United States District Court, N.D. California
ORDER DENYING MOTION TO SUPPRESS STATEMENTS BASED ON
MIRANDA VIOLATIONS RE: DKT. NO. 41
VINCE
CHHABRIA United States District Judge.
It is
clear from the transcript and the video of the interrogation
that Garcia-Zarate knowingly waived his Miranda
rights and that his statements to the police were not
coerced. Therefore, his motion to suppress his statements to
the police on Fifth Amendment grounds is denied.
With
respect to Miranda, in an early portion of the
interrogation, the officers were attempting to learn
Garcia-Zarate's age. Garcia-Zarate was having difficulty
articulating his age to the officers, and appeared to be
saying that he was born in 1863. He had just woken up from a
nap and appeared disoriented. And the conversation was in
English, which Garcia-Zarate had difficulty speaking and
understanding. Seemingly in response to the difficulty
Garcia-Zarate was having, the officers told him they would
speak to him later. One officer said: “That's
alright, you know, we'll wait. We'll talk next
time.” Garcia-Zarate responded: “Yeah.”
Then the other officer said: “Want to have a
conversation in a little bit?” Garcia-Zarate responded:
“No.” Then the first officer stated: “You
know, we'll just talk in a second.” Then
Garcia-Zarate stated: “Maybe 50,
53.”[1] Given this context, it would be
unreasonable to interpret Garcia-Zarate's utterance of
the word “no” as an expression of a desire to
remain silent, particularly when, as the officers started to
walk out of the interrogation room, Garcia-Zarate did not
maintain the silence that he now claims he desired; instead
he resumed his conversation with the officers. It is far more
likely that Garcia-Zarate simply didn't understand what
the officers were saying, or that he was saying
“no” to take back his earlier statement that he
was born in 1863, or that he was saying “no” out
of a desire to continue the conversation right then rather
than pausing and resuming it later.
A
little while after this exchange, the officers brought in a
Spanish language interpreter, having experienced difficulty
obtaining basic biographical information from the suspect in
English. By this point, Garcia-Zarate seemed more awake and
less disoriented. But Garcia-Zarate contends that the
interpreter made a fatal mistake when reading the
Miranda warnings. Specifically, he contends that the
interpreter advised him of the right to “wait for
silence, ” rather than advising him of the right to
“remain silent.” It's true that the
interpreter said that Garcia-Zarate had the right “de a
guardar silencio, ” which could be heard as the right
“de aguardar silencio” - literally, the right
“to wait for silence.” But it's highly
implausible that Garcia-Zarate could have understood it this
way. Taken in context, it's highly likely that
Garcia-Zarate could only have understood the interpreter to
be telling him that he had the right “a guardar
silencio, ” which means “to remain silent.”
This would likely be true for anyone, but it's
particularly true for Garcia-Zarate, who had been arrested
many times previously, and therefore can reasonably be
assumed to have received the Miranda warnings many
times previously.
Finally,
Garcia-Zarate points to a subsequent exchange in which the
topic of lawyers came up. He attempts to portray this
exchange as one in which he asserted his right to counsel,
but the contrary is true. During this portion of the
interrogation, the officers began to make more direct
accusations that Garcia-Zarate shot Kate Steinle.
Garcia-Zarate responded in somewhat belligerent fashion,
accusing the police officers of being corrupt, saying that he
was from Columbia, and threatening that he and his Columbian
friends would unleash their lawyers on the police. This
conversation was difficult to follow because the people in
the room were speaking over one another in rapid-fire
fashion. But in one part of the conversation, in response to
a question from an officer asking why he wanted a lawyer,
Garcia-Zarate made clear that he was not asking for a lawyer
or attempting to end the interrogation; rather he was
threatening the bring down the police with his allegations
that they are corrupt. See Interrogation Transcript,
vol. 1, 65-66.
Accordingly,
the totality of the interrogation makes clear that
Garcia-Zarate knowingly waived his Miranda rights
and that the officers did not violate those rights.
Similarly, the totality of the interrogation and the
circumstances surrounding it show that Garcia-Zarate's
statements were voluntary; although the police certainly
attempted to get him to confess to shooting Steinle, and
although they attempted to put words in his mouth, their
conduct was not nearly so coercive or deceptive as to render
the interrogation a violation of due process. Compare
Campos v. Stone, 201 F.Supp.3d 1083, 1089-90, 1097-99
(N.D. Cal. 2016).
IT
IS SO ORDERED.
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Notes:
[1] Although the transcript says,
“Maybe 50, 53, ” on the video it sounds more
like, “Maybe ...