State v. Ward
| Decision Date | 29 October 2020 |
| Docket Number | CC C132352CR (SC S066598) |
| Parties | STATE of Oregon, Respondent on Review, v. Micus Duane WARD, Petitioner on Review. |
| Court | Oregon Supreme Court |
Bear Wilner-Nugent, Bear Wilner-Nugent Counselor & Attorney at Law LLC, Portland, argued the cause and filed the briefs for petitioner on review.
Patrick M. Ebbett, Assistant Attorney General, Salem, argued the cause and filed the brief for respondent on review. Also on the brief were Ellen Rosenblum, Attorney General, and Benjamin Gutman, Solicitor General.
Rosalind M. Lee, Rosalind Manson Lee LLC, Eugene, filed the brief for amici curiae Oregon Criminal Defense Lawyer's Association and Oregon Justice Resource Center.
Defendant was convicted of aggravated and felony murder. After being arrested for that crime, and before being appointed counsel, defendant was twice interrogated while in custody. The trial court suppressed the statements that defendant made during the first interrogation, because the court determined that officers conducting that interrogation continued to question defendant after he invoked his right to remain silent, in violation of defendant's Article I, section 12, rights against self-incrimination. But the trial court refused to suppress defendant's statements from the second interrogation, because it determined that the officers who conducted that interrogation obtained a valid waiver of defendant's Article I, section 12, rights. The trial court thus suppressed statements that defendant made during the first interrogation but not those he made during the second interrogation. A jury found defendant guilty, and he was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
On review, taking into account the totality of the circumstances, we conclude that the state failed to prove that defendant validly waived his rights before the second interrogation. Accordingly, we conclude that the trial court erred in denying defendant's motion to suppress, and we further conclude that the error requires a reversal of defendant's conviction and a remand for a new trial.1
Before describing the relevant facts, we describe the basic constitutional principles that frame the dispute in this case. Article I, section 12, of the Oregon Constitution provides that "[n]o person shall *** be compelled in any criminal prosecution to testify against himself." Or Const, Art I, § 12.2 That constitutional provision guarantees a right to remain silent and a "derivative or adjunct right to have the advice of counsel in responding to police questioning." State v. Turnidge , 359 Or. 364, 399, 374 P.3d 853 (2016). As part of the constitutional guarantee, if a person in custody or other similarly compelling circumstances unequivocally invokes one of the rights guaranteed by Article I, section 12, rights, then "police must honor that request and stop questioning." State v. McAnulty , 356 Or. 432, 455, 338 P.3d 653 (2014) ().
Even a person who has initially invoked those rights may later waive them, but the state bears the burden of proving a knowing, intelligent, and voluntary waiver "under the totality of the circumstances." State v. Nichols , 361 Or. 101, 107, 390 P.3d 1001 (2017). In addition to the general "totality of the circumstances" inquiry, to ensure that any waiver is knowing as well as voluntary, officers must provide a person with the so-called Miranda warnings—that the person "has a right to remain silent and to consult with counsel and that any statements that the person makes may be used against the person in a criminal prosecution."3 State v. Vondehn , 348 Or. 462, 474, 236 P.3d 691 (2010). Those warnings are required for a valid waiver in part "[b]ecause a custodial interrogation is inherently compelling." Id.
With that legal overview as a guide, we describe the pertinent facts in a manner consistent with our obligation to accept " ‘the trial court's findings of historical fact if evidence in the record supports them.’ " See McAnulty , 356 Or. at 449, 338 P.3d 653 (quoting State v. James , 339 Or. 476, 481, 123 P.3d 251 (2005) ).
The murder victim was the great-grandmother of defendant's cousin, Joda Cain, who lived with the victim in Washington County. Before the murder, Cain had purchased a plane ticket for defendant to fly from his home in Kansas City to Portland. Defendant, who was 19 at the time and has intellectual disabilities, boarded the plane without identification by falsely claiming to be a minor.4
Cain and a friend picked defendant up from the airport and took him to the victim's home.
The friend fell asleep at the home around midnight and awoke to hear the victim screaming. He heard defendant demanding money and heard Cain say, "Just do it." The friend then heard sounds of someone being attacked, and he fled the house. The next morning, police found the victim's body in her bedroom. She had been beaten to death with a small sledgehammer that police found at the scene. A trail of blood led from the victim's bedroom to the garage, and her car was missing.
