Frequent Flyers at the Court: The Supreme Court Begins to Take the Experience of Criminal Defendants into Account in Miranda Cases
44 Pages Posted: 14 Nov 2010 Last revised: 3 Dec 2010
Date Written: November 11, 2010
Abstract
Frequent fliers in the criminal justice context are a very active group of offenders. Between May 2009 and the end of the October 2009 term, the Supreme Court decided four cases interpreting Miranda that featured frequent fliers: Montejo v. Louisiana, Florida v. Powell, Maryland v. Shatzer, and Berghuis v. Thompkins. The original purpose underlying the Miranda decision was to reduce the likelihood that suspects would fall victim to constitutionally impermissible practices of police interrogation in an intimidating atmosphere by focusing on law enforcement actions. The defendants in these four cases were familiar with interrogation procedures employed by the police and, thus, were presumably less susceptible to be coerced by the hostile and intimidating environments of a custodial interrogation. The result in individual cases is a growing acceptance by courts – implicit in the Supreme Court, but explicit in state and lower federal courts -- that a waiver of Miranda rights by a suspect with an extensive criminal history is more likely to be knowing, intelligent, and voluntary. The result in more general terms signals a potential shift in Miranda doctrine by the Supreme Court: instead of relying on a prophylactic rule to prevent abusive police tactics, the Supreme Court is starting to focus on whether a particular defendant was coerced by the tactics used by the police. The practical implications of this focus appears to be a willingness to allow greater leeway to police, and greater use of aggressive police tactics when dealing with suspects with criminal experience. While it seems unlikely that Miranda will be directly overruled, the recent decisions and an increased focus on the criminal background of suspects suggests that the existing Miranda rules will continue to be subtly abandoned in favor of a more subjective test focusing on whether a statement is the result of coercion.
Keywords: Miranda, Supreme Court, Criminal, Criminal Procedure, Criminal Law
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