(in a police precinct in New York)
The perp in in the interrogation room “lawyer’s up”, legally preventing the police from further questioning him without the presence of legal counsel.
“Fine,” says the cop, “I can’t ask you any more questions…dosen’t mean you can’t hear what I have to say.”
The cop then…asking no questions…tells the perp the facts he put together about the case. At which the perp blurts out something incriminating.
Could this be used against him in trial, even though he lawyered up?
Like GaryM: said, this is kind of a contrived question you’ve come up with, isn’t it? I mean, if the police office hadn’t given a long exposition, and the suspect just gave the evidence, how is it different? Or do you mean, someone says they want a lawyer, and gives evidence moments before the lawyers arrival? Again, it really depends more on how the show is written, in that case. Maybe, you want to ask a different question, along these lines?
Well, if that all gets thrown out, then that leads to the problematic scenario of: “I ain’t sayin nuttin til I get my lawyer!” “OK, Noodles, here’s the phone, call your lawyer.” “Hah! Now youse can’t interrogate me! So I confess, I killed em, but da judge is gonna throw out my confession cause I dint have no laywer! HAHAHAHAHA!”
Noodle’s confession isn’t going to be thrown out by the judgte.
If you’ve been reading the Freemen on The Land Thread (I highly recommend it. It’s entertaining stuff), you probably know that the law doesn’t revolve around magic words.
This cuts both ways. If a police officer is saying or doing things to you which are clearly intended to get an answer, they’re interrogating you, whether or not they use interrogative sentences.
For example, in one case, a guy was arrested for the murder of a little girl. The body had not yet been found. As he was being driven to the police station, the 2 cops in the car started a conversation among themselves, which the suspect could hear. They said things to the effect of “I bet that girl’s family is just crushed, not knowing their daughter’s final resting place. It sure would be nice if we could find the body and give her a decent Christian burial.”
The court found that this constituted an interrogation, and all the rules applicable to interrogations also applied in this case, because the words and actions of the cops were clearly intended to elicit the suspect to reveal information.
Brewer v. Williams, 430 U.S. 387 (1977), which later led to the inevitable discovery rule when the case went up again as Nix v. Williams, 467 U.S. 431 (1984).
