State v. Evans

• Decision Date: 12 June 2000
• Docket Number: No. 3187.,3187.
• Citation: 341 S.C. 219,534 S.E.2d 10
• Parties: The STATE, Appellant, v. Florence Robinson EVANS, Respondent.
• Court: South Carolina Court of Appeals

341 S.C. 219

534 S.E.2d 10

The STATE, Appellant, v. Florence Robinson EVANS, Respondent.

No. 3187.

Court of Appeals of South Carolina.

Heard December 9, 1999.

Decided June 12, 2000.

Rehearing Denied September 2, 2000.

Attorney General Charles M. Condon, Chief Deputy Attorney General John W. McIntosh, Assistant Deputy Attorney Generals Donald J. Zelenka and David K. Avant, and Assistant Attorney General S. Creighton Waters, all of Columbia, for appellant.

Senior Assistant Appellate Defender Wanda H. Haile, of SC Office of Appellate Defense, of Columbia, for respondent.

CURETON, Judge:

A Chesterfield County grand jury indicted Florence Robinson Evans for the murder of her three children.¹ At a pretrial hearing, the trial court suppressed Evans's oral and written confessions. The State appeals. We affirm.

FACTS

On the morning of March 4, 1994, a fire destroyed the Pageland trailer-home of Evans and killed her three small children. Evans survived as she was visiting her sister's nearby home at the time of the fire. Later that day, arson investigator Terry Alexander of the South Carolina Law Enforcement Division (SLED) obtained Evans's permission to search the burned-out trailer, but she refused to give Alexander a written statement. An initial test of the site revealed the presence of a flammable substance in the debris. Samples were collected for later analysis at SLED's laboratory to determine the type of accelerant present at the commencement of the fire.

Agent Alexander did not return to Pageland until after the children's funerals. Around lunchtime on March 14, 1994, he attempted to contact Evans at the home of her cousin where she had been staying since the fire, but Evans was not there. He left word with an occupant of the house to ask Evans to "come to the Pageland Police Department for the purposes [sic] of talking to me about the fire." Between 3:00 and 4:00 p.m., Evans's cousin, Inez Robinson, drove Evans to Pageland's police station.² Alexander and his supervisor, SLED Lieutenant Doug Ross, escorted Evans back to a detective's office in the station which they had borrowed to conduct the interview. Robinson and several other family members who had accompanied Evans to the station were left in the station's waiting room. Robinson asked if she could accompany Evans because "she's quiet," and Robinson wanted to be with her, but the officers refused.

Once inside the small detective's office, Evans agreed to talk with Agent Alexander and Lt. Ross. She told them that on the morning of the fire, she arose just before 9:00 a.m., lit a kerosene heater, then left her children asleep in the trailer while she went next door to visit her sister. Minutes after her arrival, Evans's sister said she smelled smoke, so Evans looked out the window and saw her trailer in flames. Evans testified that she rushed back to the trailer and attempted to gain entry, but was barred by the flames. When asked what caused the fire, Evans opined that it could have been caused by either dogs under the trailer, her sister's son playing with matches, or a faulty electrical outlet. During the interview, Alexander took notes on a "Voluntary Statement" form, but he neither asked Evans to read the form nor advised her of the Miranda³ rights contained thereon.

Agent Alexander testified that although Evans was "very cooperative" during the interview, she was also upset and sobbing. At times, Evans would speak so softly that Alexander could barely understand her. She would also clutch the agent's hands and ask him for help. Although Alexander repeatedly asked her what type of help she required, Evans never responded with a specific request. Alexander testified that he felt the interview was very unproductive and tried to end it on several occasions, but claimed that Evans would respond with tears and repeat her request for help.

Lieutenant Ross confirmed Alexander's account of the interview. He testified that "the interview seemed to be—you know—basically no help at all" and "was a very long drawn out event" which lasted two or three hours. Ross also claims to have been unsuccessful in ending the interview.

