I should probably disclose that I am a long time friend of the Judge presiding over this case, United States District Judge Matthew Brann.
I will assume everybody here has their “Miranda” basics relatively straight.
This case presents an untested aspect to Miranda. The suspect was already charged at the time of his arrest, but the officers did not disclose that fact and he waived his rights.
The question is, should the officers have informed him of the existing charge, before they asked him to waive his rights?
There is no existing precedent, either at the Supreme Court or in any lower federal court for this particular question, so Brann gets to break new Constitutional and legal ground.
I’m not really a fan of Miranda. It’s my view that it’s the duty of the citizenry to know and understand it’s rights and not the duty of the state to explain them to the citizenry.
That said, it probably doesn’t much matter because most criminals are stupid and think they can talk their way out charges.
This should be a no brainer, he waived his rights. There never has been a requirement for police to inform someone ahead of time that they have been charged already.
A lot of due process rules did not exist until particular court cases came along. Again, this particular angle has never been litigated.
Matt, prior to taking the bench, was a long time member of the Federalist Society, but he is respectful of civil rights and civil liberties and I believe he will give due consideration to both sides before he rules.
Except coercion still happens post Miranda. The police are still allowed to lie to suspects. They tell suspects things like the judge will go easier on them if they confess. They tell them they’ll go free if they turn on an accomplice. Bottom line, every person should know that they are not obligated to talk to the police about anything, ever. Maybe that should be taught in school.
For me, the question is about justice. Miranda creates a “loophole” in which guilty people go free on “technicalities”. A comparison should be made between guilty people going free and innocent people being convicted, both without the benefit of Miranda, of course. If the latter far outweighs the former, then Miranda serves its purpose.
I think laws prohibiting lying to law enforcement are absurd. I actually suspect it works against them. If it wasn’t illegal to lie to the FBI, for example, I might be inclined to talk to an agent as a witness. As it stands, if an FBI agent asks me for a recommendation of a good place to eat, I’ll tell him to ■■■■ off.
You don’t even have to lie to get nailed for perjury, all they have to do is show what you said was wrong or that you weren’t perfectly consistent when asked about a series of events.
I was NOT intending to denigrate the Federalist Society in any way. Just an unfortunate turn of phrase that unintentionally conflated two different lines of thought to produce an unintended result.
