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Supreme Court: Pre-Miranda silence can be used as evidence of guilt
- powertower 13y agoThe shotgun ballistic evidence is what got him the guilty verdict (and I'm sure quite a bit of other things). Not being able to answer a reasonable question was just the icing on the cake.
- Zimahl 13y agoUnless you are reading a different story: Ballistic reports showed the shells matched the shotgun, but police declined to prosecute Salinas. Maybe I don't understand shotgun forensics very well, but as I understand the only ballistics that they could match it the gauge of the shotgun and possibly match gunpowder residue. Other than that, shotguns don't have riflings, which make them very difficult to pinpoint as a weapon. As an example, if I were to fire 5 different shotguns of the same gauge but use the same shells and you either had the expended shell or the result of the shot (buckshot or slug), you most likely wouldn't be able to tell which rifle shot which shell. While the jury may still have had plenty to convict on with other circumstantial evidence (motive, means, opportunity), I will say that this is a bad decision.
- jlgreco 13y agoThey might be able to match the pattern the firing pin left on the primer. (I don't know if they can do that or not, just an idea.)
- hga 13y agoIf the report is accurate, shells are what's left behind, the assembly of brass and plastic that you reload and all that. And for those on the brass base there will be extractor and ejector markings, and as jlgreco reminds me, maybe the firing pin, although how good they will be as evidence I don't know. I.e. sufficiently unique, then again a lot of this science isn't really anything resembling science as it's used outside the judicial world, excepting DNA matching. BTW, some shotgun barrels do have rifling for shooting unrifled slugs for deer hunting (e.g. http://www.brownells.com/items/rifled-shotgun-barrels.aspx http://www.brownells.com/items/rifled-shotgun-barrels.aspx), but I'll bet that's not the case here.
- gradys 13y agoIANAL, but wouldn't this incentivize the police to just question suspects before they are under arrest?
- rosser 13y agoMy reading here (and IANAL, too) is that Salinas' trouble came from the fact that he was answering some questions, and then stopped when they got relevant. That is to say, his selective silence was the damning thing, not his silence, period. If you say nothing all along, or only say, "Lawyer.", your silence isn't so inculpatory.
- jack-r-abbit 13y agoIANAL either but that is also how I read it. I don't really find this all that disturbing. He chose to talk and then chose to not answer that specific question. Plus, as was pointed out in the article and by another poster here, the ballistics confirmed a match to the gun. So there was more at play in the court room than just his silence.
- gradys 13y agoHe probably would have been convicted anyway, but Supreme Court rulings set precedent for future cases.
- Zimahl 13y agoBut then what's the point of Miranda Rights then?
- rosser 13y agoBeing Mirandized doesn't give you those rights; it only reminds you that you have them. More to the point, you're only Mirandized upon arrest. Salinas hadn't been arrested yet. More fool him for talking to the cops in the first place...
- rickhanlonii 13y ago
- gradys 13y agoIANAL, but wouldn't this incentivize the police to just question suspects before they are under arrest?
- arunabha 13y agoProsecutors argued that since Salinas was answering some questions - therefore not invoking his right to silence - and since he wasn't under arrest and wasn't compelled to speak, his silence on the incriminating question doesn't get constitutional protection. This judgement sends a very strong message to never talk to the police. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8z7NC5sgik http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8z7NC5sgik explains why its a monumentally stupid idea to talk to the cops.
- glesica 13y agoI wish I could upvote this more than once. Not talking to the police isn't just a good strategy for an individual, it is also important for the collective. If no one ever talks to the police, then not talking to the police won't be a suspicious or rebellious act, just par for the course.
- mikegioia 13y agoI find it somewhat upsetting, and somewhat expected that the more the police and judicial system use people's words against them, the further they push communities away from cooperating and even helping the police. I had a friend who used to police in Queens, NY and he said relations got so bad with the people in some neighborhoods that these people wouldn't say a word to the cops even when someone they knew was killed on their block! Talk about a sick world to live in, but can you really blame them?
- tzs 13y agoHypothetical: you are visiting a zoo. You see a bear get out of its enclosure, grab a baby human, and run away. You are the only witness who saw which direction the bear ran. A police officer comes running up and asks where the bear went. Question: Do you tell him, or do you say that you will not talk without a lawyer present? I've asked people on Reddit similar questions when this video has come up there, and a lot of them say they would not talk without a lawyer, based on the video. I'm curious how many here feel that way.
- 13y ago
- jlgreco 13y agoIsn't the idea that the Miranda warning does not grant rights, but merely serves to inform the recipient of rights that they already have? Well, I thought that was the idea, it clearly is not the case anymore...
- eloisius 13y agoAnother tragedy of positively defined law. As soon as you give someone a "bill of rights" you can then do everything up to the prohibited limit.
- hga 13y agoIndeed, and that was an argument the Federalists made against the Bill of Rights. But then again, does negatively defined law ever work in practice? Sure doesn't seem to in a whole bunch of areas that don't touch on the 1st through 8th Amendments.
- mpyne 13y agoWhy would the Federalists make that argument against a Bill of Rights that contained the Ninth Amendment?
- hga 13y ago"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." Well, for one thing the 9th Amendment doesn't address the problems with the positive rights that most of the other ones establish or acknowledge.
