Moore v. State

914 So. 2d 185, 2005 WL 90941
CourtCourt of Appeals of Mississippi
DecidedJanuary 18, 2005
Docket2002-KA-01663-COA
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 914 So. 2d 185 (Moore v. State) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Mississippi primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Moore v. State, 914 So. 2d 185, 2005 WL 90941 (Mich. Ct. App. 2005).

Opinion

914 So.2d 185 (2005)

Terun MOORE, Appellant
v.
STATE of Mississippi, Appellee.

No. 2002-KA-01663-COA.

Court of Appeals of Mississippi.

January 18, 2005.
Rehearing Denied September 6, 2005.
Certiorari Denied November 10, 2005.

*187 Chokwe Lumumba, Jackson, attorney for appellant.

Office of the Attorney General, by Billy L. Gore, attorney for appellee.

EN BANC.

LEE, P.J., for the Court.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

¶ 1. On April 2, 1998, Louis Avery and his brother, Michael Evans, were visiting Hico Park in Jackson. At the park a group of men were playing basketball, drinking alcohol, and smoking marijuana. Evans, who was from Detroit, Michigan, had in his possession the money with which he was going to purchase his airplane ticket for his return home. James Washington was among the men present. According to Washington, he, Moore, and others conspired to rob Avery and Evans. As the brothers prepared to leave, Avery took the driver's seat in a car. Before Evans entered the vehicle, Washington pointed a 9 millimeter automatic pistol at Avery. Evans jumped into the car and grabbed his brother's leg in an attempt to cause the car to accelerate away from the perpetrators. As the car sped away, Avery heard several shots. Moore, who was standing outside the car on the passenger side of the vehicle, fired these shots at Evans with a .25 caliber pistol. Avery drove the car to his girlfriend's house and called the paramedics for assistance. Evans was pronounced dead at the scene.

¶ 2. Moore's account of the events differs from Washington's testimony. Moore testified that although he had been at the park imbibing with the other men earlier that afternoon, he left the park and was not present during the robbery. Moore testified that he was unaware of the homicide until he saw it reported on the nightly news.

¶ 3. Moore was arrested several days after the incident, and, according to police testimony, Moore admitted to shooting Evans and expressed regret for his actions. Moore testified that he made no such admission and merely told the police that he was not present during the shooting.

¶ 4. On July 15, 2001, Moore was convicted of the capital murder of Michael Evans. Moore was sentenced to serve a term of life imprisonment in the custody of the Mississippi Department of Corrections. It is from this conviction that Moore now appeals, arguing the following six assignments of error: (1) the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress his alleged statements admitting to the shooting; (2) the trial court erred in denying Moore's Batson challenge to the State's exclusion of several jurors; (3) the trial court erred in ruling that Moore waived his motion to suppress because Moore's attorney failed to appear for the motion hearing; (4) the trial court erred in denying Moore's motion to dismiss and for a judgment of acquittal; (5) the trial court erred in denying Moore's motion for a mistrial after the State elicited testimony that Moore was incarcerated; and (6) the cumulative effect of errors denied Moore a constitutionally fair trial and therefore his conviction should be reversed.

¶ 5. After an extensive review of the record in this case and the briefs submitted by the parties, this Court finds that these arguments lack merit, and the judgment of the trial court should be affirmed.

*188 DISCUSSION OF ISSUES

I. DID THE TRIAL COURT ERR IN DENYING MOORE'S MOTION TO SUPPRESS?

¶ 6. Moore urges this Court to reverse the trial court's decision which allowed into evidence his statement to the police in which he admitted to the shooting. Moore cites Brown v. Illinois, 422 U.S. 590, 95 S.Ct. 2254, 45 L.Ed.2d 416 (1975), in support of this proposition. Moore argues that he was arrested illegally, therefore his "confession" was a product of the illegal arrest and should have been suppressed. In his brief Moore argues that "Brown holds that if you are unlawfully arrested any statements which flows [sic] from that arrest are illegal."

¶ 7. Contrary to Moore's assertion, Brown does not stand for the above proposition, and this Court declines to construe it as such. In Brown, the defendant was arrested without probable cause and without a warrant under circumstances indicating that the arrest was investigatory. While in custody, the defendant made two inculpatory statements after he had been given the warnings proscribed by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966). The Supreme Court determined that the Illinois court erred in adopting a per se rule that Miranda warnings in and of themselves broke the causal chain so that any subsequent statement, even if induced by effects of unconstitutional custody, was admissible if it was voluntary and not coerced in violation of the Fifth and Fourteenth amendments. The Supreme Court decided only "that the Illinois courts were in error in assuming that the Miranda warnings by themselves, under Wong Sun, always purge the taint of an illegal arrest." Brown, 422 U.S. at 605, 95 S.Ct. 2254 (citing Wong Sun v. U.S., 371 U.S. 471, 486, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441 (1963)). The Court determined that while Miranda protected a person's Fifth Amendment rights, Fourth Amendment rights are implicated in an unlawful arrest as well. Thus, excluding a statement taken without the benefit of a warning under Miranda might protect the purposes of the Fifth Amendment, but that exclusion does nothing to protect the Fourth Amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures. To break the causal chain between the illegal arrest and the statements made subsequent to the arrest, Wong Sun requires that the statement meet the Fifth Amendment standard of voluntariness and that it be "sufficiently an act of free will to purge the primary taint." Brown, 422 U.S. at 602, 95 S.Ct. 2254, (quoting Wong Sun, 371 U.S. at 486, 83 S.Ct. 407). To determine if the statement is a "product of a free will" the Supreme Court looks to a number of factors in addition to voluntariness, including the "temporal proximity of the arrest and confession, the presence of intervening circumstances, and, particularly, the purpose and flagrancy of the official misconduct are all relevant." Brown, 422 U.S. at 603-604, 95 S.Ct. 2254 (internal citations omitted).

¶ 8. Assuming, without deciding, that Moore was arrested illegally, under Brown and Wong Sun, Moore's statement could be admitted if Moore's statement was the product of his free will to the extent that the taint of the illegal arrest had been purged. With this in mind, this Court now turns to the factors outlined in Brown. Under the first consideration of Brown, we look to the temporal proximity between the arrest and the confession. While Moore signed a waiver and an acknowledgment that he understood his rights as outlined in the Miranda warnings, the confession was given, at most, within a few hours of the arrest. We next look to the presence of any intervening *189 circumstances between the illegal arrest and the confession which would purge the taint of the illegal arrest.

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914 So. 2d 185, 2005 WL 90941, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/moore-v-state-missctapp-2005.