maybe we lawyers should write our clients in prison and enclose yesterday's opinion, and tell them not to get sucked in. If they aren't sure, they should just start humming Hotel California to themselves, so they remember they can check out of the interview room (by calling for guards to take them back to their cell) any time they want, even though they can't leave the "hotel."
Police have been craftily creating exceptions to Miranda for decades. Courts have been steadily approving them. None of these rulings change the fact that the inmates, just like those not in custody, don't have to talk. If they don't provide the police with any statements, the police won't have any statements to use against them.
I was not opposed to Kagan, even though I had concerns, because the alternative at the time, Judge and former prosecutor Merrick Garland, would have been so much worse. Other views on Kagan are here and here.
