Also known as: Nemo tenetur prodere seipsum · Nemo tenetur seipsum accusare · nemo tenetur · privilege against self-incrimination · right to silence
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A Latin maxim stating the principle that no individual is obligated to furnish evidence that would incriminate himself in a criminal proceeding. The maxim protects against compelled testimonial disclosures that could tie a person to criminal conduct or furnish leads to such evidence.
Stephanie testified on direct about her revenue calculations and occupancy reporting. On cross-examination counsel asked whether she had skimmed cash tips and failed to report the income. Stephanie asserted the privilege. The court sustained the objection because the inquiry related only to character for truthfulness.
Everett received a subpoena to a regulatory hearing and was asked whether he had signed off on components he knew had failed pressure tests. He refused to answer, asserting that any response would furnish a lead to evidence of falsifying safety records. The court upheld the invocation because the testimony would tie him to potential criminal conduct.
Officers arrested Felicity on suspicion of paying kickbacks and questioned her at the stationhouse. They did not advise her of her rights before asking about falsifying clinical trial reports. Felicity made incriminating statements that prosecutors later sought to introduce at trial.
In March 1963 Ernesto Miranda was arrested at his home in Phoenix and taken to the police station where he was identified by the complaining witness. He was then questioned by two officers in Interrogation Room No. 2 for two hours. The officers did not advise him of any right to counsel. Miranda signed a typed confession that was introduced at his trial for kidnapping and rape. On October 14 1960 Michael Vignera was arrested in connection with a Brooklyn robbery. He was taken first to the 17th Detective Squad headquarters in Manhattan and later to the 66th Detective Squad. A detective questioned him for several hours without any advice concerning counsel. Vignera made an oral admission. He was then questioned by an assistant district attorney whose transcribed statement was also introduced at his trial for first-degree robbery. On March 20 1963 Carl Calvin Westover was arrested by Kansas City police as a suspect in two local robberies. Kansas City police interrogated Westover on the night of his arrest. The next day local officers interrogated him again throughout the morning. Westover was then turned over to FBI agents who questioned him for two to two-and-a-half hours about California robberies and obtained signed confessions. At the time the FBI agents began questioning Westover he had been in custody for over fourteen hours. On January 31 1963 Roy Allen Stewart was arrested at his home in connection with a series of purse-snatch robberies. During the next five days police interrogated Stewart on nine different occasions without any advice of rights. On the ninth session Stewart confessed. Transcripts of the interrogations were introduced at his trial for kidnapping rape and murder. The Arizona Supreme Court affirmed Miranda's conviction. The New York courts affirmed Vignera's conviction. The Ninth Circuit affirmed Westover's conviction. The California Supreme Court reversed Stewart's conviction. The Supreme Court granted certiorari in the four cases and consolidated them for argument.
View caseAgents arrested Felicity and gave Miranda warnings. She invoked her right to remain silent. Two days later different agents gave fresh warnings and questioned her about a separate offense. Felicity made statements that were later offered at trial.
On January 10, 2000, a shooting occurred outside a mall in Southfield, Michigan, in which Samuel Morris died from multiple gunshot wounds and Frederick France was injured but recovered. Van Chester Thompkins was identified as a suspect and fled; he was arrested in Ohio approximately one year later. Two Southfield police officers, including Detective Helgert, traveled to Ohio to interrogate Thompkins while he awaited transfer to Michigan. The interrogation began around 1:30 p.m. in an 8-by-10-foot room and lasted about three hours, with Thompkins seated in a chair resembling a school desk. At the outset, Detective Helgert presented Thompkins with a written Miranda rights form derived from the standard warnings. Thompkins read the fifth warning aloud, after which Helgert read the remaining warnings; Thompkins declined to sign the form to acknowledge understanding his rights, though there was conflicting evidence about whether he verbally confirmed understanding. During the interrogation Thompkins remained largely silent and uncommunicative, giving only occasional one-word answers such as “yeah,” “no,” or “I don’t know,” nodding his head at times, and stating that he did not want a peppermint offered by the officers and that the chair he was sitting in was hard. Approximately two hours and forty-five minutes into the interrogation, Helgert asked Thompkins whether he prayed to God to forgive him for shooting the boy; Thompkins answered “yes,” made eye contact, and his eyes welled with tears. Thompkins refused to provide a written confession, and the interrogation ended about fifteen minutes later. Thompkins was charged with first-degree murder, assault with intent to commit murder, and firearms-related offenses; he moved to suppress the statements made during the interrogation. The trial court denied the suppression motion. At trial the prosecution called Eric Purifoy, who had driven the van during the shooting and had been acquitted of murder and assault charges in a prior trial but convicted of firearms offenses; the jury convicted Thompkins on all counts, and he was sentenced to life in prison without parole. The Michigan Court of Appeals rejected Thompkins’s Miranda and ineffective-assistance claims and affirmed the conviction; the Michigan Supreme Court denied discretionary review. Thompkins filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, which denied relief; the Sixth Circuit reversed on both the Miranda and ineffective-assistance claims, and the Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseState university officials and campus police questioned Cassandra in her office about falsified research grants. They warned that refusal to answer could result in termination and criminal referral. Cassandra provided admissions that prosecutors later sought to use in a criminal case.
