State v. Miranda

• Decision Date: 11 January 1990
• Citation: 309 Or. 121,786 P.2d 155
• Parties: STATE of Oregon, Respondent, v. Reyes MIRANDA, Appellant. CC C87-03-31650, SC S34970.
• Court: Oregon Supreme Court

Page 155

786 P.2d 155

309 Or. 121

STATE of Oregon, Respondent, v. Reyes MIRANDA, Appellant.

CC C87-03-31650, SC S34970.

Supreme Court of Oregon,

In Banc.

Argued and Submitted Sept. 7, 1989.

Decided Jan. 11, 1990.

[309 Or. 122] Stephen J. Williams, Deputy Public Defender, Salem, argued the cause for appellant. With him on the brief was Gary D. Babcock, Public Defender.

Brenda J. Peterson, Asst. Atty. Gen., Salem, argued the cause for respondent. With her on the brief were Dave Frohnmayer, Atty. Gen., Virginia L. Linder, Sol. Gen., and Diane S. Lefkow, Michael C. Livingston, Janet A. Metcalf, and Timothy A. Sylwester, Asst. Attys. Gen., Salem.

JONES, Justice.

This is a case of automatic review of a conviction of aggravated murder and sentence of death. Defendant challenges both his conviction and the resulting sentence. We find his extensive arguments concerning the guilt phase not well taken and affirm his conviction for aggravated murder. We find the sentencing proceeding to be inadequate for the reasons set forth in our opinion in State v. Wagner, 309 Or. 5, 786 P.2d 93 (1990) (decided this date), and so remand the case to the circuit court for a new sentencing proceeding.

FACTS

The relevant facts of this case are that defendant Miranda and co-defendant Nefstad met Steven Jackson, the victim, for the first time at the Acropolis Tavern in Milwaukie sometime after midnight on the morning of the murder. The three left the tavern at about 1:45 a.m. in Miranda's Plymouth. At 2:37 a.m. Miranda was photographed withdrawing $200 from Jackson's account using Jackson's bank card. Sometime between when the three left the tavern and Miranda's use of Jackson's bank card, Jackson was brutally murdered with multiple stab wounds ranging from his head to his knees, with the fatal wounds to his heart. The blood from Jackson's body was emptied into defendant's car. Defendant Miranda admitted to his friends that he had killed the victim and that after the stabbing his car looked like "Psycho III." When first arrested, defendant lied to the police about some "black man" doing the killing, but later retracted

that statement and at the time of trial attempted to lay the blame for the killing on co-defendant Nefstad. The jury rejected defendant's version of the events and found that he and Nefstad had robbed and killed the victim.

GUILT PHASE

Defendant makes 17 assignments of error with respect to the guilt phase of his trial. We have reviewed all of them. Most relate to various aspects of this particular case, are not well taken, and would add nothing to the body of law surrounding criminal prosecutions if discussed at length. Those that relate more generally to the question of the constitutionality or applicability of the death penalty statutes themselves have been answered elsewhere, most notably in State v. Wagner, supra, and State v. Farrar, 309 Or. 132, 786 P.2d161 (1990) (decided this date), and will not again be discussed here. There are two assignments of error, however, that raise novel questions that call for fuller discussion by this court. We turn to those questions now.

I.

Defendant claims that the trial court erred in allowing the state to impeach his trial testimony with statements defendant made after he requested the assistance of an attorney during custodial interrogation after his arrest.

Defendant was interrogated by two detectives on the night he was arrested. Defendant Miranda was given his Miranda warnings and agreed to talk with the officers. While he was questioned concerning his actions on the night of the killing, he was confronted with photographs taken of him at a First Interstate Bank automatic teller machine. He was at the bank using the victim's credit card to obtain $200 in cash. He denied that he was the person in the photographs and then told police that he thought his girlfriend had set him up. When the detectives asked defendant about bloody clothing he had taken to her house, defendant responded, "I think I better have a lawyer." The questioning continued and defendant ultimately admitted being with the victim and another man in defendant's car when the other man killed the victim. Defendant then agreed to take the police to the place where the victim's body had been left in Vancouver, Washington.

At trial, defendant moved to suppress all statements made after he requested an attorney and all evidence discovered as a result of his statements. The state responded by conceding that the statements made after his request for an attorney were unlawfully obtained, and the prosecutor agreed not to introduce those statements in the state's case-in-chief but contended that the statements were admissible for impeachment if defendant testified at trial. ¹ The trial court did not rule on the admissibility of the statements.

