People v. Sunset Bay

76 A.D.2d 592, 430 N.Y.S.2d 601, 1980 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 12174
CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
DecidedJuly 24, 1980
StatusPublished
Cited by18 cases

This text of 76 A.D.2d 592 (People v. Sunset Bay) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
People v. Sunset Bay, 76 A.D.2d 592, 430 N.Y.S.2d 601, 1980 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 12174 (N.Y. Ct. App. 1980).

Opinion

OPINION OF THE COURT

Sandler, J.

After denial of a motion to suppress his confession following a hearing, the defendant pleaded guilty to murder in the second degree and was sentenced to an indeterminate term of imprisonment of 15 years to life.

The principal issue on this appeal is raised by defendant’s contention that the confession was secured by police methods that violated his rights under the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. We agree that the defendant’s constitutionál rights were violated and, accordingly, vacate the judgment of conviction, grant the motion to suppress the confession, and remand for further proceedings.

On April 16, 1975, a young woman was stabbed to death in the course of a rape. The intensive police investigation that followed discovery of her body failed to disclose evidence pointing to the identity of the killer, but a general suspicion developed with regard to the defendant, a resident of the apartment building in which the body was found, and who was present in the building on the date of the crime.

The investigating police decided to develop a friendly relationship with the defendant. Under the guise of securing his co-operation in the solution of the crime, they talked to him from time to time about the case. The defendant proved eager to co-operate. The practice developed that the investigating detectives would make an appointment to meet the defendant, talk to him and ride with him in their police car. On occasions they took defendant to City Island for dinner. Conversations about the case during these meetings were preceded by Miranda warnings which defendant said he understood because of some prior training at the police academy. Defendant [594]*594willingly responded to their inquiries and, in furtherance of the investigation, gave evidence to the police, including samples of his pubic hair, his footprints, and his sneakers.

Suspicion of the defendant became more sharply focused on July 15, 1975, when an FBI laboratory report disclosed that defendant’s pubic hair was consistent with specimens found under the body of the victim. Moreover, the police concluded that there was no plausible explanation other than guilt for the defendant’s knowledge that the deceased had been bound with her own brassiere.

On the morning of August 6, 1975, shortly before noon, the investigating detectives asked defendant to accompany them to the station house where they could again talk to him about the case. Defendant was apparently quite willing to accompany them.

At the station house, tape-recording equipment was set up which recorded much of that which was to occur in the following six hours. From time to time the tape ran out and was not replaced for some period of time, leaving considerable gaps in the recording.

The first tape involved a long discursive conversation between the defendant and one of the investigating officers, Detective Davis, which followed another reading of the Miranda rights. In the preliminary phase of the interrogation, there was a rambling discussion about a variety of matters, some connected with the crime and some unrelated to it, in which little of an accusatory character developed.

Following this interview, a determination was made to confront the defendant with the evidence. The following conversation, recorded on the second tape admitted into evidence, is central to the issue presented.

The tape opens with the defendant already sobbing, a development not accounted for in the hearing, and following a gap of undetermined length after completion of the conversation recorded on the first tape. Preliminarily, the detectives undertook by way of questions and affirmative statements to convince the defendant that they had conclusive evidence of his guilt. In part at least the statements they made to the defendant significantly distorted and magnified the evidence already available to the detectives.

Most important of the items of evidence presented to the defendant was the vehemently repeated statement that his [595]*595pubic hairs had been found under the body of the deceased. The laboratory report was far more limited, disclosing only that his pubic hairs were consistent with those found. To what extent the other police assertions with regard to evidence were inaccurate is less clearly established in this record. It seems likely, however, that their references to blood stains and footprints also exaggerated the significance of the information available to them.

It is, of course, clear that police deception by itself does not invalidate a resulting confession, although it is relevant where accompanied by other coercive factors. (See, e.g., Spano v New York, 360 US 315; Lisenba v California, 314 US 219, 237; Robinson v Smith, 451 F Supp 1278.)

After this preliminary, at least partially successful, effort to persuade the defendant of the conclusive evidence of his guilt in their possession, the investigating officers undertook a sustained effort over a period of several hours to induce the defendant to confess. Operating in relays, this period was dominated by repeated exhortations to the defendant to confess, in which a variety of psychological techniques were used, varying in approach and intensity of language. Appeals were made to the defendant’s religious principles, to his superstitious fears, to his sense of his worth as a man, and to his ethnic pride. Gruesome color photographs of the deceased were exhibited to him. He was asked to contemplate what would occur if he, as a result of a similar impulse, should kill his girlfriend. And it was suggested that if he were to kill again, he might be the victim of mob violence.

From time to time the effort developed high emotional intensity. The tenor of some of the proceedings is perhaps suggested by the following statements to the defendant by one of the interrogating detectives. "(Are you crazy?) man, why don’t you tell them to get it over with? these people got you up tight. They got you up tight, man. At least, you can say uh * * * well uh * * * Say anything—say any foolish thing. I must have done that without even thinking.”

On several occasions the defendant asked for an opportunity to speak to a woman friend. This was responded to variously by the statement that the police had been unable to contact her, the truthfulness of which is unclear, and by arguing that such a conversation could not possibly be helpful. At different intervals defendant stated that he was suffering from severe headaches and requested aspirins, which were refused him. It [596]*596was explained at the hearing that the detective was fearful that he might not be able to prove what medication had been given.

The main theme pursued by the police, and one that appears to have been the primary factor inducing the confession, requires detailed discussion.

In substance the police took the position that they had conclusive evidence of the defendant’s guilt and could arrest him without any interrogation at all except that they were convinced that he was not a bad man who had done this terrible thing maliciously. They believed that the defendant must have been sick when this occurred and that it may well have occurred during the course of a blackout, accounting for his inability to remember the events. They thought he required treatment.

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Bluebook (online)
76 A.D.2d 592, 430 N.Y.S.2d 601, 1980 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 12174, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/people-v-sunset-bay-nyappdiv-1980.