People v. Al-Yousif

• Decision Date: 01 July 2002
• Docket Number: No. 01SA415.,01SA415.
• Citation: 49 P.3d 1165
• Parties: The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Naif AL-YOUSIF, a/k/a Naif Al-Yousir, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

49 P.3d 1165

The PEOPLE of the State of Colorado, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Naif AL-YOUSIF, a/k/a Naif Al-Yousir, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 01SA415.

Supreme Court of Colorado, En Banc.

July 1, 2002.

A. William Ritter, Jr., District Attorney, Robert J. Whitley, Chief Appellate Deputy District Attorney, Denver, Colorado, Attorneys for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Isaacson, Rosenbaum, Woods & Levy, PC, Gary Lozow, Blain D. Myhre, Lisa D.L. Williams, Denver, Colorado, Attorneys for Defendant-Appellee.

Justice KOURLIS delivered the Opinion of the Court.

In this case, we must determine whether to uphold a trial court order suppressing the defendant's statement. The defendant, a native of Saudi Arabia who had lived in the United States for four years, gave the statement after hearing the Miranda rights read to him in English and after agreeing that he understood. The trial court ruled that the defendant did not make a valid waiver of his rights. We conclude that the trial court required a deeper appreciation of the implications and consequences of a waiver than does our case law. Because the question of whether the defendant sufficiently understood his rights to waive them is essentially a conclusion of law, we review it de novo. Based upon that review, including a thorough review of the videotaped interview with the defendant, we now conclude that the defendant did sufficiently understand his rights and that the waiver was, therefore, valid. Accordingly, we reverse the trial court order.

I. Facts

Denver police arrested the defendant, Naif Al-Yousif, a native of Saudi Arabia, in connection with the murder of Abdulaziz Al-Kohaji. At the time of the arrest, the twenty-two-year-old defendant had resided in the United States for four years and had intermittently attended school including English language classes. The arrest took place at the Denver bus station and during the ride to the police station, the defendant told detectives, "I know all about it." Detective Guigli, who was heading the investigation and who was sitting behind Al-Yousif in the car, gave the defendant a brief oral advisement of his rights and then told him to be quiet until they reached the station.

Once at the station, two detectives, Guigli and another named Martinez, began questioning the defendant in a video interview room. They informed Al-Yousif that the interview would be video- and audiotaped. Detective Martinez told Al-Yousif that they "needed to get some paperwork out of the way," and then proceeded to ask him several routine intake questions. After that, Martinez said that he was going to tell Al-Yousif about his rights. Martinez read the traditional Miranda warnings¹ from a preprinted form. The detective instructed Al-Yousif to sign the form in two places; Al-Yousif complied. When the detectives asked the defendant whether they had coerced him or threatened him to make a statement, Al-Yousif looked confused and replied, "What statement?" The detectives clarified they meant the statement the defendant was about to make, and Al-Yousif then responded that no coercion had taken place.

Initially, Al-Yousif denied any knowledge of the murder. When Guigli reminded him that he had already said he "knew all about it," Al-Yousif indicated that he wanted to speak to the victim's uncle before talking to police. The detectives denied this request. As the interview continued, Al-Yousif began making incriminating statements and little by little revealed his role in the murder. The ninety-minute interview ended with Al-Yousif agreeing to take the detectives to a dumpster where he and his cohorts had dumped the victim's body.

When the officers and Al-Yousif returned to the police station from visiting the dumpster, two new officers began to interview Al-Yousif, Detective Vigil and Detective Schneider. Vigil re-advised the defendant of his rights under Miranda, and Al-Yousif said he wanted a lawyer. The officers terminated the interview.

In a pretrial hearing, the trial judge suppressed Al-Yousif's statement to police as being obtained in violation of the Fifth Amendment. After finding that the statement was voluntarily given, the judge concluded that "the People have failed to sustain their burden of proving by a preponderance of the evidence that defendant made a knowing and intelligent waiver of his Miranda rights." The court found the evidence insufficient to support a conclusion that Al-Yousif was "fully aware of the nature of the right to remain silent . . . and the consequences of abandoning that right," as required under People v. Kaiser, 32 P.3d 480 (Colo.2001). The People took this interlocutory appeal pursuant to C.A.R. 4.1 and section 16-12-102(2), 6 C.R.S. (2001).