After more than an hour of questioning, the two agents stepped into the hall outside the interview room to confer about Evans's statement. Ross testified that he suggested to agent Jennifer Edwards of SLED's child fatality unit to "go in and talk to [Evans], see if [Edwards] could—you know—get anything different than we already had." Edwards testified she spent "approximately 45 minutes to an hour" alone with Evans trying to comfort her. Edwards maintains she was just "having a conversation" with Evans the whole time and "was not on a fact-finding mission." On at least one occasion, Edwards escorted Evans to the bathroom and "stood outside the door" because, according to her, she thought Evans may try to harm herself. When they returned to the interview room, Evans continued to plead for help. Edwards responded: "Florence, I don't know what kind of help you need until you tell me." Evans then whispered, "I dropped a lit piece of paper on the floor.... I walked next door and waited until somebody saw the fire." Edwards immediately summoned Ross and asked Evans to repeat what she had said. Evans complied. Ross called in Alexander and Evans again repeated the statement. As a result, Alexander added another paragraph to his notes on the Voluntary Statement form:

I dropped a lit piece of paper on the floor. I rolled it up and lit it. It was writing paper. I dropped the paper on a rug. The rug caught on fire and I went out the front door. I went next door to my sisters [sic] house and just waited. I waited about two hours until someone saw the fire. I got some kerosene in a cup and poured it on the rug. The fire got bigger and as I left it was burning a lot [sic]. I was hurting inside about seeing people do people wrong. Please get me some help. Please get me some help. I lit the fire with a match. I don't remember who found the fire. I got the kerosene out of the blue jug and put it back on the porch.

The interview ended at 6:01 p.m. Alexander read his notes back to Evans and she subsequently signed and initialed the "Voluntary Statement." As a result, the officers immediately placed her under arrest. Evans testified that during the interview, she repeatedly asked to speak with her cousin, Inez Robinson. She also admitted to asking the agents for help. Evans does not deny signing the voluntary statement, but claims she thought she "was signing some [sic] papers to get me some [sic] help."

Robinson also attempted to speak with Evans during the interview, but was restricted to the station's waiting room until after Evans's arrest. Robinson testified that "[w]hen [Evans] saw me, she just run [sic] to me and held me. She said she told them she wanted to get to me.... She kept crying out to see me. They would not let her see me." According to Robinson, Evans was "real shaky" and "upset, like if someone had scolded her." She said Evans told her "[t]here was some kind of paper they wanted her to sign," and Evans then declared, "Inez, I did not kill my babies." Robinson stated she had "never seen [Florence] look like that" and reported that Evans told her the officers "pushed her to sign some papers."

A Chesterfield County grand jury indicted Evans on three counts of murder on April 13, 1994. On May 1-4, 1998 the trial court held a Jackson v. Denno⁴ hearing to discuss the admissibility of Evans's oral and written statements of March 14, 1994. The trial court suppressed her oral and written statements to the police pursuant to Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). This appeal followed.

LAW/ANALYSIS

Our review of a trial court's ruling that a person was "in custody" for Miranda purposes "is limited to a determination of whether the ruling by the trial court is supported by the testimony." State v. Easler, 322 S.C. 333, 342, 471 S.E.2d 745, 751 (Ct.App.1996) (citing State v. Primus, 312 S.C. 256, 440 S.E.2d 128 (1994)),modified on other grounds, 327 S.C. 121, 489 S.E.2d 617 (1997). In the instant action, the State invites us to adopt a new standard and conduct a de novo review of the "mixed question of law and fact" pursuant to Thompson v. Keohane, 516 U.S. 99, 116 S.Ct. 457, 133 L.Ed.2d 383 (1995). As our Supreme Court has recently rejected a similar de novo standard promulgated by the United States Supreme Court in Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 116 S.Ct. 1657, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996), we must reject the State's invitation.

In Keohane, the Supreme Court resolved a dispute among the Federal Courts of Appeals concerning the proper standard of review in federal habeas corpus proceedings. The Court held that "state-court `in custody' determinations" are not entitled to "a presumption of correctness under 28 U.S.C. § 2254(d)," and that the determination of "whether a suspect is `in custody,' and therefore entitled to Miranda warnings, presents a mixed question of law and fact qualifying for independent review." Id. at 102, 106, 116 S.Ct. 457. In reaching its holding, the Court traced the evolution of federal habeas corpus review and differentiated between "basic, primary, or historical facts" and "subsidiary factual questions." Id. at 110, 116 S.Ct. 457. After acknowledging that it has "`not charted an entirely clear course in this area[,]'" the Court espoused its new theory concerning the "ultimate `in custody' determination for Miranda purposes...." Id. at 110, 112, 116 S.Ct. 457 (quoting Miller v. Fenton, 474 U.S. 104, 113, 106 S.Ct. 445, 88 L.Ed.2d 405 (1985)).

Shortly after deciding Keohane, the Supreme Court resolved a similar conflict among the Federal Courts of Appeals concerning the proper standard of review for warrantless searches in federal criminal proceedings. In Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 691, 116 S.Ct. 1657, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996), the Court held that "the...