OCTOBER TERM, 1993
Syllabus
STANSBURY v. CALIFORNIA
CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA No. 93-5770.
Argued March 30, 1994-Decided April 26, 1994
When California police first questioned petitioner Stansbury as
a possible witness to the rape and murder of a 10-year-old girl,
they had another suspect. However, Stansbury became a suspect
during the interview, when he told police that, on the night of the
murder, he drove a car matching the one seen where the girl's body
was found. After he also admitted to prior convictions for rape,
kidnaping, and child molestation, officers stopped the interview,
advised him of his rights under Miranda v. Arizona,
384 U. S. 436, and
arrested him. The trial court denied his pretrial motion to
suppress his statements to the police, reasoning that he was not
"in custody" for purposes of Miranda until the officers began to
suspect him. He was convicted of, inter alia, first-degree murder
and sentenced to death. In affirming, the State Supreme Court
concluded that one of the relevant factors in determining whether
Stansbury was in custody was whether the investigation was focused
on him. Agreeing that suspicion focused on him only when he
mentioned the car, the court found that Miranda did not bar the
admission of statements made before that point.
Held: Because the initial determination of custody depends on
the objective circumstances of the interrogation, an officer's
subjective and undisclosed view concerning whether the interrogee
is a suspect is irrelevant to the assessment whether that person is
in custody. See, e.
g., Beckwith v. United States,
425 U. S. 341. Numerous
statements in the State Supreme Court's opinion are open to the
interpretation that the court regarded the officers' subjective
beliefs regarding Stansbury's status as a suspect as significant in
and of themselves, rather than as relevant only to the extent they
influenced the objective conditions surrounding his interrogation.
The State Supreme Court should consider in the first instance
whether objective circumstances show that Stansbury was in custody
during the entire interrogation.
4 Cal. 4th 1017,846 P. 2d 756, reversed and remanded.
Robert M. Westberg, by appointment of the Court, 510 U. S. 1009,
argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs were David
S. Winton and Joseph A. Hearst.
319
Aileen Bunney, Deputy Attorney General of California, argued the
cause for respondent. With her on the brief were Daniel E. Lungren,
Attorney General, George Will iamson, Chief Assistant Attorney
General, Ronald A. Bass, Senior Assistant Attorney General, and
Ronald E. Niver, Deputy Attorney General. *
PER CURIAM.
This case concerns the rules for determining whether a person
being questioned by law enforcement officers is held in custody,
and thus entitled to the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona,
384 U. S. 436
(1966). We hold, not for the first time, that an officer's
subjective and undisclosed view concerning whether the person being
interrogated is a suspect is irrelevant to the assessment whether
the person is in custody.
I
Ten-year-old Robyn Jackson disappeared from a playground in
Baldwin Park, California, at around 6:30 p.m. on September 28,
1982. Early the next morning, about 10 miles away in Pasadena,
Andrew Zimmerman observed a large man emerge from a turquoise
American sedan and throw something into a nearby flood control
channel. Zimmerman called the police, who arrived at the scene and
discovered the girl's body in the channel. There was evidence that
she had been raped, and the cause of death was determined to be
asphyxia complicated by blunt force trauma to the head.
Lieutenant Thomas Johnston, a detective with the Los Angeles
County Sheriff's Department, investigated the hom-
*Briefs of amici curiae urging affirmance were filed for the
Orange County District Attorney, State of California, by Michael R.
Capizzi and Devallis Rutledge; for Americans for Effective Law
Enforcement, Inc., by Bernard
J. Farber, Fred E. Inbau,
Wayne W Schmidt, and James P. Manak; and for the Criminal Justice
Legal Foundation by Kent S. Scheidegger.
320
Per Curiam
icide. From witnesses interviewed on the day the body was
discovered, he learned that Robyn had talked to two ice cream truck
drivers, one being petitioner Robert Edward Stansbury, in the hours
before her disappearance. Given these contacts, Johnston thought
Stansbury and the other driver might have some connection with the
homicide or knowledge thereof, but for reasons unimportant here
Johnston considered only the other driver to be a leading suspect.
After the suspect driver was brought in for interrogation, Johnston
asked Officer Lee of the Baldwin Park Police Department to contact
Stansbury to see if he would come in for questioning as a potential
witness.
