Boles v. Stevenson, 298
| Decision Date | 16 November 1964 |
| Docket Number | No. 298,298 |
| Citation | 85 S.Ct. 174,379 U.S. 43,13 L.Ed.2d 109 |
| Parties | Otto C. BOLES v. Ernest STEVENSON |
| Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
Charles Robert Sarver and Claude A. Joyce, Asst. Attys. Gen. of West Virginia, for petitioner.
Daniel J. Meador, for respondent.
The respondent, Stevenson, was convicted of murder in the first degree and sentenced to death in the Common Pleas Court of Cabell County, West Virginia. The conviction was affirmed on appeal by the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals. State v. Stevenson, 147 W.Va. 211, 127 S.E.2d 638. Certiorari was denied here. 372 U.S. 938, 83 S.Ct. 886, 9 L.Ed.2d 768. He then filed a petition for habeas corpus in the United States District Court. Stevenson v. Boles, 221 F.Supp. 411. That court issued the writ on the ground that the State Supreme Court of Appeals used an erroneous standard for determining voluntariness and that an oral admission of guilt contained in the testimony of three state police officers was involuntary. The District Court ordered Stevenson's release conditioned on the failure of the State to retry the defendant within a reasonable time, and the Court of Appeals affirmed. Without reaching the voluntariness of the confession, it held that the defendant was denied a fair and effective resolution of the voluntariness issue at trial when the trial court failed to hold a preliminary examination on this issue and failed to submit it to the jury under appropriate instructions. We grant certiorari and modify the order of the Court of Appeals, 331 F.2d 939, to conform to our subsequent decision in Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908.*
At Stevenson's trial Officer Coleman restified for the State that he, and two other police officers, arrested the defendant and took him to the Atlantic Sea Food Store to show him the badly mutilated body of the victim. On cross-examination Coleman stated that the defendant strongly resisted efforts to confront him with the still undisturbed scene of the crime inside the building. Another of the officers gave the defendant a choice between entering the store or explaining what he knew about the crime. Coleman testified that the defendant then admitted committing the crime. At the conclusion of this testimony the defense moved to strike the oral confession of guilt because it 'does not comply with the rules covering the introduction of a confession in that he was not warned that any statement he made may and would be used against him or any of the other requirements on entering of a confession.' This motion was overruled without comment and without a hearing on voluntariness. Subsequent motions to exclude the testi- mony of the other two officers in respect to the same challenged admission of guilt were similarly overruled without comment. After this confession was thrice admitted, the defendant took the stand in his own defense and denied ever having made the admission to the officers.
Relying on this denial, the State Supreme Court of Appeals ruled that no preliminary examination was required in this case and that the confession was voluntary.
The practice in West Virginia, when an objection to a confession is interposed, is to hold a preliminary...
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Miller v. Fenton
...(1964) (trial court must make initial determination of voluntariness before submission to jury); Boles v. Stevenson, 379 U.S. 43, 44-46, 85 S.Ct. 174, 175-76, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964) (per curiam) (same as Jackson ); Sims v. Georgia, 385 U.S. 538, 541-44, 87 S.Ct. 639, 641-43, 17 L.Ed.2d 593 (......
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U.S. v. McLernon
...the jury might find that he made were coerced." 518 F.2d at 347; Stevenson v. Boles, 331 F.2d 939 (4th Cir.), modified, 379 U.S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964). Thus even if Carranza did deny the fact that he offered the inculpatory statements, the district court was still required......
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State v. Hatfield
...and second degree murder. In State v. Stevenson, 147 W.Va. 211, 127 S.E.2d 638 (1968), rev'd on other grounds, Boles v. Stevenson, 379 U.S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964), this Court noted at common law there were no degrees of murder, and went on to state that under our statute fi......
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Fernandez v. Beto
...pro tunc finding of voluntariness by the state judge. It is not, however, necessary to reach this question. In Boles v. Stevenson, 1964, 379 U. S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109, the Supreme Court, in a per curiam opinion, held that under the Jackson v. Denno doctrine, a new hearing on th......
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Confessions
...surrounding the voluntariness of confessions applies to oral confessions to the same extent as written confessions. Boles v. Stevenson, 379 U.S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964); Terrazas v. State, 4 S.W.3d 720 (Tex. Crim. App. Where the voluntariness of an oral confession is questio......
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Confessions
...surrounding the voluntariness of confessions applies to oral confessions to the same extent as written confessions. Boles v. Stevenson, 379 U.S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964); Terrazas v. State, 4 S.W.3d 720 (Tex. Crim. App. 1999). Where the voluntariness of an oral confession is ......
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Confessions
...surrounding the voluntariness of confessions applies to oral confessions to the same extent as written confessions. Boles v. Stevenson, 379 U.S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964); Terrazas v. State, 4 S.W.3d 720 (Tex. Crim. App. 1999). Where the voluntariness of an oral confession is ......
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Table of Cases
...(Tex. Crim. App. 1982), §14:53.4 Bolden v. State, 967 S.W.2d 895 (Tex.App.—Fort Worth 1998, pet. ref’d ), §15:24.4.2 Boles v. Stevenson, 379 U.S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964), §6:92 Boles v. Stevenson, 379 U.S. 43, 85 S.Ct. 174, 13 L.Ed.2d 109 (1964), §6:72 Bolt v. State, 604 S.W......