Also known as: attenuate the taint · attenuates the taint · attenuating the taint · attenuation of the taint · attenuation doctrine · taint attenuation
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A doctrine in criminal procedure under which evidence obtained after unlawful police conduct remains admissible. Intervening circumstances such as the discovery of a valid preexisting arrest warrant break the causal chain between the constitutional violation and the evidence when the officer's misconduct was at most negligent and not purposeful or flagrant.
Officer Lewis stopped Anita Ali near a factory loading dock solely because she carried a bulky duffel bag. Dispatch reported a preexisting warrant for a missed child-support hearing. Lewis arrested Ali on the warrant and found methamphetamine in her car during a search incident to arrest. The court admitted the drugs because the valid warrant served as an intervening circumstance that attenuated the taint of the unlawful stop.
Police arrested Alfred Ashford without probable cause and took him to the station. After receiving Miranda warnings Ashford confessed to a robbery. The court suppressed the confession because the close temporal proximity to the unlawful arrest and the absence of any intervening circumstance left the taint intact.
On May 13, 1968, Chicago police detectives William Nolan and William Lenz broke into petitioner Richard Brown's apartment without a warrant or probable cause, searched it, and waited inside. When Brown arrived around 7:45 p.m. and climbed the rear stairs, the detectives arrested him at gunpoint after one positioned himself at the rear door window and the other approached from behind. The detectives had obtained Brown's name from the brother of murder victim Roger Corpus, killed one week earlier on May 6 with a .38-caliber revolver, but had identified him only as an acquaintance and lacked probable cause for arrest. They transported Brown to the Maxwell Street police station. At the station, after obtaining the Corpus homicide file, the detectives gave Brown Miranda warnings around 8:45 p.m. and questioned him for twenty to twenty-five minutes. Brown signed a two-page statement acknowledging that he and Jimmy Claggett had visited Corpus on May 5, that Claggett ordered Brown at gunpoint to bind Corpus, and that Claggett shot Corpus three times with a revolver Brown had sold him. The detectives and Brown then searched for Claggett, arrested him around 12:15 a.m., and returned to the station. Brown remained at the station and at 2 a.m. spoke with Assistant State's Attorney Crilly, who again administered Miranda warnings. Brown gave a second statement around 3 a.m. that was substantially consistent with the first but contained inaccuracies about his employment and education; he refused to sign it. Brown made a phone call to his mother at 4 a.m. and was taken before a magistrate at 9:30 a.m., approximately fourteen hours after arrest. Brown and Claggett were indicted on June 20, 1968. The trial court denied Brown's motion to suppress the statements after a hearing. At trial the State introduced evidence of both statements through Detective Nolan's testimony and the reading of the second statement to the jury. Brown was convicted of murder and sentenced to fifteen to thirty years' imprisonment. The Illinois Supreme Court affirmed the conviction.
View caseOfficers entered Alice Atkins's apartment without a warrant and remained inside. Hours later they obtained a valid search warrant based on information gathered before the entry. The court admitted evidence found under the warrant because the valid warrant and the officers' merely negligent conduct constituted intervening circumstances that attenuated the taint of the initial unlawful entry.
In January 1981, the New York Drug Enforcement Task Force received information indicating that Andres Segura and Luz Marina Colon probably were trafficking in cocaine from their New York apartment. Acting on this information, Task Force agents maintained continuing surveillance over petitioners until their arrest on February 12, 1981. On February 9, agents observed a meeting between Segura and Enrique Rivudalla-Vidal. Three days later, Segura telephoned Rivudalla-Vidal and agreed to provide him with cocaine at a designated fast-food restaurant in Queens. Rivudalla-Vidal and Esther Parra arrived at the restaurant at 5 p.m. Agents observed Colon deliver a bulky package to Parra in the parking lot. Agents stopped the couple as they were about to enter Rivudalla-Vidal's apartment, found Parra in possession of cocaine, and arrested both. Rivudalla-Vidal cooperated, admitted purchasing the cocaine from Segura, and informed agents that Segura was to call him at approximately 10 o'clock that evening. Between 6:30 and 7 p.m., agents received authorization from an Assistant United States Attorney to arrest Segura and Colon and to secure the premises because a search warrant probably could not be obtained until the following day. At about 7:30 p.m., agents arrived at petitioners' apartment and established external surveillance. At 11:15 p.m., Segura entered the lobby and was arrested. Agents took him to the third-floor apartment, knocked on the door, and entered with him when Colon appeared. Agents arrested Colon and three other persons found in the apartment. They conducted a limited security check and observed in plain view a triple-beam scale, jars of lactose, and numerous small cellophane bags. None of these items was disturbed. Two agents remained in the apartment awaiting the warrant. Because of administrative delay, the warrant application was not presented to the Magistrate until 5 p.m. the next day. The warrant was issued and the search was performed at approximately 6 p.m., some 19 hours after the agents' initial entry. In the search pursuant to the warrant, agents discovered almost three pounds of cocaine, 18 rounds of .38-caliber ammunition, more than $50,000 cash, and records of narcotics transactions. Segura and Colon were indicted for conspiring to distribute cocaine and for distributing and possessing with intent to distribute cocaine. They moved to suppress all evidence seized from the apartment. The District Court granted the motion. The Court of Appeals affirmed in part and reversed in part. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseA park ranger stopped Anika Anand's vehicle solely to verify permits. The ranger ran Anand's license and discovered a preexisting warrant for an old protest charge. After arresting Anand the ranger found illegal mushrooms in the car. The court admitted the evidence because the warrant attenuated the taint of the suspicionless stop.
