Miranda Warnings

Miranda Warnings In one of its most famous decisions, the Warren Court required police to advise criminal suspects of particular constitutional rights prior to interrogation. These Miranda warnings consisted of four items: (1) the right to remain silent; (2) the reminder that anything said could be used against the suspect; (3) the right to counsel; and (4) the related reminder that counsel would be provided for indigents.

Miranda warnings apply when suspects are in police custody and under interrogation. In decisions subsequent to Miranda, the Court has emphasized that custody consists of the restriction of freedom of movement by police. This can occur in one's home (Orozco v. Texas, 1969), or in jail on an unrelated offense (Mathis v. United States, 1968). Public safety concerns, however, constitute an exemption to this requirement as the Court emphasized in New York v. Quarles (1984) when it ruled that emergency circumstances (e.g., the officer's immediate protection) do not require Miranda warnings, even if these situations could be describe as interrogations. Suspects who voluntarily go to a police station are not entitled to Miranda warnings unless arrested and drivers who are stopped by police for a routine traffic violation are also not entitled to Miranda warnings (California v. Beheler, 1983, and Berkemer v. McCarty, 1984).

Under Miranda, an interrogation exists whenever police reasonably expect that a suspect is likely to offer incriminating information (Rhode Island v. Innis, 1980). Although most interrogations are carried out by law enforcement officers, some psychiatric examinations (e.g., those related to competency to stand trial) constitute interrogations (Estelle v. Smith, 1981). Grand jury proceedings, however, are not included (United States v. Wong, 1977). Witnesses in grand jury proceedings may, of course, assert their Fifth Amendment privilege against self‐incrimination, but they do not need to be advised of these rights in Miranda fashion. Some lower courts have applied Miranda to grand jury proceedings in a departure from this pattern, but the majority do not, citing United States v. Dionisio (1973) where the Court argued that grand jury subpoenas are not unreasonable searches and seizures in the context of the Fourth Amendment and, therefore, not custodial in Fifth Amendment terms.

Related to the scope of interrogation are more subtle means of eliciting incriminating information from criminal defendants. In 1977 the Supreme Court concluded that police comments to each other in the presence of a suspect could be designed to elicit incriminating evidence (Brewer v. Williams). In this decision, however, the Court relied more on Sixth Amendment right to counsel protection than the Fifth Amendment privilege against self‐incrimination. Several states filed amicus briefs in the Brewer case and explicitly asked the Court to overrule its decision in Miranda. A similar issue was raised in a 1987 case where the Court accepted a tape‐recorded conversation between a couple suspected of murdering their son where the husband had been advised of his Miranda rights but the wife initiated the conversation (Arizona v. Mauro, 1987).

Another question related to Miranda warnings is the admissibility of evidence obtained in involuntary physical tests. In Schmerber v. California (1966), the Court distinguished testimonial evidence that required Fifth Amendment protection and physical evidence that did not, thereby accepting the admissibility of an involuntary blood test.

Similarly, the Court has considered the degree to which incomplete warnings violate Miranda. In Michigan v. Tucker (1974), the Court upheld a conviction where police failed to advise the suspect that counsel would be provided if he were indigent. This reluctance to require police to warn suspects in an unequivocal manner has been upheld in other decisions. In Duckworth v. Eagan (1989), the Court accepted a confession where police indicated that they did not have any way of providing a lawyer but did assure the defendant that one would be provided if and when he went to court. Although Eagan argued that this set of warnings did not conform to the Court's own precedent (California v. Prysock, 1981), the Court concluded that Miranda warnings did not have to be issued in an exact form and that police were not obligated to produce defense lawyers “on call.”

In Miranda, the Court acknowledged that criminal defendants could waive their Miranda rights and talk to police. Questions about police judgments that a defendant voluntarily offered information, however, remain. In the 1994 decision, Davis v. United States, for example, the Court concluded that a suspect's comment that “maybe I should talk to a lawyer” did not constitute a request for an attorney under the Miranda warnings requirement. Moreover, in a series of cases the Court has ruled that a written waiver form is not essential (North Carolina v. Butler, 1979), that a waiver cannot be presumed from the suspect's failure to complain after warning (Tague v. Louisiana, 1980), that the suspect does not have to be notified of the specific offense under investigation (Colorado v. Spring, 1987), that a post‐warning waiver is not invalidated by a pre‐warning confession (Oregon v. Elstad, 1985), and that all the ramifications of a waiver need to be appreciated by the suspect for constitutional validity (Moran v. Burbine, 1986).

The Court has also ruled on the conditions that may render a suspect's confession and waiver of Miranda invalid. For example, mental illness on the part of a defendant who confessed to police in the absence of coercion does not invalidate a confession (Colorado v. Connelly, 1986), but the confessions of injured suspects on medication and in severe pain who are questioned in the hospital should be excluded (Beecher v. Alabama, 1972, and Mincey v. Arizona, 1978). So general are the Court's waiver standards that suspects who explicitly refuse to offer a written statement without counsel may be regarded as having waived their Miranda rights (Connecticut v. Barrett, 1987).

During the 2004 term, the U.S. Supreme Court considered the applicability of Miranda to juveniles. Of central interest in Yarborough Warden v. Alvarado, was the use at trial of testimony obtained in a two‐hour interview that police in Los Angeles conducted with a seventeen‐year‐old who was implicated in an attempted robbery and murder case. At trial, Alvarado moved to suppress the interview on the grounds that no Miranda warnings were issued, a claim unchallenged by the prosecution. The trial court and the state appellate court concluded that Alvarado was not in custody at the time of the interview, citing Thompson v. Keohane. The Ninth Circuit reversed in Alvarado v. Hickman, took issue with the application of the custody test, and called particular attention to Alvarado's youth and inexperience. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the Ninth Circuit ruling and concluded that Alvarado was not in custody for purposes of Miranda and that the trial court's application of the custody test was not unreasonable.

One of the most important questions related to the continued validity of Miranda is the indirect use of information obtained in violation of the warning requirement. In 1971 the Burger Court concluded that statements made in violation of Miranda could be used to impeach the credibility of the defendant if s/he took the stand in his/her own defense. This decision in Harris v. New York has sometimes been described as a “back‐door” reversal of the famous 1966 precedent. However, the U.S. Supreme Court continues to uphold the constitutionality of the Court's famous 1966 decision and the warnings requirement that it set out. An appropriate illustration is the 2000 decision in Dickerson v. United States where the Court rejected a 1999 Fourth Circuit ruling that upheld the admissibility of a voluntary confession in the face of an acknowledged failure of police to issue Miranda warnings. In this decision, the Court emphasized, among other arguments, that “the (Miranda) warnings have become part of our national culture.”

Susette M. Talarico