Also known as: rights to remain silent · right-to-remain-silent · right to silence · Miranda right
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
A constitutional privilege protecting individuals from compelled self-incrimination. The privilege requires law enforcement to provide specific warnings before custodial interrogation and bars the use of silence or statements obtained without a valid waiver.
Ravi Reddy received Miranda warnings during stationhouse questioning about a fraud scheme. He remained silent for several minutes before answering one question about his role in the transactions. Prosecutors later sought to introduce his answer at trial.
Roland Rhodes was arrested and invoked his right to counsel during initial questioning about a theft. Officers stopped but returned the next day without providing counsel and resumed interrogation about the same offense. Rhodes made further statements during the resumed session.
Riley Rivera invoked the right to counsel after arrest for assault. She consulted briefly with an attorney that evening. The next morning officers returned alone and questioned her again about the incident without counsel present.
Ronald Reed was taken into custody at the station and questioned for two hours about a robbery. Officers never advised him of his rights before obtaining his statements. The prosecution later offered those statements at trial.
Renee Rogers gave a statement during custodial interrogation after receiving warnings. Congress later passed a statute purporting to admit voluntary confessions without the warnings. Prosecutors relied on the statute to introduce her statement at trial.
Petitioner Dickerson was indicted for bank robbery, conspiracy to commit bank robbery, and using a firearm in the course of committing a crime of violence. Before trial, Dickerson moved to suppress a statement he had made at a Federal Bureau of Investigation field office on the grounds that he had not received Miranda warnings before being interrogated. The District Court granted his motion to suppress, and the Government took an interlocutory appeal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. That court reversed the District Court's suppression order. It agreed that petitioner had not received Miranda warnings before making his statement but held that 18 U.S.C. § 3501 governed the admissibility of the statement. The Fourth Circuit concluded that Miranda was not a constitutional holding and that Congress could therefore have the final say on admissibility. Two years after Miranda was decided, Congress enacted 18 U.S.C. § 3501, which provides that a confession shall be admissible in evidence if it is voluntarily given and directs the trial judge to consider specified factors in determining voluntariness. Because of the importance of the questions raised by the Court of Appeals' decision, the Supreme Court granted certiorari.
View caseRoberto Reyes refused to answer questions during a state probation hearing about prior criminal conduct. The state court held that the Fifth Amendment did not apply in state proceedings and compelled his testimony. Reyes was later prosecuted based on that testimony.
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 caseNo. Silence alone does not invoke the right. The suspect must clearly and unambiguously assert the desire to remain silent.
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Police may resume after scrupulously honoring the invocation by waiting a significant period, giving fresh warnings, and limiting the new interview to a different offense.
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Police must cease all interrogation and may not reinitiate questioning about any offense until counsel is provided or the suspect reinitiates contact.
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Yes. The Fifth Amendment privilege is incorporated against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment.
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No. Such comment violates the Fifth Amendment by inviting the jury to draw an adverse inference from the exercise of the right to remain silent.
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…interrogated him in a police station for the purpose of obtaining a confession. The police did not effectively advise him of his right to remain silent or of his right to consult with his attorney. Rather, they confronted him with an alleged accomplice who accused him of having perpetrated a murder. When the defendant denied the accusation…