Lee and three other plainclothes officers arrived at Stansbury's
trailer home at about 11:00 that evening. The officers surrounded
the door and Lee knocked. When Stansbury answered, Lee told him the
officers were investigating a homicide to which Stansbury was a
possible witness and asked if he would accompany them to the police
station to answer some questions. Stansbury agreed to the interview
and accepted a ride to the station in the front seat of Lee's
police car.
At the station, Lieutenant Johnston, in the presence of another
officer, questioned Stansbury about his whereabouts and activities
during the afternoon and evening of September 28. Neither Johnston
nor the other officer issued
Miranda warnings. Stansbury
told the officers (among other things) that on the evening of the
28th he spoke with the victim at about 6:00, returned to his
trailer home after work at 9:00, and left the trailer at about
midnight in his housemate's turquoise, American-made car. This last
detail aroused Johnston's suspicions, as the turquoise car matched
the description of the one Andrew Zimmerman had observed in
Pasadena. When Stansbury, in response to a further question,
admitted to prior convictions for rape, kidnaping, and child
molestation, Johnston terminated the interview and another officer
advised Stansbury of his Miranda rights.
321
Stansbury declined to make further statements, requested an
attorney, and was arrested. Respondent State of California charged
Stansbury with first-degree murder and other crimes.
Stansbury filed a pretrial motion to suppress all statements
made at the station, and the evidence discovered as a result of
those statements. The trial court denied the motion in relevant
part, ruling that Stansbury was not "in custody"-and thus not
entitled to
Miranda warnings-until he mentioned that he had
taken his housemate's turquoise car for a midnight drive. Before
that stage of the interview, the trial court reasoned, "the focus
in [Lieutenant Johnston's] mind certainly was on the other ice
cream [truck] driver," Tr. 2368; only "after Mr. Stansbury made the
comment ... describing the ... turquoise-colored automobile" did
Johnston's suspicions "shif[t] to Mr. Stansbury,"
ibid.
Based upon its conclusion that Stansbury was not in custody until
Johnston's suspicions had focused on him, the trial court permitted
the prosecution to introduce in its case in chief the statements
Stansbury made before that time. At trial, the jury convicted
Stansbury of first-degree murder, rape, kidnaping, and lewd act on
a child under the age of 14, and fixed the penalty for the
first-degree murder at death.
The California Supreme Court affirmed. Before determining
whether Stansbury was in custody during the interview at the
station, the court set out what it viewed as the applicable legal
standard:
"In deciding the custody issue, the totality of the
circumstances is relevant, and no one factor is dispositive.
However, the most important considerations include (1) the site of
the interrogation, (2) whether the investigation has focused on the
subject, (3) whether the objective indicia of arrest are present,
and (4) the length and form of questioning." 4 Cal. 4th 1017, 1050,
846 P. 2d 756, 775 (1993) (internal quotation marks omitted).
322
Per Curiam
The court proceeded to analyze the second factor in detail, in
the end accepting the trial court's factual determination "that
suspicion focused on [Stansbury] only when he mentioned that he had
driven a turquoise car on the night of the crime." Id., at 1052,
846 P. 2d, at 776. The court "conclude[d] that [Stansbury] was not
subject to custodial interrogation before he mentioned the
turquoise car," and thus approved the trial court's ruling that
Miranda v. Arizona did not bar the admission of statements
Stansbury made before that point. 4 Cal. 4th, at 1054, 846 P. 2d,
at 777-778.
We granted certiorari. 510 U. S. 943 (1993).
II
We held in Miranda that a person questioned by law enforcement
officers after being "taken into custody or otherwise deprived of
his freedom of action in any significant way" must first "be warned
that he has a right to remain silent, that any statement he does
make may be used as evidence against him, and that he has a right
to the presence of an attorney, either retained or appointed." 384
U. S., at 444. Statements elicited in noncompliance with this rule
may not be admitted for certain purposes in a criminal trial.
Compare id., at 492, 494, with Harris v. New York,
401 U. S. 222 (1971). An
officer's obligation to administer Miranda warnings attaches,
however, "only where there has been such a restriction on a
person's freedom as to render him 'in custody.'" Oregon v.
