People v. Hamilton, 92SA21
| Decision Date | 07 July 1992 |
| Docket Number | No. 92SA21,92SA21 |
| Citation | 831 P.2d 1326 |
| Parties | The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Michael Joseph HAMILTON, Defendant-Appellee. |
| Court | Colorado Supreme Court |
James F. Smith, Dist. Atty., and Steven L. Bernard, Deputy Dist. Atty., Brighton, for plaintiff-appellant.
David F. Vela, Colorado State Public Defender, and Lisabeth P. Castle, Deputy State Public Defender, Brighton, for defendant-appellee.
The People, pursuant to C.A.R. 4.1, have filed this interlocutory appeal from a ruling in which the district court suppressed several inculpatory statements made by the defendant, Michael Hamilton, to police officers contemporaneously with and subsequent to his arrest for second-degree burglary of a dwelling. The district court suppressed the defendant's initial statement to the arresting officer because it was the result of a custodial interrogation which had not been preceded by the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). The district court also suppressed the defendant's subsequent statements as the illegal products of the initial statement made by the defendant without the benefit of the Miranda warnings. We affirm that part of the district court's ruling suppressing the defendant's initial statement. Because, however, the district court applied an erroneous legal standard in suppressing the subsequent statements, we reverse that part of the ruling suppressing those statements. We accordingly remand the case to the district court for further proceedings in accordance with the correct standard for constitutional admissibility of the inculpatory statements made by the defendant subsequent to his initial unwarned statement.
The defendant was charged in the Adams County District Court with second-degree burglary of a dwelling. After pleading not guilty to the charge, the defendant filed a motion to suppress several incriminating statements made to the police on the grounds that they were made without an adequate warning or waiver of Miranda rights and were constitutionally involuntary. The district court conducted an evidentiary hearing on the suppression motion at which the following evidence was elicited.
On April 23, 1991, Charles Worley reported to the Commerce City Police Department that a videocassette recorder had been stolen from his Commerce City home. The burglar had gained entry to the Worley residence by pushing on a window and dislodging a piece of wood placed in the track of the window. Worley told the investigating officer that the defendant had stayed at the Worley residence for a period of time and knew that the window could be opened in this manner.
On the day after the burglary Worley telephoned the police and reported that the defendant was present at the Worley home at that time. Officer Abbott responded to the Worley residence and met Worley in the front yard. Worley told Officer Abbott that Hamilton was inside the home. As Worley and the officer were walking into the home, Worley told the officer that Hamilton was a little bit "slow" and that he had already admitted the theft of the videocassette recorder.
Officer Abbott and Worley continued talking about the burglary in the front living room of the Worley residence while Hamilton was present in the same room. Officer Abbott then telephoned the police station and received verification that a burglary had occurred at the Worley residence, that a videocassette recorder had been taken, and that the suspect's name was Michael Hamilton.
Officer Abbott testified at the suppression hearing that because it appeared to him that the defendant was in the Worley residence with Worley's consent, he would not have prevented the defendant from leaving before his telephone call to the police station for a verification of the burglary. After receiving the verification of the burglary from the police records department, however, Officer Abbott approached the defendant and asked him his name and asked, "What's happening here between you and Mr. Worley?". Hamilton told the officer his name and stated that he had returned to the Worley residence because he felt guilty about having taken the videocassette recorder. At that point Officer Abbott advised the defendant of his Miranda rights. After the defendant stated that he understood his Miranda rights, Officer Abbott asked him how he stole the VCR. The defendant responded that he knew how to get into the Worley residence, that he had done so, and that he had taken the videocassette recorder and sold it. Officer Abbott arrested the defendant and took him to the Commerce City police station. Officer Abbott acknowledged during his suppression testimony that the defendant spoke slowly and "formulate[d] his sentences more than most people would."
At the police station Officer Abbott told the defendant that his Miranda rights were still in effect and asked the defendant whether he wanted to make a written statement. The defendant stated that he did and wrote out a statement admitting his participation in the burglary. The defendant was subsequently transported to the county jail.
On April 25, 1991, the day after the defendant's arrest, Officer Pfannenstiel, a Commerce City police detective, went to the county jail to interview the defendant. The detective first advised the defendant of his Miranda rights and then asked him whether he understood his rights as they were read to him. The defendant responded affirmatively and signed a written acknowledgement that he had been advised of his rights. The defendant, however, did not sign that portion of the form indicating that he understood each of the rights that had been read to him. Detective Pfannenstiel also testified at the suppression hearing that he could not remember if he read the following statement from the advisement form to the defendant: "Knowing my rights and knowing what I'm doing, I now wish to voluntarily talk to you." Neither the defendant's signature nor the detective's signature appeared below this "waiver" provision on the advisement form. After advising the defendant of his Miranda rights, the detective questioned the defendant about the burglary and tape-recorded the defendant's confession. Detective Pfannenstiel acknowledged in his suppression testimony that the defendant was "slow" and that he had trouble expressing himself.
The defendant testified at the suppression hearing that he remembered having been read his rights by Officer Abbott at the Worley home but that he did not understand them. He acknowledged, however, that he had been arrested previously, but he did not remember being advised of his Miranda rights on those occasions and did not understand what was meant by "rights."
A social services case manager, Bonnie Good, also testified at the suppression hearing. She stated that the defendant had been enrolled in several programs offered by the North Metro Community Services Agency. Ms. Good also stated that the defendant had an IQ of 45 and that he is a "verbal" person who can listen to whatever someone is saying to him and that he "can tell you these words back," but "he's not able to conceptualize." What this means, according to Ms. Good, is that the defendant may say that he understands something but he really "doesn't understand the scope of things that go with that," and as a result a person talking to him believes that the defendant "understands or is more knowledgeable about things than he really is."
The district court, in ruling on the suppression motion, first considered the totality of circumstances surrounding the defendant's initial statement to Officer Abbott at the Worley home and concluded that a reasonable person in that situation, with or without cognitive limitations, would have believed that he was not free to leave the Worley residence and would also have believed that he was about to be arrested for burglary. The district court also ruled that Officer Abbott's first question to the defendant--namely, "What's happening here between you and Mr. Worley?"--constituted custodial interrogation because it was reasonably calculated to elicit an incriminating response from the defendant. The district court accordingly suppressed the defendant's initial statement to the police because it was obtained as a result of a custodial interrogation without a prior Miranda advisement.
The district court also suppressed the defendant's second statement to Officer Abbott at the Worley residence made shortly after the first incriminating statement because, in the court's view, the second statement was the immediate product of the first custodial statement made by the defendant without the benefit of the Miranda warnings. In addition, the court ruled that the defendant's statement to Officer Abbott at the Commerce City police station shortly after his arrest also was the direct product of the illegal interrogation of the defendant at the Worley home. Finally, the court suppressed the defendant's statement to Detective Pfannenstiel at the county jail made the day after the defendant's initial interrogation and arrest because, according to the court, "[there] is nothing to show that the defendant had any opportunity in the intervening time to interview with an attorney and discuss the matter with counsel" and that "there was nothing to attenuate, significantly attenuate, the effect of the first three confessions" made by the defendant on the day of his arrest.
The People in this interlocutory appeal argue that the district court applied an erroneous standard in determining that the defendant was in custody when he made his first inculpatory statement to Officer Abbott at the Worley home and that the court also erred in suppressing the defendant's subsequent inculpatory statements to the police as the fruit of the initial incriminating statement. We will address these arguments in turn.
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