Taylor v. State
| Decision Date | 01 October 2001 |
| Docket Number | No. S01A0930.,S01A0930. |
| Citation | 274 Ga. 269,553 S.E.2d 598 |
| Parties | TAYLOR v. The STATE. |
| Court | Georgia Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Harrison & Harrison, Stephen P. Harrison, Parker & Day, Vallerina F. Day, McDonough, for appellant.
Tommy K. Floyd, Dist. Atty., Thomas R. McBerry, Asst. Dist. Atty., for appellee.
In accordance with the Unified Appeal Procedure, we granted Robin Leigh Taylor's application for interim review before her death penalty case proceeds to trial. We requested that the parties address the following matters: (1) whether Taylor's references to a lawyer during her interview on October 6, 1999, constituted a request for counsel; (2) whether comments that police officers made to Taylor constituted a hope of benefit under OCGA § 24-3-50; and (3) whether the alleged murder weapon would have been inevitably discovered without Taylor's statement.
Because Taylor's videotaped statement shows that she made an unambiguous request for counsel during her interview, we conclude that her statement must be suppressed. We reject, however, her contention that the officers induced her to confess by holding out a hope of benefit and affirm the trial court's ruling that her statement was voluntary under OCGA § 24-3-50. Although we find that the evidence is too speculative to conclude that the police would have inevitably discovered the murder weapon without Taylor's statement, we nevertheless hold that the gun is admissible because the "fruit" of a Miranda1 violation is not subject to the exclusionary rule under Georgia law.
Taylor is charged with malice murder, felony murder, armed robbery, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. The State is seeking the death penalty. On the morning of December 28, 1998, Jay Basha was found dead in a Pizza Hut restaurant. Basha, the store manager, had arrived alone that morning to prepare the store for business. He was shot once in the back with a .38 handgun and approximately $500 was missing from the restaurant. Police found a cup on a shelf near the restaurant's back door that yielded a fingerprint that did not match the victim. The cup also contained ice, indicating that the fingerprint had been left around the time Basha was killed.
The police investigation focused on employees and former employees of the store who could have gained access to the restaurant before it opened for business. Taylor had been recently fired from the Pizza Hut. Upon initial analysis, the fingerprint taken from the cup did not match any fingerprints of the restaurant's employees or former employees. Months later, the GBI Crime Lab discovered that the fingerprint had been accidentally transposed. When properly examined, the fingerprint allegedly matched Taylor's fingerprint. The police obtained a warrant and arrested Taylor at her apartment on October 6, 1999. They read her Miranda rights from a card and Taylor affirmed that she understood those rights. Taylor was taken to police headquarters where Captain Simmons interviewed her. The interview was videotaped in its entirety.
At the beginning of the interview, Taylor acknowledged that a police officer had read her rights to her. Captain Simmons informed her that her fingerprint had been found at the crime scene and that she was being charged with murder and armed robbery. The following exchange then took place Simmons: We can prove you were there, and I want to know exactly what happened. I want to know your side of it before we pick anybody else up, okay?
Taylor: Okay.
Simmons: Tell me about it.
Taylor: Can I have a lawyer present when I do that?
Simmons: You can.
Taylor: Okay.
Simmons: But I mean if you want a lawyer or—it ain't going to change, it's being recorded so whatever you say is not going to change it any form. But I mean if you decide you want a lawyer, we'll get you a lawyer, you know. But I can assure you you were there, but I'm wanting to know if you're want to tell your side of the story right now before it gets—before anybody else has the opportunity to say anything.
Taylor then admitted that she had been at the Pizza Hut on December 28 to return her uniform, but claimed that she did not kill Basha. Captain Simmons stated that evidence taken from the crime scene contradicted her story and urged her to tell the truth. The following exchange then took place:
Simmons: We got videotapes of where that cup was sitting back there on that rack right there at the back door and your hand print all over it. Now I'm not lying to you, God is my witness, that's exactly where it's at. Now you need to tell it just like it is. You need to help yourself right now.
Taylor: How can I do that without a lawyer?