- sethbannon 13y agoFrom the article: Salinas' "Fifth Amendment claim fails because he did not expressly invoke the privilege against self-incrimination in response to the officer's question," Justice Samuel Alito said. "It has long been settled that the privilege `generally is not self-executing' and that a witness who desires its protection `must claim it.'" Does this mean one must actually say "I plead the fifth" to 'claim' one's rights under the fifth amendment?
- jlgreco 13y agoGood question. I always thought that was only something done for television/movies.
- rocky1138 13y agoThat's not what the constitution says, but let's be honest: does it really matter what it says?
- kbenson 13y agoYes. Yes it does.
- rayiner 13y agoThe 5th amendment says, in relevant portion: "No person... shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself..." I don't think it's a great decision, but it's misleading to say "that's not what the constitution says." The constitution doesn't say anything, one way or the other, about the proper way to invoke the right against self-incrimination. It just says that people shall not be "compelled."
- rosser 13y agoIANAL. If you're under oath, testifying in court, you're expected to give an answer of some form — in fact, you've sworn an oath to do exactly that — so in order to invoke your 5th Amendement right against self-incrimination, you must do so explicitly. If you're being questioned by the police, even subsequent to an arrest, however, your silence should be sufficient. Salinas' trouble didn't come from not explicitly invoking his privilege, but from waiving it by starting to talk, and then invoking it by refusing to talk further once the State's line of questioning in the pre-Miranda police interview became relevant to the crime in question. The moral of the story? "Don't talk to the police. Ever." Also, IANAL.
- RobotCaleb 13y agoWait... So is it a right or a privilege?
- rayiner 13y agoYou have a right to a lawyer in a criminal trial, but that doesn't mean one magically appears if you don't ask for one.
- RobotCaleb 13y agoSeeing as a lawyer is a tangible thing that doesn't really strike me as a fair analogy. Also, isn't Salito quoted as stating it as a privilege in the article?
- deleted 13y ago[deleted]
- alanh 13y agoA lot of developments lately make me think of this wonderful letter Emily Haines sent fans of Metric last fall. > The thing we have to get our heads around on a daily basis is that even a small step in the wrong direction is too far when attempting to prevent a slide backwards. Full letter here: http://peg.gd/3eN http://peg.gd/3eN (short URL is not a redirect, but in fact a mirror of the email content itself).
- iandanforth 13y agoThink about this, the people most affected by this decision will, by definition, never know about it. If you're ignorant of the basic right, you are definitely ignorant of the case law. The supreme court just said two things 1. The state has no responsibility to inform people of their rights and thus 2. The ignorant have no rights. This both sickens and terrifies me.
- speakez 13y agoMore and more I'm giving up on this government.
- lifeisstillgood 13y agoThis is one more of a creeping unbalancing of the checks and balances of modern government and it causes me great unease In the UK we lost the "right to silence" twenty years ago - I remember campaigning to stop the bill. (Don't hire me as a lobbyist) I think only the PACE reforms which focused police back on real evidence and away from confession and go policing has kept us from an explosion in the courts system. Bein arrested and interviewed is a massively intimidating thing and just shutting up is almost always the best advice. But if that advice can add years to your sentence you are asking people to make a fine risk assessment at the point most people are just in a head spin. Not good. Aaron Schwartz had time to think about his fine balancing act. Look how that played out. Keep the courts a long way away from inferences about why you shut up - write your congressman now. Seriously .
- quux 13y agoAre there any questions that a suspect is required to answer? Like their name, where they live etc? I think if you are driving a car you are required to produce your driver license on request, but other than that you don't have to answer any questions.
- hga 13y agoIn some states you have to provide your name.
- quux 13y agoThe ACLU's "Bust card" has a good set of guidelines for what to do if you are stopped by the police to best protect yourself. http://www.aclu.org/files/assets/bustcard_eng_20100630.pdf http://www.aclu.org/files/assets/bustcard_eng_20100630.pdf #1 on the list of your rights: "You have the right to remain silent. If you wish to exercise that right, say so out loud."
- yread 13y agoWow this case is just so weird: - convicted based on weapon only? Isn't that just an indirect proof? - 2nd trial after the first one was a mistrial - I thought you can only be tried once?! - convicted 15 years after it happened - isn't there a time bar? - the whole miranda business - when they arrested Tsarnaev, they didn't read him his rights and people just assumed he had them anyway. This guy apparently didn't have them until they read it. So, if they don't read them you either have them if they won't read them to you ever or don't have them if they will read them in some unspecified point in the future? I think I'll just stay out of Texas for a while. EDIT: also "did not answer when asked if a shotgun he had access to would match up with the murder weapon" what kind of idiotic question is that?! "Excuse me sir, does your weapon match with the murder weapon?" "Yes, it does, officer!"
- hga 13y agoSufficiently strong circumstantial evidence has long been enough to convict. You can only be tried once, by both a state or subdivision, and the feds, "on the same set of facts", if a verdict of innocence is rendered. In a mistrial, the trial is ended for whatever reason without a verdict of any sort being rendered, generally the judge prematurely ends it because of a procedural issue or the jury deadlocks. The prohibition against double jeopardy (which the courts have determined does not extend to both a state and a federal prosecution each, e.g. see the Rodney King debacle) is to prevent the authorities from trying you again and again until they get a jury to come to the "right" decision, and this decreases the problem of "the process is the punishment". Also protects you from a better prosecution after you reveal your (successful) defense the first time.