In November 1959, Harold Malloy was arrested during a gambling raid in Hartford, Connecticut, on charges related to pool selling. He pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor, receiving a sentence of one year in jail and a five-hundred-dollar fine, with the jail term suspended after ninety days followed by two years of probation. Approximately sixteen months later, Malloy was subpoenaed to appear before a referee appointed by the Superior Court of Hartford County to investigate alleged gambling and other criminal activities in the county. During the inquiry, he was questioned about the circumstances of his 1959 arrest and conviction, including the identity of his employer, who paid his fine and bondsman, the tenant of the apartment where he was arrested, and whether he knew a man named John Bergoti. Malloy refused to answer any of these questions, asserting that his responses might tend to incriminate him. The Superior Court adjudged Malloy in contempt and ordered him committed to prison until he answered the questions. The Connecticut Supreme Court of Errors affirmed the contempt adjudication, holding that the Fifth Amendment privilege was unavailable in state proceedings and that Malloy had not properly invoked the state constitutional privilege. Malloy then sought federal habeas corpus relief in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut, which was denied, and the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the dismissal. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the constitutional questions presented.
View caseKimberly was tried for mail fraud. The court instructed the jury that it could consider her decision not to testify as evidence of guilt. Defense counsel did not object. Kimberly was convicted and appealed on the ground that the instruction violated her constitutional protection.
On December 27, 1970, Gordon Patterson shot and killed John Northrup in Glens Falls, New York. After a brief and unstable marriage, Patterson had become estranged from his wife Roberta. Roberta had resumed an association with Northrup, a neighbor to whom she had been engaged before her marriage to Patterson. Patterson borrowed a rifle from an acquaintance and went to the residence of his father-in-law. There he observed his wife through a window in a state of semiundress in Northrup's presence. He entered the house and killed Northrup by shooting him twice in the head. Patterson was charged with second-degree murder. At his jury trial in Warren County Court, Patterson raised the affirmative defense of extreme emotional disturbance and presented psychiatric evidence tending to show that he had been extremely emotionally disturbed when he killed Northrup. The jury was instructed that the prosecution had the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt each element of the crime of murder. The defendant had the burden of proving the affirmative defense by a preponderance of the evidence. The jury convicted Patterson of second-degree murder. The Appellate Division affirmed the conviction. While appeal to the New York Court of Appeals was pending, this Court decided Mullaney v. Wilbur. The New York Court of Appeals nevertheless affirmed, distinguishing the Maine statute at issue in Mullaney and holding that New York's allocation of the burden of proof on the affirmative defense was consistent with due process. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari limited to the question whether the burden of proof placed on the defendant by New York law is consistent with the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.
View caseNo. A witness who testifies on another matter does not waive the privilege against self-incrimination when the cross-examination inquiry relates only to character for truthfulness.
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Testimony is incriminating if it would tie the witness to the commission of a crime or furnish a lead to evidence that could tie the witness to a crime. The testimony need not itself establish guilt.
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Yes. The Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination is incorporated against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment and binds state officials in the same manner as federal officials.
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Yes, provided officers scrupulously honor the invocation by immediately stopping, waiting a significant period, giving fresh warnings, and limiting the new interview to a different offense.
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