The same morning, a state trooper spotted the victim's car weaving erratically on the interstate in eastern Oregon. Cain was driving, and defendant was a passenger. After a high-speed chase, police forced the car to stop and arrested Cain. Defendant ran away but was quickly arrested, too. Evidence in the car and blood on defendant's clothes tied defendant to the murder.
An officer read defendant his Miranda warnings at the scene and then took him to the Union County Jail, where defendant was again given Miranda warnings and then interrogated. When one of the officers asked if defendant was "going to visit with us here today at all?" defendant gave a negative response that the officer acknowledged by asking, "No?"5 But the officers then repeated Miranda warnings and continued the interrogation by telling defendant that Cain had decided to "be honest." They told defendant that Cain had described the murder and car theft as entirely defendant's responsibility and encouraged defendant to give his "version of events." As described in defendant's brief, he "largely maintained his silence," but made at least some statements that the trial court suppressed.
After the interrogation, defendant was held at the Union County Jail for four days, until two detectives from Washington County arrived. Before driving defendant back to Washington County, the detectives read Miranda warnings to him, and defendant responded "yes" when asked if he understood those rights. During the four- to five-hour drive to Washington County, the detectives did not talk to defendant about the case. But upon arriving at the Washington County Sheriff's Office, the detectives took defendant into a "soft" interview room, meaning it was furnished more like a living room than a typical jail interview room.
At that point, without repeating Miranda warnings or asking defendant whether he wanted to waive his rights, the detectives began questioning defendant. Defendant answered questions without repeating his earlier assertion that he did not want to talk. The detectives made no threats or promises and described the tone of the interview as a "very relaxed conversation." Defendant's ability to communicate did not appear to the detectives "to be impaired by any sort of substance or mental problems," and his answers appeared to "make sense in a contextual fashion." In response to the questions, defendant denied knowing anything about the murder, denied ever being in the victim's bedroom, and denied having her blood on his clothing. He told the officers that Cain had woken him late at night asking if he wanted to go for a ride, and, when asked why he had run after police stopped the car, defendant answered that he was afraid he would go to jail for lying about his age when he flew to Portland.
Defendant was eventually indicted for two counts of aggravated murder and two counts of felony murder. Before defendant filed the pretrial motion to suppress that is at issue on review, the trial court conducted two other proceedings that are pertinent to defendant's arguments on review. In the first, the court found that defendant was unfit to proceed with trial as a result of his intellectual disability and committed him to the Oregon State Hospital for treatment. The court based that finding on the report from a court-ordered psychological evaluation in which the author, Dr. Stover, concluded that defendant had a "mild" intellectual disability that made him unable to aid and assist his attorney or meaningfully participate in his defense at that time.
Nine months later, the trial court held another hearing and determined that defendant had the capacity to stand trial. The court based that decision on a later report from Dr. Stover, who had concluded that defendant "gained trial competency" through education about the legal process, although he recommended accommodations so that defendant would better understand his attorneys’ legal advice. During the same hearing, the prosecutor confirmed that the state would not be seeking the death penalty because it conceded that defendant "does, in fact, suffer from an intellectual disability" that would make it constitutionally impermissible to impose that penalty, under the United States Supreme Court's decision in Atkins v. Virginia , 536 U.S. 304, 122 S. Ct. 2242, 153 L. Ed. 2d 335 (2002).
After the ruling that the case would proceed toward trial, defendant moved to suppress the statements that he had made to the officers during the first...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
State v. Martin
..."[W]e are not bound by decisions of the Ninth Circuit—or any other federal circuit—even on questions of federal law." State v. Ward , 367 Or. 188, 197, 475 P.3d 420 (2020). Although we consider decisions by all lower federal courts, including the Ninth Circuit, for their persuasive effect, ......
-
State v. Pittman
...We emphasize that that issue is distinct from the issue of what standard of review should apply on appeal. See State v. Ward , 367 Or. 188, 196-200, 475 P.3d 420 (2020) (determining what standard of review should apply to other questions under Article I, section 12 ). We need not address th......
-
State v. Shevyakov
...continues to ask substantive questions, the suspect may feel that the invocation of rights was "meaningless." See State v. Ward , 367 Or. 188, 205-06, 475 P.3d 420 (2020) (describing such a harm resulting from officers "ignoring defendant's invocation of his right to remain silent, then hol......
-
State v. Dean
...intelligent, and voluntary waiver of the Article I, section 12, rights at the time of the * * * interrogation." State v. Ward , 367 Or. 188, 202, 475 P.3d 420 (2020). When the state contends, as it does here, that a defendant "validly waived his rights despite an earlier violation, ‘there i......