Paul Nicholas Kulyk v. United States

414 F.2d 139, 1969 U.S. App. LEXIS 11128
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedAugust 12, 1969
Docket26174_1
StatusPublished
Cited by20 cases

This text of 414 F.2d 139 (Paul Nicholas Kulyk v. United States) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Paul Nicholas Kulyk v. United States, 414 F.2d 139, 1969 U.S. App. LEXIS 11128 (5th Cir. 1969).

Opinion

GOLDBERG, Circuit Judge:

Appellant, Paul Nicholas Kulyk, appeals to this court contesting his 1968 conviction for knowingly transporting in interstate commerce a stolen motor vehicle, 18 U.S.C.A. § 2312. We affirm.

Appellant was arrested on Saturday, September 16, 1967, at 2:30 in the *141 morning as he was exiting the Sylvester, Georgia, V.F.W. Club via the window. The city police took him to the Worth County, Georgia, jail, where he was booked for drunk and disorderly conduct and breaking and entering. On Monday, September 18, appellant was interviewed by John Perry, an officer of the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. After Perry had given appellant the warnings required by Miranda v. Arizona, 1966, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694, appellant told the officer that he had stolen a truck in Virginia and abandoned it in Macon, Georgia. Perry, later that day, relayed this information to Ed Haggerty, an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation in Albany, Georgia. Haggerty informed the F.B.I. office in Macon, Georgia, and the truck was found on September 19, exactly where Kulyk said he abandoned it. On September 25, Kulyk was questioned in the Worth County jail by Haggerty and another F.B.I. agent. Appellant was again given the Miranda warnings and signed the standard F.B.I. waiver form. He then again admitted stealing the truck and driving it from Virginia to Georgia.

On March 15, 1968, the United States Marshal went to the Worth County Prison Camp where he officially arrested Kulyk and took him into federal custody. Thereafter an attorney was appointed to represent appellant, and on April 17, 1968, the court heard a motion seeking to exclude all admissions made by the appellant to Perry of the G.B.I. and Haggerty of the F.B.I. The court heard evidence on the motion on two successive occasions and after careful consideration of all the evidence the motion was denied.

When the ease was called for trial Ku-lyk, without consultation with his attorney, presented two motions to the court. One requested that he be released on a personal recognizance bond. This was overruled. The other requested that appointed counsel be removed and another lawyer appointed to defend Kulyk. The trial court, after some consultation with all parties, informed Kulyk that he would dismiss counsel, but would not appoint another lawyer on the eve of trial. The court gave appellant the night to decide whether under the circumstances he still wanted the court appointed attorney dismissed. The next day appellant announced his decision to represent himself without any assistance of counsel and the trial court reluctantly permitted him to do so.

At the trial both Perry and Haggerty testified that appellant admitted to them that he had stolen the truck and driven it from Virginia to Georgia. Appellant was convicted and received a -maximum sentence of five years.

We first consider appellant’s contentions that his confessions were made during a period of unlawful confinement and were not voluntarily given. He, therefore, asserts that the trial court erred in overruling the motion to suppress and in allowing the use of these incriminating statements at his trial.

The record is anything but clear concerning the events which transpired during the first two weeks of Kulyk’s incarceration in the Worth County jail. Evidence produced at the preliminary hearings on the motion to suppress indicates that it was probably at least September 20, 1967, five days after his arrest, before the appellant was brought before a judicial officer and informed of his constitutional rights. Georgia law [Ga. Code Ann. § 27-212 (1967 Supp.)] requires that a person be brought before a magistrate within 48 hours after an arrest without a warrant. It is therefore apparent that appellant’s confession to Perry, three days after his arrest, was made during a period of illegal detention by the state authorities.

This alone, however, does not make the confession inadmissible. The right under the- federal rules to be promptly taken before a magistrate has not been given constitutional status and *142 has not been applied to persons in state custody. Culombe v. Connecticut, 1961, 867 U.S. 568, 81 S.Ct. 1860, 6 L.Ed.2d 1037; Barnett v. United States, 5 Cir. 1967, 384 F.2d 848; Edwards v. Holman, 5 Cir.1965, 342 F.2d 679. Further, a confession obtained during such state custody can be used in a federal trial for a federal offense in certain circumstances. In United States v. Coppola, 2 Cir. 1960, 281 F.2d 340, aff'd, 1961, 365 U.S. 762, 81 S.Ct. 884, 6 L.Ed.2d 79, the court held that admissions made by a defendant during an illegal detention by state authorities were not rendered inadmissible in a trial on a federal charge when the state detention was not due to a “working arrangement” with the federal authorities. In explaining what constituted the fatal “working arrangement” the court stated:

“The rule excludes confessions when the “working arrangement” includes the illegal detention — in other words —when federal law enforcement officers induce state officers to hold the defendant illegally so that they may secure a confession.” Id. at 344.

Appellant concedes, as from the record he must, that at the time of arrest no such “working arrangement” existed between the F.B.I. and the Georgia authorities. However, he asserts that as soon as the F.B.I. acted on the state information and found the truck, a “working arrangement” did develop since the F.B.I. “took full advantage of appellant’s confinement by state authorities.” It is true that Agent Haggerty did interview appellant in the Worth County jail on September 25, but this is not the sort of “working arrangement” contemplated by the court in Coppola, supra, or in Anderson v. United States, 1943, 318 U.S. 350, 63 S.Ct. 599, 87 L.Ed. 829 where the concept originated. The appellant’s state detention was on a state charge and he was subsequently convicted by the state. It is not suggested that Georgia continued to hold appellant in order to allow the F.B.I. to secure a confession. Without such a “working arrangement” the illegal detention does not bar the admission of appellant’s confession. United States v. Coppola, supra.

Appellant next contends that as soon as the F.B.I. had probable cause to think a federal crime had been committed, appellant should have been taken before a federal commissioner as required by Rule 5(a) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure and that this failure renders appellant’s confessions inadmissible.

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Bluebook (online)
414 F.2d 139, 1969 U.S. App. LEXIS 11128, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/paul-nicholas-kulyk-v-united-states-ca5-1969.