II. Trial Court's Findings

The trial court's order is thorough and thoughtful. It begins with a narrative of "undisputed facts" accompanied thereafter by the court's resolution of the following "disputed facts": (1) the defendant's background and fluency in English; and (2) the defendant's understanding of his Miranda rights and the waiver.² The judge examined each in turn, weighing the credibility of the various witnesses and explaining his perspective on those questions in detail.

In the "conclusions of law" section of the order, the trial judge examined, again in substantial detail, the factors set forth by this court in Kaiser. One by one, the court rendered determinations on the evidence as it related to each factor.

First, addressing the "time interval" factor, the judge found that a "very brief" time had passed between the advisement and the subsequent interrogation.

Second, concerning who initiated the interview, the judge found that the detectives had initiated it, although Al-Yousif had earlier demonstrated "some eagerness to talk with the detectives."

Third, on efforts made to remind the defendant of his rights, the court found "no effort [was made] to remind defendant of his rights or give a fuller explanation of them during the course of the interrogation."

Fourth, the court found, "Defendant's acknowledgment of the rights and his waiver were so perfunctory as to be meaningless for a person with defendant's background. The advisement was cursory at best."

Fifth, the trial judge ruled that Al-Yousif "did not understand that he had the right to remain silent" as evidenced by his request to speak to the victim's uncle first, which the detectives denied.

Sixth, the court viewed the defendant's immediate request for an attorney the second time he was read the Miranda warnings as demonstrating definitively that the defendant had not understood his rights during the first advisement.

Seventh, the court concluded, based upon the testimony of Al-Yousif's peers and expert witnesses, that the defendant's English abilities were "limited."

Eighth, the court determined that the "defendant's cultural background as a citizen of Saudi Arabia made it impossible for him to understand and absorb the Miranda warnings without further explanation or elaboration."

Finally, the court concluded that Al-Yousif "displayed no lack of intelligence that would have impeded his understanding of an effective explanation of his rights."

Ultimately, the trial court ruled that, when all these factors were considered together, Al-Yousif had not knowingly and intelligently waived his constitutional rights.

III. Standard of Review

We first note that the trial judge held the prosecution to the appropriate burden of proof. People v. Gennings, 808 P.2d 839, 843 (Colo.1991) (noting that the prosecution must prove the validity of the waiver by a preponderance of the evidence). Examining whether the prosecution has met this burden, courts apply a "totality of the circumstances" test. Moran v. Burbine, 475 U.S. 412, 421, 106 S.Ct. 1135, 89 L.Ed.2d 410 (1986) (holding waivers valid "only if the `totality of the circumstances surrounding the interrogation' reveals both an uncoerced choice and the requisite level of comprehension" on behalf of the suspect) (citing Fare v. Michael C., 442 U.S. 707, 725, 99 S.Ct. 2560, 61 L.Ed.2d 197 (1979)).

The courts must necessarily examine the objective circumstances surrounding the waiver in an effort to determine the suspect's level of understanding. See Colorado v. Connelly, 479 U.S. 157, 166-68, 107 S.Ct. 515, 93 L.Ed.2d 473 (1986)

; United States v. Yunis, 859 F.2d 953, 965 (D.C.Cir.1988). In that context, it falls to the trial courts to resolve "disputed facts," and, as a reviewing court, we defer to the trial court's resolution of those disputed facts when the resolution is supported by competent evidence in the record. People v. Miranda-Olivas, 41 P.3d 658, 661 (Colo.2001); Gennings, 808 P.2d at 844. However, as we recently clarified in People v. Matheny, 46 P.3d 453 (Colo.2002), the appellate courts have an enhanced role in examining a trial court's application of law to fact, particularly in the arena of constitutional rights. Id. at 461-62. After acknowledging the traditional deference afforded a trial court on purely factual issues, see People v. Quezada, 731 P.2d 730, 732 (Colo.1987), we ruled in Matheny that the application of the legal standard to the facts, an exercise that resolves the "ultimate constitutional question," merits de novo review. Matheny, 46 P.3d at 462. Thus, where the historical facts are supported by competent evidence in the record, we will not disturb them. But interpreting the significance of those facts to resolve the constitutional question at hand we undertake as if for the first time. See id.

In this context, we accept those trial court findings that have support in the record, but the question of whether Al Yousif understood the Miranda warnings to the extent that his waiver was "knowing and intelligent," is a legal question that we review "de novo."

IV. The Test for Constitutional Sufficiency

As noted in 2 Wayne R. LaFave et al., Criminal Procedure § 6.9(b), at 586 (2d ed.1999),

[a] waiver may be knowing and

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