People v. Stone

California Court of Appeal
1965 Cal. App. LEXIS 1080, 48 Cal. Rptr. 469, 239 Cal. App. 2d 14 (1965)

ELI5:

Rule of Law:

A single, non-accusatory question posed to a suspect in custody does not constitute a process of interrogation requiring constitutional warnings against self-incrimination. Additionally, evidence in plain view, such as the shoes an arrestee is wearing, may be lawfully seized without a warrant during a routine search upon admission to jail.

Facts:

On April 4, 1964, two men, one later identified as Stone, robbed the Kinney Shoe Store in Belmont, taking cash and two pairs of shoes.
Several store employees later identified Stone from photographs shown to them by the police.
Stone was arrested in Los Angeles on April 13th.
On April 14th, Officer Trenam took custody of Stone and noticed he was wearing shoes similar to those stolen in the robbery.
Officer Trenam asked Stone where he had purchased the shoes.
Stone replied that he had purchased them at a shoe store in Los Angeles.
Upon being admitted to the San Mateo County Jail, Stone was searched as part of a routine intake process.
During the search, Stone's shoes were removed and examined, revealing the Kinney trademark and stock number matching the stolen items.

Procedural Posture:

Stone was charged with robbery in a California superior court (trial court).
At trial, the court admitted into evidence Stone's statement about the shoes and the shoes themselves.
A jury found Stone guilty of robbery.
Stone (appellant) appealed his conviction to the California Court of Appeal, First District, Division Three.

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Issue:

Does a single, non-accusatory question asked by a police officer to a suspect in custody, without prior warnings of the right to counsel or silence, constitute an interrogation that renders the suspect's statement inadmissible?

Opinions:

Majority - Salsman, J.

No. A single, non-accusatory question to a suspect in custody does not rise to the level of a constitutional interrogation. The court reasoned that while Stone was in custody and suspicion had focused upon him, the critical element of an interrogation designed to elicit incriminating statements was 'totally absent.' The officer's question about where Stone purchased the shoes was not accusatory and, in fact, assumed a lawful purchase. Because it was not a 'process of interrogation,' the rules from Escobedo and Dorado requiring warnings of the right to counsel and silence did not apply, and the statement was admissible. The court also held that the seizure of the shoes was constitutional because it is reasonable to search prisoners upon admission to jail, and the shoes, being in plain sight, were not discovered through an illegal search.

Analysis:

This case helps define the line between permissible, preliminary questioning and a formal custodial interrogation that triggers Fifth Amendment protections under the Escobedo/Dorado framework, the precursor to Miranda. The decision establishes that not every question asked by police to a suspect in custody constitutes an 'interrogation.' This ruling preserved a degree of flexibility for officers to ask basic, non-accusatory questions during the initial stages of custody without having to provide constitutional warnings, narrowing the scope of what the court considered a 'process of interrogations that lends itself to eliciting incriminating statements.'

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