Simmons: Well, if you want a lawyer we'll get you a lawyer, but you can help yourself by telling the truth the way it goes. I mean look, let me ask you a question, let me ask you a question, if you was to sit there and go before a judge and you said judge, yes I did it or I was there, or anything of this nature while it was being done, and I'm throwing myself at the mercy of the court, is that going to look good or is it going to look bad, or is it going to say look, do I do this, do I say I ain't done nothing, you know. I wasn't even there. I was at the front desk while we can prove you was at the back door. We can prove you was there when Jay got killed. Now that's the way I'm talking about do you want to help yourself. You're going to jail. You're going to jail one way or the other is what I'm trying to tell you, but what you want to do is up to you, how you want to help yourself during this whole ordeal.
Taylor: I want to help myself.
After further questioning, Taylor admitted that she was inside the Pizza Hut when Basha was killed. Initially, she stated that she let the killer in through the back door but eventually she admitted that she acted alone. She told Captain Simmons that she had stolen a .38 revolver from her mother and Basha let her inside the restaurant to return her uniform and get something to drink. While inside the store, Taylor shot the victim in the back, took $500, and left the cup by the back door. She told the police that the gun was at her mother's trailer. She then stated, "I want a lawyer," but police questioning continued. After the statement, the police obtained the alleged murder weapon from Taylor's mother at her trailer.
After a suppression hearing, the trial court ruled that the portion of the statement made after "I want a lawyer" was inadmissible. However, the trial court found that Taylor's statement before that point was admissible because her initial reference to an attorney was ambiguous and did not constitute a request for counsel. The trial court also found that Taylor's statement was voluntary and concluded that the gun would have been inevitably discovered regardless of the admissibility of Taylor's statement.
1. Taylor contends that her statement, "Can I have a lawyer present when I do that?" followed by "Okay" when told she could, was an unambiguous request for counsel that required the cessation of all questioning and that her entire ensuing statement is therefore inadmissible. We agree.
A suspect who asks for a lawyer at any time during a custodial interrogation may not be subjected to further questioning by law enforcement until an attorney has been made available or until the suspect reinitiates the conversation.2 If the police persist in questioning a suspect who has requested that counsel be present, any resulting statements made by the suspect are inadmissible in the State's case-in-chief.3 In Davis v. United States,4 the United States Supreme Court stated that a suspect "must articulate his desire to have counsel present sufficiently clearly that a reasonable police officer in the circumstances would understand the statement to be a request for an attorney."5 The Supreme Court found that the suspect's statement, "Maybe I should talk to a lawyer," was ambiguous and therefore not a clear request for counsel that required the cessation of questioning.6 This Court reached the same result in Jordan v. State,7 where the suspect said he "might need a lawyer" and the police continued to interrogate him. This Court held that this reference to a lawyer was ambiguous and that the suspect's ensuing statement was therefore admissible.8 Since the statement in Taylor's case was videotaped and there are no relevant additional facts, the trial court's application of the law to the undisputed facts is subject to de novo appellate review.9 We conclude, based on our review of the videotaped statement, that Taylor unambiguously requested a lawyer to assist her when answering Captain Simmons's questions about what happened in the Pizza Hut. Unlike the suspects in Davis and Jordan, Taylor did not use equivocal words such as "might" or "maybe" when referring to her desire for a lawyer. She was also not referring to a need for counsel sometime in the future, and she did not volunteer information at any time during her statement.10 Her desire for counsel was not ambiguous simply because it was articulated in the form of a question; it is common for people to ask for things by saying "Can I have ... ?" Under the circumstances, a reasonable police officer would have understood that Taylor asked if she could have a lawyer because she wanted one.11 Her later response to Captain Simmons's request for her to "tell it just like it is"—"How can I do that without a lawyer?"—further illustrates Taylor's belief that she needed a lawyer to assist during the police interrogation. In addition, we are troubled by Captain Simmons's response to Taylor's initial reference to a lawyer, which appeared to be an attempt to steer Taylor away from asking for the assistance of a lawyer. Taylor's request for counsel at the beginning of her interview was unambiguous and the police failure to cease the...
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