The state also conceded that the victim's body was found as a result of the unlawfully obtained statements; however, the prosecutor argued that the evidence concerning the location and condition of the body was admissible under the "inevitable discovery" doctrine. The trial court held that the body inevitably would have been discovered and denied defendant's motion to suppress it. The judge's decision that the body inevitably would have been discovered is supported by ample evidence.

During the guilt phase of the trial, none of defendant's out-of-court statements made to the police were elicited or alluded to during the state's case-in-chief. After the state rested, defendant took the stand in his own defense and testified on direct examination:

"Q. [By defense counsel:] At the time you were arrested by the Portland Police, did you give a statement ?

"A. A statement?

"Q. Did they ask you about what had happened in the car and you gave a statement?

"A. To the Portland Police?

"Q. Right.

"A. Yes. Once I was at the Yamhill County Police Department.

"Q. And at that point did you conceal the identity of Mr. Nefstad?

"A. Did I conceal it? Yes, I did.

"Q. What did you tell the Portland Police about the other person that had been with you on that night at the Acropolis Tavern?

"A. I told them it was a black guy that was with me.

" * * * * *

"Q. Did you describe the events of that particular night to the Portland police officers?

"A. Yes and no, I guess you can say.

"Q. With the exception of identifying the other person as a black man and not saying it was Mr. Nefstad, was the rest of what you said accurate, to the best of your recollection?

"A. I don't really remember what I told them that night. I was giving them a story, so to speak.

" * * * * *

"Q. After you had given the statement to Detective Hill, did you then show them the area in Vancouver where you now described these events took place?

"A. Yes, I did.

"Q. Did you actually take the police officers over there?

"A. That's correct." ² (Emphasis added.)

On cross-examination, the prosecutor, without objection, elicited further details from defendant about the statements to the police that he had referred to on direct examination:

"Q. [By prosecutor:] Now, do you recall telling Detective Macdonald that--at that time that after the victim, Mr. Jackson, and the black man and you went out to the car from the Acropolis and smoked some dope, that you went back into the Acropolis? Do you remember that?

"A. I don't really recall what happened in that conversation because I was emotionally upset at that time.

"Q. * * * Do you remember telling him at that time that you went back into the Acropolis, and then you came back outside and went--you came back outside and that the black male had his left arm around the victim's neck in a headlock and that the black male told you that he had the victim's bank card and that they were going to go to a bank and withdraw money from the victim's account through an automatic teller machine?

"A. I don't remember saying that.

"Q. Now, do you remember then contradicting yourself and saying that it wasn't until you arrived at the bank that the black male handed you Mr. Jackson's bank card and that the victim told you the personal identification number to the bank card and that he did this after the black male threatened to kill him as you were outside the bank?

"A. Like I said, I don't recall any conversation that I made at that time.

"Q. Well, are you telling us that happen[ed], what I have just described? Did that happen?

"A. I don't know. Time-wise I was--

"Q. You have said that you don't remember that. I am asking you whether those events occurred.

"A. Oh, no, they did not.

"Q. Now, would you also indicate for me whether when you returned to the car after withdrawing the money from the bank machine that you told Detective Macdonald that the black male was either stabbing the victim or punching him in the chest saying 'This mother fucker is dead. Let's take him someplace.'

"A. I don't recall any of that conversation.

" * * * *

"Q. Do you recall telling Detective Macdonald that the victim was either walking or stumbling after he left the car, and that the black male then threw the victim into a ditch adjacent to the road, got back in the car and stated 'Let's go'?

"A. I never--I don't recall saying that." (Emphasis added.)

The state never called Detective Hill or Macdonald to testify that defendant, in fact, made any of these statements.

Defendant acknowledges that he did not object to the evidence that he now claims was erroneously admitted. When the prosecutor made it clear that the state was conceding that the statements were inadmissible in its case-in-chief, defense counsel advised the court that if use of the statements becomes an issue, "we can deal with it at the time it arises." Instead of resisting the use of the statements, defendant brought out the statements on direct and then, on cross-examination, simply claimed that he did not recall the details of the statements which he admitted on direct examination consisted of a concocted tale.

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