Mathiason,
429 U. S.
492, 495 (1977) (per curiam); see also Illinois v. Perkins,
496 U. S. 292,
296 (1990). In determining whether an individual was in custody, a
court must examine all of the circumstances surrounding the
interrogation, but "the ultimate inquiry is simply whether there
[was] a 'formal arrest or restraint on freedom of movement' of the
degree associated with a formal arrest." California v. Beheler,
463 U. S. 1121,
1125 (1983) (per curiam) (quoting Mathiason, supra, at 495).
323
Our decisions make clear that the initial determination of
custody depends on the objective circumstances of the
interrogation, not on the subjective views harbored by either the
interrogating officers or the person being questioned. In Beckwith
v. United States,
425
U. S. 341 (1976), for example, the defendant, without being
advised of his Miranda rights, made incriminating statements to
Government agents during an interview in a private home. He later
asked that Miranda "be extended to cover interrogation in
noncustodial circumstances after a police investigation has focused
on the suspect." 425 U. S., at 345 (internal quotation marks
omitted). We found his argument unpersuasive, explaining that it
"was the compulsive aspect of custodial interrogation, and not the
strength or content of the government's suspicions at the time the
questioning was conducted, which led the Court to impose the
Miranda requirements with regard to custodial questioning." Id., at
346-347 (internal quotation marks omitted). As a result, we
concluded that the defendant was not entitled to Miranda warnings:
"Although the 'focus' of an investigation may indeed have been on
Beckwith at the time of the interview ... , he hardly found himself
in the custodial situation described by the
Miranda Court as
the basis for its holding." 425 U. S., at 347.
Berkemer v. McCarty,
468 U. S. 420 (1984),
reaffirmed the conclusions reached in Beckwith. Berkemer concerned
the roadside questioning of a motorist detained in a traffic stop.
We decided that the motorist was not in custody for purposes of
Miranda even though the traffic officer "apparently decided as soon
as [the motorist] stepped out of his car that [the motorist] would
be taken into custody and charged with a traffic offense." 468 U.
S., at 442. The reason, we explained, was that the officer "never
communicated his intention to" the motorist during the relevant
questioning. Ibid. The lack of communication was crucial, for under
Miranda "[a] policeman's unarticulated plan has no bearing on the
question whether a suspect was 'in custody' at a particular
324
Per Curiam
time"; rather, "the only relevant inquiry is how a reasonable
man in the suspect's position would have understood his situation."
468 U. S., at 442. Other cases of ours have been consistent in
adhering to this understanding of the custody element of Miranda.
See, e. g., Mathiason, supra, at 495 ("Nor is the requirement of
warnings to be imposed simply because ... the questioned person is
one whom the police suspect. Miranda warnings are required only
where there has been such a restriction on a person's freedom as to
render him 'in custody' "); Beheler, supra, at 1124, n. 2 ("Our
holding in Mathiason reflected our earlier decision in [Beckwith],
in which we rejected the notion that the 'in custody' requirement
was satisfied merely because the police interviewed a person who
was the 'focus' of a criminal investigation"); Minnesota v. Murphy,
465 U. S. 420,
431 (1984) ("The mere fact that an investigation has focused on a
suspect does not trigger the need for Miranda warnings in
noncustodial settings, and the probation officer's knowledge and
intent have no bearing on the outcome of this case") (citation
omitted); cf. Pennsylvania v. Bruder,
488 U. S. 9, 11, n. 2
(1988).
It is well settled, then, that a police officer's subjective
view that the individual under questioning is a suspect, if
undisclosed, does not bear upon the question whether the individual
is in custody for purposes of Miranda. See F. Inbau, J. Reid, &
J. Buckley, Criminal Interrogation and Confessions 232, 236,
297-298 (3d ed. 1986). The same principle obtains if an officer's
undisclosed assessment is that the person being questioned is not a
suspect. In either instance, one cannot expect the person under
interrogation to probe the officer's innermost thoughts. Save as
they are communicated or otherwise manifested to the person being
questioned, an officer's evolving but unarticulated suspicions do
not affect the objective circumstances of an interrogation or
interview, and thus cannot affect the Miranda custody inquiry. "The
threat to a citizen's Fifth Amendment rights
325
that Miranda was designed to neutralize has little to do with
the strength of an interrogating officer's suspicions." Berkemer,
supra, at 435, n. 22.