In December 2006, an anonymous tipster contacted the South Salt Lake City police department's drug-tip line to report narcotics activity at a particular residence, specifying that the activity involved a white male and providing a physical description of the man and his car. Detective Douglas Fackrell was assigned to investigate the tip and conducted intermittent surveillance of the home over the course of about a week. During this period, Fackrell observed visitors who would frequently enter the residence and leave after short periods of time, a pattern consistent with drug dealing in his experience. One of the visitors was Edward Strieff. Officer Fackrell observed Strieff exit the house and walk toward a nearby convenience store. In the store's parking lot, Fackrell detained Strieff without reasonable suspicion, identified himself as a police officer, and asked what Strieff was doing at the residence. As part of the stop, Fackrell requested Strieff's identification, and Strieff produced his Utah identification card. Fackrell relayed the information to a police dispatcher, who reported that Strieff had an outstanding arrest warrant for a traffic violation. Fackrell arrested Strieff pursuant to the warrant. When Fackrell searched Strieff incident to the arrest, he discovered a baggie of methamphetamine and drug paraphernalia. The State of Utah charged Strieff with unlawful possession of a controlled substance and possession of drug paraphernalia. Strieff moved to suppress the evidence, arguing that it was obtained by exploitation of an unlawful investigatory stop. The trial court denied the motion to suppress. The Utah Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court's denial of the suppression motion. The Utah Supreme Court reversed. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseOfficers detained Andrew Avery for questioning without probable cause and transported him to the station. Avery made incriminating statements after receiving Miranda warnings. The court suppressed the statements because the detention was illegal and the warnings alone did not attenuate the taint.
On March 26, 1971, the proprietor of a pizza parlor in Rochester, New York, was killed during an attempted robbery. On August 10, 1971, Detective Anthony Fantigrossi learned of a possible lead implicating petitioner Irving Dunaway in the crime from an informant. Fantigrossi questioned a jail inmate but obtained no information sufficient to secure a warrant for Dunaway's arrest. Nevertheless, on the morning of August 11, 1971, three detectives located Dunaway at a neighbor's house and took him into custody. Although not told he was under arrest, Dunaway would have been physically restrained if he had attempted to leave. He was driven to police headquarters in a police car and placed in an interrogation room. After receiving Miranda warnings, Dunaway waived his right to counsel and made statements and drew sketches that incriminated him in the crime. He was then formally arrested and charged with murder and attempted robbery. Dunaway's motion to suppress the statements and sketches was denied at trial, and he was convicted by a jury. Following initial affirmances and a remand from the Supreme Court in light of Brown v. Illinois, the County Court found the detention illegal and granted the suppression motion, but the Appellate Division reversed that determination. The New York Court of Appeals dismissed Dunaway's application for leave to appeal.
View caseCourts examine the temporal proximity between the illegality and the discovery of evidence, the presence of intervening circumstances, and the purpose and flagrancy of the official misconduct.
Yes when the warrant is unconnected to the stop, the officer's conduct was at most negligent, and there is no purposeful or flagrant violation. The warrant then constitutes an intervening circumstance that breaks the causal chain.
No. Temporal proximity is only one factor. A strong intervening circumstance such as a valid preexisting warrant can outweigh close timing when the officer's misconduct was merely negligent.
Purposeful or flagrant misconduct such as a systematic policy of suspicionless stops weighs strongly against attenuation and favors suppression.
…that the record is adequate to allow us to rule on the major issue — whether advice of Miranda rights constitutes a per se attenuation of the taint of an illegal arrest in all cases. I do not agree, however, that the record is adequate for the Court to rule, in addition, that there was insufficient attenuation of taint in this…