{"id":6039,"date":"2016-09-12T07:10:32","date_gmt":"2016-09-12T11:10:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6039"},"modified":"2016-09-13T07:19:40","modified_gmt":"2016-09-13T11:19:40","slug":"miranda-and-the-police-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6039","title":{"rendered":"Miranda and the Police Interview"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_6040\" style=\"width: 283px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-6040\" class=\"size-full wp-image-6040\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/streaker.jpg?resize=273%2C392\" alt=\"streaker\" width=\"273\" height=\"392\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/streaker.jpg?w=273&amp;ssl=1 273w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/streaker.jpg?resize=104%2C150&amp;ssl=1 104w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/streaker.jpg?resize=209%2C300&amp;ssl=1 209w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 273px) 100vw, 273px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-6040\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">No Miranda for you!? photo: Jonas Bengtsson, creative commons license<\/p><\/div>\n<p>When Ernesto Miranda was arrested by the Phoenix Police Department in 1963, accused of kidnapping and rape, it\u2019s a cinch that of all the things he thought might happen to him, the likelihood his name would become a verb was probably nowhere on the list.<\/p>\n<p>In crime fiction, cops \u201cMirandize\u201d suspects all the time. Too often, perhaps. Leslie Budewitz, a lawyer and president of Sisters in Crime, says that giving every character a Miranda warning is \u201cone of the 12 common mistake fiction writers make about the law.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Writers of crime novels and screenplays often don\u2019t get their Miranda facts straight. The Miranda warning is based on the Fifth Amendments self-incrimination clause and the Sixth Amendment\u2019s right to an attorney, in words familiar to any consumer of U.S. popular culture:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>You have the right to remain silent;<\/li>\n<li>Anything you say can be used against you in a court of law;<\/li>\n<li>You have the right to consult with a lawyer and have that lawyer present during the interrogation;<\/li>\n<li>If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed to represent you<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As John Schembra points out in the comments below, some states have slight variations on the core Miranda rights, cited above, particularly as they apply to juveniles. Some of those interstate differences are described in this <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Miranda_warning#Use_in_various_U.S._state_jurisdictions\">Wikipedia article<\/a> (and subject to change).<\/p>\n<p>In 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court decided (in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.oyez.org\/cases\/2009\/08-1470\"><em>Berghuis v. Thompkins<\/em><\/a>) a controversial case involving the right to remain silent, which some scholars believe weakened <em>Miranda<\/em> protections.<\/p>\n<p>At last month\u2019s Writers\u2019 Police Academy in Green Bay, Wisconsin, police training officer Mike Knetzger agrees that fiction provides Miranda warnings far more often than actually appropriate or used in practice. He outlined the three essential elements that must be present for a Miranda warning to be necessary.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">Crime + Custody + Questioning<\/p>\n<p>The occurrence of an actual <strong>crime<\/strong> seems an obvious prerequisite, but in many situations, police may simply want to talk to a person\u2014for background or as a witness, not yet a suspect. <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nolo.com\/legal-encyclopedia\/crimes-felonies-misdemeanors-infractions-classification-33814.html\">Violations and infractions<\/a> (civil offenses) are not \u201ccrimes.\u201d Examples are traffic tickets and the one Knetzger gave\u2014just possibly from on-the-job experience\u2014running out of the Green Bay Packers\u2019 Lambeau Field stark naked.<\/p>\n<p>Individuals must be \u201cin <strong>custody<\/strong>.\u201d Even if they are at the police station, if they are free to leave, they are not in custody and, therefore, receive no warning. However, if they make \u201cspontaneous statements\u201d there\u2014\u201cHe trashed my cooking one time too many and I hit him over the head with the frying pan\u201d\u2014those statements can be used in court.<\/p>\n<p>The <strong>questioning<\/strong> of the individual must be intended to elicit incriminating evidence, not just make general inquiries. After a crime is committed, the police may ask a great many people about the events and the people involved. None of these are necessarily suspects\u2014yet.<\/p>\n<p>Next time you see, read\u2014or write\u2014that a fictional character receives a Miranda warning, ask yourself whether all three of the above conditions are met.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When Ernesto Miranda was arrested by the Phoenix Police Department in 1963, accused of kidnapping and rape, it\u2019s a cinch that of all the things he thought might happen to him, the likelihood his name would become a verb was &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=6039\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Miranda and the Police Interview - writers play it safe & Mirandize everybody.  No way.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[52,54,174,29],"tags":[347,416,609],"class_list":["post-6039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime","category-detective","category-first-draft-blog","category-writing","tag-police","tag-real-life","tag-sisters-in-crime"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-1zp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6039"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6039\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6044,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6039\/revisions\/6044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}