silent record

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.

In December 1976, William Thomas Butler and a man named Elmer Lee robbed a gas station in Goldsboro, North Carolina, and shot the station attendant during the robbery. The attendant survived the shooting and later testified against Butler at trial. A North Carolina trial court convicted Butler of kidnapping, armed robbery, and felonious assault based on the evidence presented. Following his arrest by Federal Bureau of Investigation agents in the Bronx, New York, on a North Carolina fugitive warrant, Butler received Miranda warnings at the scene. The agents then took Butler to the FBI office in New Rochelle, New York. There, after confirming that Butler had an eleventh-grade education and could read, the agents provided him with the Bureau's Advice of Rights form, which he read. Butler stated that he understood his rights, refused to sign the waiver at the bottom of the form, and said he would talk to the agents but would not sign any form. He subsequently made inculpatory statements to the agents without requesting the assistance of counsel or attempting to stop the questioning. Outside the presence of the jury, FBI Agent Martinez testified to these events at Butler's trial. The trial court denied Butler's motion to suppress the incriminating statements, concluding that Butler had effectively waived his rights. The statements were admitted into evidence, and the jury found Butler guilty of each offense charged. On appeal, the North Carolina Supreme Court reversed the convictions and ordered a new trial. The state supreme court determined that the statements had been admitted in violation of Miranda because Butler had refused to waive his right to counsel in writing and had not made a specific oral waiver. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider whether the North Carolina Supreme Court's per se rule requiring an explicit waiver aligned with the Miranda decision.

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.

In August 1972, the Janaf Branch of the United Virginia Bank/Seaboard National in Norfolk, Virginia, was robbed. Witnesses saw two men wearing masks and carrying guns enter the bank while a third man waited in the car. About an hour after the robbery, the getaway car was discovered. Inside was found a rent receipt signed by one "Allen R. Norris" and a lease, also signed by Norris, for a house in Norfolk. Two men subsequently convicted of participating in the robbery were arrested at the rented house with the proceeds of the robbery and the guns and masks used by the gunmen. Government agents traced the rent receipt to respondent Billy Gale Henry. On the basis of this information, Henry was arrested in Atlanta, Georgia, in November 1972. Two weeks later he was indicted for armed robbery under 18 U.S.C. §§ 2113(a) and (d). He was held pending trial in the Norfolk city jail. Counsel was appointed on November 27, 1972. On November 21, 1972, shortly after Henry was incarcerated, government agents contacted Nichols, an inmate at the Norfolk city jail who had been engaged to provide confidential information to the Federal Bureau of Investigation as a paid informant. Nichols informed the agent that he was housed in the same cellblock with Henry. The agent told Nichols to be alert to any statements made by the federal prisoners but not to initiate any conversation with or question Henry regarding the bank robbery. In early December, after Nichols had been released from jail, the agent again contacted Nichols, who reported that he and Henry had engaged in conversation and that Henry had told him about the robbery of the Janaf bank. Nichols was paid for furnishing the information. When Henry was tried in March 1973, Nichols testified that he had an opportunity to have some conversations with Mr. Henry while he was in the jail. Henry told him about going to the Janaf Branch to see which employees opened the vault and described the details of the robbery. The jury was not informed that Nichols was a paid Government informant. On the basis of this testimony, Henry was convicted of bank robbery and sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 25 years. His conviction was affirmed on appeal, and his petition to this Court for a writ of certiorari was denied. On August 28, 1975, Henry moved to vacate his sentence pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 2255. He alleged that he had just learned that Nichols was a paid Government informant and that the introduction of Nichols' testimony violated his Sixth Amendment right to the assistance of counsel. The District Court denied the motion without a hearing. The Court of Appeals reversed and remanded for an evidentiary inquiry. On remand, the District Court again denied the motion after reviewing affidavits from the government agents. The Court of Appeals reversed, holding that the actions of the Government impaired Henry's Sixth Amendment rights. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider whether respondent's Sixth Amendment right to the assistance of counsel was violated by the admission at trial of incriminating statements made by respondent to his cellmate, an undisclosed Government informant, after indictment and while in custody.