State v. Collins

• Court: South Carolina Supreme Court
• Writing for the Court: CHIEF JUSTICE BEATTY
• Citation: State v. Collins, 442 S.C. 444 (S.C. 2024)
• Docket Number: Appellate Case No. 2021-001176,Opinion No. 28197
• Decision Date: 03 April 2024
• Parties: The STATE, Petitioner, v. Randy COLLINS, Respondent.
• topic: Criminal procedure,Civil Procedure

442 S.C. 444

The STATE, Petitioner,

v.Randy COLLINS, Respondent.

Appellate Case No. 2021-001176

Opinion No. 28197

Supreme Court of South Carolina.

Heard October 3, 2023

Filed April 3, 2024

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE COURT OF APPEALS

Appeal From Georgetown County, Larry B. Hyman, Jr., Circuit Court Judge

Attorney General Alan McCrory Wilson and Assistant Deputy Attorney General Mark Reynolds Farthing, both of Co- lumbia; and Solicitor Jimmy A. Richardson, II, of Conway, for Petitioner.

E. Brandon Gaskins, of Moore & Van Allen, PLLC, of Charleston, and Chief Appellate Defender Robert Michael Dudek, of Columbia, for Respondent.

CHIEF JUSTICE BEATTY:

Randy Collins was convicted of first-degree arson and criminal conspiracy. The court of appeals reversed and remanded the matter to the circuit court for a new trial on the basis Collins’s statement to law enforcement was involuntary and, thus, inadmissible. State v. Collins, 435 S.C. 31, 864 S.E.2d 914 (Ct. App. 2021). We granted the State’s petition for a writ of certiorari and now affirm as modified. We hold Collins’s statement was rendered involuntary when law enforcement gave Collins Miranda ¹ warnings and subsequently negated them by falsely advising him that his statements would remain confidential.

I. FACTS

On March 29, 2014, firefighters received a call around 1:15 a.m. and responded to a fire at a mobile home that was rented by Marissa Cohen in Andrews, South Carolina. The neighbor who reported the fire indicated that he believed the home to be vacant (as Cohen had recently removed her belongings). However, upon forcibly entering the locked home and extinguishing the fire, the firefighters discovered the body of a twelve-year-old boy—Cohen’s youngest son—who had died from smoke inhalation.

The town’s fire marshal, who was also the firefighters’ chaplain, was struck by Cohen’s reaction at the scene, as she seemed unusually calm for someone who had just lost her son. Investigators quickly determined the fire had been set with an accelerant found in kerosene that had been poured on the floor. Further investigation revealed that Cohen had purchased $20 worth of kerosene the night of the fire; that she obtained a $25,000 contents-only insurance policy on the mo- bile home a few weeks before the fire; and that she had filed a claim under the policy just a week after her son’s death.²

Collins became part of the investigation based on an anonymous tip received by an investigator with the Georgetown County Sheriff’s Office, Melvyn Garrett ("Investigator Garrett"), who was told Cohen, Collins, and another individual, Benjamin "Mano" Brown, were involved in the fire.³

Investigator Garrett transcribed a short statement from Collins on April 9, 2014, in which Collins denied any involvement and stated he was at a club with James Miller, his nephew, at the time of the fire, and a bartender he knew had been working that night. Investigator Garrett obtained a similar statement from Miller on April 10, 2014, in which Miller stated he was not involved in the fire and had been at a club with Collins.

Investigator Garrett determined there were inconsistencies in the statements from Collins and Miller, however, after he talked to the bartender and other people who had been at the club that evening. Thereafter, officers obtained a search warrant to determine if there had been any communication between the parties. Senior Agent Scott Hardee ("Agent Hardee") from the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division ("SLED"), an arson specialist who assisted in the investigation, reviewed the phone data and discovered that Collins and Cohen had spoken three times just prior to the fire, during the evening hours of March 28, 2014, and again three times after the fire, at 2:50 a.m., 3:01 a.m., and 3:24 a.m. on March 29, 2014.

On June 4, 2014, Collins arranged with Officer Nesmith, someone he already knew, to retrieve his phones at the Andrews Town Hall and Police Department (the offices were located at one complex). Once there, however, Collins encountered Agent Hardee and Investigator Garrett, who knew Collins would be coming to pick up his phones. The two officers were waiting for Collins, as he had previously failed to show up for an interview with them, and they had been trying, unsuccessfully, to reach him.

