Mao v. State, A96A1582
| Decision Date | 13 August 1996 |
| Docket Number | No. A96A1582,A96A1582 |
| Citation | 474 S.E.2d 679,222 Ga.App. 482 |
| Parties | MAO v. The STATE. |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
Colette B. Resnik, Atlanta, for appellant.
Daniel J. Porter, Dist. Atty., David K. Keeton, Asst. Dist. Atty., for appellee.
Saon Mao was convicted of aggravated assault and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. She appeals the denial of her motion to suppress her custodial statement. We affirm.
Although Mao was read her Miranda rights twice before giving the statement, she contends that a combination of linguistic, cultural, and emotional factors prevented her from making a knowing and intelligent waiver of those rights.
Mao was born in Cambodia in 1958. She fled from there to a refugee camp in Thailand, where she spent several years before emigrating to the United States approximately seven years before her trial. She spoke little English when she arrived, but took English classes and learned the language through everyday interactions with other people. Mao earned her GED and completed some nursing school before the incident that gave rise to this case.
In that incident, Mao shot her estranged boyfriend when he returned some gifts she had given him during the relationship. A police officer called to the scene of the shooting placed Mao in the back seat of his patrol car and read her Miranda rights to her. She said she understood her rights and was willing to talk to him, but he did not continue the conversation.
A detective arrived a short time later and again read Mao her Miranda rights, and again she said she understood and was willing to talk. He advised Mao that she was being charged with aggravated assault. She asked what the charge meant, and he explained that it meant she was accused of shooting the victim. The detective then tape-recorded her statement while they sat in the back seat of the patrol car. The statement was about four or five minutes in length, and was recorded approximately 25 to 40 minutes after the patrol officer first received the call about the shooting.
While in custody before trial, Mao was interviewed by Dr. Robert Storms and Dr. Theresa Sapp, forensic psychologists with the Georgia Mental Health Institute. Both later testified at the Jackson-Denno hearing that they believed Mao had not actually understood her Miranda rights, even though she had given the patrol officer and the detective the impression that she understood them. Storms and Sapp based this opinion on several underlying factors:
They concluded that the cultures in which Mao had lived most of her life did not have a tradition of citizens' rights to due process and against self-incrimination; and that Mao, while living under oppression in Cambodia and Thailand, had developed the "survival mechanism" of always indicating understanding and assent to people in authority. Storms and Sapp also found that though Mao's...
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