People v. Figueroa-Ortega

2012 CO 51, 283 P.3d 691, 2012 WL 2393082
CourtSupreme Court of Colorado
DecidedJune 25, 2012
DocketNo. 12SA78
StatusPublished
Cited by226 cases

This text of 2012 CO 51 (People v. Figueroa-Ortega) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Colorado primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Figueroa-Ortega, 2012 CO 51, 283 P.3d 691, 2012 WL 2393082 (Colo. 2012).

Opinion

Justice COATS

delivered the Opinion of the Court.

T1 The People brought an interlocutory appeal pursuant to section 16-12-102(2), C.R.S. (2011), and C.A.R. 4.1, challenging the district court's suppression of statements made by the defendant to a police detective. The district court found that the statements in question were the product of custodial interrogation, without the benefit of Miranda warnings. Because we determine that the defendant was not in custody at the time he made the statements in question, the district court erred, and its suppression order is therefore reversed.

[692]*692I.

12 Erick Fignueroa-Ortega was charged with burglary, criminal mischief, and theft, in connection with a break-in at the restaurant where he worked as a cook. Counsel for the defendant filed a motion to suppress the statements he made to the police and other evidence on the grounds that the statements were the fruits of an illegal seizure of the defendant; that the statements were involuntary in any event; and that the statements were taken in violation of the defendant's Miranda rights. Although the motion did not specify any particular statements to be suppressed, it made reference to two different law enforcement contacts with the defendant-one on September 18, 2009, the morning following the break-in, and the other on September 283, ten days later-alleging that the defendant had been subjected to custodial interrogation, during which he made "many involuntary inculpatory statements."

T3 Following a hearing on March 12, 2012, at which the only witnesses were the officer who spoke with the defendant on September 13 and the officer who spoke with him on September 23, the trial court made findings of fact and conclusions of law. It was undisputed that Officer Patton of the Aurora Police Department arrived at the seene of the reported burglary on the morning of September 13, 2009, observed that the front glass door of the restaurant was smashed, and learned from the owners that cash from the previous night was missing. The officer also had a short conversation with the defendant, who had apparently shown up at the scene, in which the defendant indicated that he was a cook at the restaurant, that he had worked the night before, and that he was the one who closed up at the end of the night.

14 During his subsequent investigation, Detective Crowfoot learned that the church next door had a surveillance camera, which had recorded the outside of the restaurant on the night of the burglary. The video from the church camera, which showed the restaurant being locked up about 11:00 p.m. and being broken into a few hours later, was shown to several different people, including one of the restaurant owners and an employee of the church, who identified both the person who locked up and the person who broke in hours later as the defendant. On September 28, Detective Crowfoot went to the defendant's apartment and spoke with him for about twenty minutes, in the open just outside his front door. Although the detective confronted the defendant at some point with this evidence, accused him of committing the burglary, and told him that he would be charged, the defendant steadfastly denied any involvement. During the exchange, however, the defendant did concede that he went back to the restaurant after locking up, although only to move his truck, and that he knew where the money from the day's receipts was kept each night. After about twenty minutes, the detective thanked the defendant for his time and left.

T5 The trial court made detailed factual findings and conclusions of law, first denying the defendant's challenge to the voluntariness of the statements he made on September 183. With regard to the defendant's statements to Detective Crowfoot on September 28, the court similarly found that the defendant had not been seized at all, much less that he had been seized without reasonable articulable suspicion, and that his statements to Detective Crowfoot were not involuntary. The court then found, however, that at some point between eight and nine minutes into the interview, it became accusatory and confrontational, constituting "custody" for purposes of the Miranda doctrine. Because there was never any dispute that the defendant's statements were made in response to questions by the detective or that the defendant was never advised of, and therefore never effectively waived, his Miranda rights, the trial court ordered all of the defendant's statements to Detective Crowfoot on September 28 suppressed as a violation of his constitutional rights.

T6 The prosecutor filed a notice of interlocutory appeal, pursuant to section 16-12-102, C.R.S. (2011), and C.AR. 4.1.

II.

17 While due process of law forbids the use of any statements that were actually coerced by law enforcement authori[693]*693ties, Brown v. Mississippi, 297 U.S. 278, 56 S.Ct. 461, 80 L.Ed. 682 (1936), the prophylactic warnings formulated in Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 86 S.Ct. 1602, 16 L.Ed.2d 694 (1966), apply only to custodial interrogation. Because the Miranda warnings were expressly developed as an added protection against "incommunicado interrogation of individuals in a police-dominated atmosphere," id. at 445, 86 S.Ct. at 1612, the United States Supreme Court made clear, more than a quarter century ago, that by "custodial" it intended not merely that a suspect have been seized within the contemplation of the Fourth Amendment, but that his liberty actually have been infringed upon to a degree associated with a formal arrest. Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U.S. 420, 440, 104 S.Ct. 3138, 3150, 82 L.Ed.2d 317 (1984); see also Minnesoto v. Murphy, 465 U.S. 420, 429, 104 S.Ct. 1136, 1143, 79 L.Ed.2d 409 (1984); California v. Beheler, 463 U.S. 1121, 1125, 103 S.Ct. 3517, 3520, 77 L.Ed.2d 1275 (1983). While the point at which official infringement rises to a degree associated with a formal arrest, and therefore mandates a Miranda warning, remains a matter to be determined in the totality of the cireumstances of each case, People v. Klinck, 259 P.3d 489, 493 (Colo.2011), "custody" for purposes of Mirando clearly entails some degree of infringement on an individual's liberty exceeding a minimally cognizable constitutional seizure.

18 Because interrogation can be custodial only if the person being interrogated has at least been stopped, the non-exclusive list of factors frequently identified as bearing on the question of whether a reasonable person would no longer feel free to leave, and therefore whether he has been seized at all, remains relevant for Miranda purposes. See People v. Matheny, 46 P.3d 453, 465-66 (Colo.2002). Because, however, that general list of factors was actually developed to determine whether an encounter with law en-foreement officers has ceased to be consensual and therefore has progressed beyond a contact short of a stop to a constitutionally cognizable investigatory stop, see United States v. Mendenhall, 446 U.S. 544, 100 S.Ct. 1870, 64 L.Ed.2d 497 (1980); see also People v.

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Bluebook (online)
2012 CO 51, 283 P.3d 691, 2012 WL 2393082, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-figueroa-ortega-colo-2012.