Collins agreed to talk to Agent Hardee and Investigator Garrett, so the three of them went to a small room on the premises. Prior to the start of the interview, the officers went over a SLED form, entitled "Miranda Rights," with Collins, with the time noted as 10:20 a.m. The form set forth a listing of rights, including the rights to remain silent, to have an attorney present during questioning, and to the appointment of an attorney if he could not afford one. It also included the warning: "Anything you say can be used in court as evidence against you." Agent Hardee read the form to Collins, and Collins initialed next to each item. Collins signed underneath a "Waiver of Rights" section at the bottom of the form to indicate that he understood his rights and was willing to talk to the officers without an attorney present. The interview lasted approximately three hours. It was recorded using Agent Hardee’s personal video camera, which was similar in size to a cell phone and was reportedly visible to Collins on the table. The battery died at about 1.5 hours in, however, so when Agent Hardee realized that, he replaced the battery to resume the recording.

When asked at the beginning of the interview whether he had any preexisting issues, Collins, who was 43, noted he had a stroke in April 2013 and had been in a car accident in 2006. He also noted that he had gotten little sleep the night before and had not eaten breakfast that morning, as he had not planned to be interviewed. Agent Hardee mentioned that the "word on the street" was that Collins had something to do with the fire. Agent Hardee advised Collins that investigators had determined the fire was intentionally set with kerosene and a young boy died in the fire, so they were trying to figure out who could provide information about this incident. Collins initially denied any involvement in the fire and reiterated his position that he had been at a club named Carnell that evening with Miller, his nephew, although Collins changed the timeline slightly from his prior statement, indicating he went to the club at approximately 11:00 p.m. and left around 2:00 a.m. Collins said he recognized T. Chandler running the bar and spoke to him while Miller played pool. Collins stated Miller took him home after they left the club.

As the officers continued the discussion, Agent Hardee asked Collins to set aside their discussion to that point and just tell them what he thought happened and whether the fire was intentional or "a bad accident." Collins responded that he did not know and did not want to "say the wrong thing." Agent Hardee reassured Collins that the interview was confidential, emphasizing that the door was shut and the blinds were closed in the interview room and that anything Collins told them was only for the "file" and would not "leave this room." The court of appeals accurately recounted this point in the interview as follows:

Of particular note … is an assurance made by Agent Hardee approximately twenty-one minutes into the interview, after Appellant was asked whether he thought the fire was intentionally started, and Appellant responded he did not want to "say the wrong thing." Agent Hardee responded, "Well, you’re not going to say the wrong thing. Whatever you tell me, it ain’t gonna leave this room. This, um, tape is going into my file. And I’m gonna, I’m gonna burn a copy for him [Investigator Garrett]. And we’ll have a copy of this tape. And it ain’t gonna go any further than this room. That’s why we got the door shut, the blinds pulled, there’s no sound device in here. I want you to be honest with me and tell me what you think."

State v. Collins, 435 S.C. 31, 41-42, 864 S.E.2d 914, 919 (Ct. App. 2021).

The officers reassured Collins that they were interested in Cohen, not him, and that no matter what happened during the interview, Collins would be able to go home that day. However, the officers also told Collins that if he did not tell them anything, he could be facing over thirty years in prison. Collins asked to stop the interview at one point, but he was told not to leave by the officers, as they believed he was on the verge of revealing inculpatory information.

Collins eventually acknowledged that Cohen, who rented the mobile home, had asked him to burn it down. Collins stated he had declined to do it, but he told Miller about Cohen’s request. Collins conceded that he was at the mobile home with Miller the night of the fire, but he maintained that he left the scene and was not the person who actually started the fire.

Ultimately, at the conclusion of the three-hour interview, Collins signed a written, two-page statement for the Georgetown County Sheriff’s Office that was labeled "VOLUNTARY STATEMENT" on June 4, 2014, at 1:40 p.m. Collins began the statement by maintaining, "I DID NOT DO it." Collins acknowledged that Cohen had asked him to do a "job" of burning down her home and offered him $5,000; that she told him to "think about it"; that he had told his nephew, Miller, about it; that after he and Miller went to the club that night, he told Miller to take him home, but Miller did not and, instead, drove over to the mobile home; after finding the doors to the home locked, Miller pushed a window open and lit a piece of paper and threw it in the window; Miller thereafter drove around the home several times but did not "see anything lit"; and Miller took him home. Collins ended the written statement by indicating Cohen called him and told him that her son was dead and, after that, at around 3:30 a.m., Miller came to his home and also informed him that Cohen’s son had died in the mobile home fire. Collins was permitted to go...