Roderick v. State, CR

• Decision Date: 17 March 1986
• Docket Number: No. CR,CR
• Citation: 288 Ark. 360,705 S.W.2d 433
• Parties: Jim Duke RODERICK, Appellant v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee. 85-86.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

Page 433

705 S.W.2d 433

288 Ark. 360

Jim Duke RODERICK, Appellant v. STATE of Arkansas, Appellee.

No. CR 85-86.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

March 17, 1986.

Brad J. Beavers and W. Frank Morledge, Forrest City, for appellant.

Steve Clark, Atty. Gen. by Joel O. Huggins, Asst. Atty. Gen., Little Rock, for appellee.

HAYS, Justice.

On the evening of Friday, August 12, 1983, the nude body of Linda Cruce was found in a rural area of St. Francis County. The sheriff's office began an investigation, obtaining information that the appellant, Jim Duke Roderick, had been seen with Linda Cruce several times leading up to the discovery of the body.

On Monday evening, August 15, having heard the sheriff wanted to talk to him, Roderick came to the sheriff's office at about 7:00 o'clock where he was arrested, given the Miranda warnings and placed in a jail cell. Sometime around midnight Roderick sent word that he wanted to talk and he gave a statement which implicated him in the murder. He said when he and Linda left the Razorback on Thursday evening she wanted to go to the Legion Club; when he told her he didn't have any more money she called him a "no good bum." He said he struck her with the heel of his hand on her neck and she slumped over. He drove to a secluded spot, removed her clothes and had sex with her. Afterwards he realized she was not breathing, so he left her body nearby and threw her clothes and purse in the river near Big Eddie's Hill.

Roderick was tried, convicted and sentenced to life without parole, which brings this appeal. He presents a number of points of error, one of which is persuasive and requires reversal. Roderick argues that because there was no probable cause for his arrest his statement should have been suppressed. The argument must be sustained.

Probable cause to arrest without a warrant exists when the facts and circumstances within the officers' collective knowledge and of which they have reasonably trustworthy information are sufficient in themselves to warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that an offense has been committed by the person to be arrested. Coble v. State, 274 Ark. 134, 624 S.W.2d 421 (1981); Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 93 L.Ed.2d 1879 (1949); Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132, 45 S.Ct. 280, 69 L.Ed.2d 543 (1925). A.R.Cr.P. Rule 4.1. It has been held not to require that degree of proof sufficient to sustain a conviction. McGuire v. State, 265 Ark. 621, 580 S.W.2d 198 (1979). Its determination is based on factual and practical considerations of prudent men rather than of legal technicians. Sanders v. State, 259 Ark. 329, 532 S.W.2d 752 (1976). However, a mere suspicion is not enough. Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963). Even a "strong reason to suspect," will not suffice. Henry v. United States, 361 U.S. 98, 80 S.Ct. 168, 4 L.Ed.2d 134 (1959).

With that background, we find probable cause in this case to be plainly lacking. Three officers testified: Sheriff Coolidge Conlee, Chief Deputy Evan Hughes and Deputy Chuck Thomas. Their proof, separately or combined, failed to add up to more than a bare suspicion. The substance of their information was that Roderick, who was having marital problems, was seen on Wednesday and Thursday nights drinking beer with the victim at the Crazy Horse Saloon and at the Razorback Club. There was a report that they were "shacking up." The two were last seen together leaving the Razorback at about 9:00 or 9:30 on Thursday evening, August 11. On the evening of August 12 the victim's body was found off Barrow Hill Road near Lake St. Francis.

We think the information of the officers at the time Roderick was arrested fails to rise to the level of probable cause. Given its strongest import, it amounts to little more than that the two were seen together in public, which can hardly translate into probable cause to charge Roderick with murder. The point is best illustrated by the testimony of the officers themselves Officer Thomas, who was in charge of the investigation, testified candidly that there was nothing in his investigation that led him to believe Roderick had committed the crime at the time of his arrest. Sheriff Conlee's testimony provides no help, as he said there was nothing to tie Roderick to the crime at the time of his arrest except that he was the last person to be seen with Linda Cruce. Sheriff Conlee's tacit acknowledgement that probable cause was wanting is found, we believe, in his admission that Roderick was not charged with any crime on Monday evening when he was undeniably arrested, but was charged simply with "suspicion of murder." The sheriff said he was "only a suspect" until he gave his statement sometime after midnight on August 16. There is, of course, no crime known as "suspicion of murder," and one who is merely suspected of a crime, while subject to a brief detention (A.R.Cr.P. Rule 3.1), is not subject to arrest. The testimony of Officer Hughes adds nothing not already mentioned.

The state points out that when Roderick came to the Sheriff's office on Monday evening he denied knowing Linda Cruce. But that did not come out until Roderick testified at the trial, and even when that element is added to the remaining proof, it comes up short. Whatever Roderick's initial statement may have been, it obviously was not regarded by the officers as significant because none of them mentioned it in the suppression hearing. It is their knowledge at the moment of arrest that determines whether probable cause exists. Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 85 S.Ct. 223, 13 L.Ed.2d 142 (1964). For the reasons stated, we find there was no probable cause to arrest Jim Duke Roderick on Monday evening. "Arrest on mere suspicion collides violently with the basic human rights of liberty." Henry v. United States, supra, 361 U.S. at p. 101, 80 S.Ct. at p. 170.

That brings us to the collateral issue--is the statement Roderick gave after midnight tainted by his unlawful arrest? The state has a heavy burden of proof in this case. It must prove that the statement, made while Roderick was in custody, was not only voluntary, Harvey v. State, 272 Ark. 19, 611 S.W.2d 762 (1981), but that there was no causal connection between the statement and the illegal arrest. Brown v. Illinois, 422 U.S. 590, 95 S.Ct. 2254, 45 L.Ed.2d 416 (1975). Dunaway v. New York, 442 U.S. 200, 99 S.Ct. 2248, 60 L.Ed.2d 824 (1979). Those determinations are made upon the totality of the circumstances at the time the statement was given. Fuller v. State, 278 Ark. 450, 646 S.W.2d 700 (1983). On appeal that evidence is reviewed independently of the trial court's findings as to the issue of voluntariness. Hunes v. State, 274 Ark. 268, 623 S.W.2d 835 (1981).

As to the illegal arrest, it has long been the rule that statements, like objects, are to be excluded as evidence if they are found to be the fruits of an unlawful arrest. Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963). In Brown v. Illinois, supra, the Supreme Court reversed a holding by the Illinois Supreme Court that the giving of the Miranda warnings following an illegal arrest operated as an intervening cause to purge the primary taint of the unlawful arrest. The United States Supreme Court observed:

It is entirely possible ... that persons arrested illegally frequently may decide to confess, as an act of free will unaffected by the initial illegality. But the Miranda warnings, alone and per se, cannot always make the act sufficiently a product of free will to break, for Fourth Amendment purposes, the causal connection between the illegality and the confession.

Thus, whether the confession or statement is an act of...