An officer's knowledge or beliefs may bear upon the custody
issue if they are conveyed, by word or deed, to the individual
being questioned. Cf. Michigan v. Chesternut,
486 U. S. 567, 575, n. 7
(1988) (citing United States v. Mendenhall,
446 U. S. 544, 554, n. 6
(1980) (opinion of Stewart, J.)). Those beliefs are relevant only
to the extent they would affect how a reasonable person in the
position of the individual being questioned would gauge the breadth
of his or her" 'freedom of action.'" Berkemer, supra, at 440. Even
a clear statement from an officer that the person under
interrogation is a prime suspect is not, in itself, dispositive of
the custody issue, for some suspects are free to come and go until
the police decide to make an arrest. The weight and pertinence of
any communications regarding the officer's degree of suspicion will
depend upon the facts and circumstances of the particular case. In
sum, an officer's views concerning the nature of an interrogation,
or beliefs concerning the potential culpability of the individual
being questioned, may be one among many factors that bear upon the
assessment whether that individual was in custody, but only if the
officer's views or beliefs were somehow manifested to the
individual under interrogation and would have affected how a
reasonable person in that position would perceive his or her
freedom to leave. (Of course, instances may arise in which the
officer's undisclosed views are relevant in testing the credibility
of his or her account of what happened during an interrogation; but
it is the objective surroundings, and not any undisclosed views,
that control the Miranda custody inquiry.)
We decide on this state of the record that the California
Supreme Court's analysis of whether Stansbury was in custody is not
consistent in all respects with the foregoing principles. Numerous
statements in the court's opinion are open
326
Per Curiam
to the interpretation that the court regarded the officers'
subjective beliefs regarding Stansbury's status as a suspect (or
nonsuspect) as significant in and of themselves, rather than as
relevant only to the extent they influenced the objective
conditions surrounding his interrogation. See 4 Cal. 4th, at 1050,
846 P. 2d, at 775 ("whether the investigation ha[d] focused on the"
person being questioned is among the "most important
considerations" in assessing whether the person was in custody). So
understood, the court's analysis conflicts with our precedents. The
court's apparent conclusion that Stansbury's Miranda rights were
triggered by virtue of the fact that he had become the focus of the
officers' suspicions, see 4 Cal. 4th, at 1052, 1054, 846 P. 2d, at
776, 777-778; cf., e. g., State v. Blanding, 69 Haw. 583, 586-587,
752 P. 2d 99, 101 (1988); State v. Hartman, 703 S. W. 2d 106, 120
(Tenn. 1985), cert. denied, 478 U. S. 1010 (1986); People v.
Herdon, 42 Cal. App. 3d 300, 307, n. 10, 116 Cal. Rptr. 641, 645,
n. 10 (1974), is incorrect as well. Our cases make clear, in no
uncertain terms, that any inquiry into whether the interrogating
officers have focused their suspicions upon the individual being
questioned (assuming those suspicions remain undisclosed) is not
relevant for purposes of Miranda. See generally 1 W. LaFave &
J. Israel, Criminal Procedure §6.6(a), pp. 489-490 (1984).
The State acknowledges that Lieutenant Johnston's and the other
officers' subjective and undisclosed suspicions (or lack thereof)
do not bear upon the question whether Stansbury was in custody, for
purposes of Miranda, during the station house interview. It
maintains, however, that the objective facts in the record support
a finding that Stansbury was not in custody until his arrest.
Stansbury, by contrast, asserts that the objective circumstances
show that he was in custody during the entire interrogation. We
think it appropriate for the California Supreme Court to consider
this question in the first instance. We therefore reverse its
327
judgment and remand the case for further proceedings not
inconsistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
JUSTICE BLACKMUN, concurring.
I join the Court's per curiam opinion and merely add that, even
if I were not persuaded that the judgment must be reversed for the
reasons stated in that opinion, I would adhere to my view that the
death penalty cannot be imposed fairly within the constraints of
our Constitution. See my dissent in Callins v. Collins, 510 U. S.
1141, 1143 (1994). I therefore would vacate the death sentence on
that ground, too.
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