People v. Soto
| Decision Date | 25 June 1984 |
| Docket Number | Cr. 44632 |
| Citation | 204 Cal.Rptr. 204,157 Cal.App.3d 694 |
| Court | California Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
| Parties | The PEOPLE, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Carmelo SOTO, Defendant and Appellant. |
Thomas Kallay, Los Angeles, under appointment by the Court of Appeal, for defendant and appellant.
John Van de Kamp, Atty. Gen., Howard J. Schwab and Edward T. Fogel, Jr., Deputy Attys. Gen., for plaintiff and respondent.
Upon trial by jury, defendant was convicted of second-degree murder with use of a deadly weapon. (Pen.Code, §§ 187; 12022, subd. (b).) He appeals, contending: (1) improper introduction of a confession and the murder weapon, (2) erroneous exclusion of defense evidence, and (3) various errors in the jury instructions. We conclude that the confession was obtained in violation of Miranda v. Arizona (1966) 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, and we therefore reverse.
Sixteen-year old Rosa Gutierrez was killed on the night of August 20, 1980. Her sisters discovered the body in the family living room at 10:30 p.m. She had been stabbed multiple times in the head and neck, and suffered several more blunt-force trauma wounds. Her clothes had been partially removed. Police noted blood in various areas of the living room.
Police interviewed Rosa's family and friends, including 19-year old defendant, whom Rosa had mentioned in her diary in an amorous context and whom she had tried to telephone on the night of her death. In the first interview, on the morning of August 21, defendant denied all knowledge of the killing. In a subsequent interview on August 27, he confessed to it, and led the police to an open area near which they found a jagged "rebar" (reinforcement bar used in construction work) which could have caused the blunt force wounds and several of the stab wounds.
In the interview, defendant stated he had stabbed Rosa in the hand, arm, and leg as well as the head and neck; her body, however displayed no such wounds. Defendant also insisted that the stabbing occurred in Rosa's front yard; although the stab wounds were such as would have caused instantaneous and considerable bleeding, no blood was found outside the house. Defendant repeatedly insisted that Rosa had been wearing pants; in fact she had worn a dress. Defendant accurately described the location in the living room where the body had been left, the fact that it was left partially unclad, and the fact that a knife had been used.
Apart from the confession, no evidence connected defendant with the crime. Examination of the rebar failed to disclose any indication that it had been used as a weapon.
The defense was alibi. Defendant testified that the confession was given falsely in response to badgering by the police, that he had learned of some of the details of the crime from a newspaper article and Rosa's family, and that he had made up other details.
The jury found defendant guilty after a little more than four full days of deliberation.
Defendant contends that, by repeatedly asking to call his mother during the station house interrogation of August 27, he invoked his constitutional right to remain silent. Therefore, he urges, the trial court should have excluded both the ensuing confession and the rebar which the police were able to locate as a result of the confession.
The trial court concluded that defendant did not invoke his right to silence. Its ruling was based on a tape recording and transcript of the interrogation, and on conflicting testimony about related events which were not taped. We now must accept the version of the conflicting evidence which is most favorable to the People, and examine the tape and transcript of the interrogation, to determine independently whether defendant invoked his Fifth Amendment rights. (People v. Jackson (1980) 28 Cal.3d 264, 300, 168 Cal.Rptr. 603, 618 P.2d 149.)
Defendant's requests to call home and to speak to his mother occurred late in the interrogation process. First, defendant was interviewed on the morning of August 21 when he was not a suspect in the crime. Then, on the evening of August 26, he was interviewed again and given a lie detector test, which he "failed." 1 The police took defendant home around 11:00 p.m. on August 26, then picked him up early the next morning for a second lie detector test which he again failed. After this test, defendant was taken to Rosa's grave at his request. According to police testimony, in the police car on the way back to the station, defendant said, "What if I did it, but didn't know what I was doing?" This was defendant's first statement indicating that he may have been involved in the crime. In response, the officer read defendant his Miranda rights and said he would talk to defendant about it at the station. Defendant had previously been given, and waived, his Miranda rights at the interview of August 26 and at the two lie detector tests. The rights were not again mentioned after the exchange in the police car.
At the station a period of questioning commenced which was tape-recorded without defendant's knowledge. In this session (which the parties refer to as the "dream sequence") defendant stated many details of how he had killed Rosa, in the guise of a dream he had had on the night of her death.
The following exchange then occurred:
[Two and a half minute period of silence.]
The questioning then continued with defendant alternating between providing more details of the crime, saying he did not remember and was just relating a dream, saying that he was telling the truth, and saying that most of what he had been telling the officer was "bullshit." Several times during this sequence, the original interrogating officer, and another who had joined the session, 2 told defendant that they thought he was covering up for his brother. 3 Defendant's requests to call home were then renewed:
The officer's references to defendant's brother, and his to his mother, culminated shortly thereafter:
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