"They Never Read Me My Rights, Miss!!"

I swear I wish I had a dollar for every client who has repeated this exact same phrase to me. Most often, they tell me this after the DA has handed me a notice of some crazy sounding statement that my client made to the police in the midst of being arrested. Some of my favorites...

• "Yea I punched her. I'd have killed her if I had to. I love my son." (spoken by a man arrested for domestic violence against his wife).
• "I smoked a half hour before I got into the car." (spoken by a man arrested for driving under the influence of drugs)
• " In my country, it's ok to have a few drinks before you drive. It's not like I'm drunk or something!" (spoken by a woman arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol)
• "I'm getting arrested for this?? Well tell him when I get out of jail, I'ma REALLY whoop his ass!!" (spoken by a man arrested for assault on a neighbor)

You get the idea. But the funny thing about it (not so funny for me because I end up being the one that has to clean up the mess), is that my clients are so quick to talk about their Miranda rights after they get arrested, but if they knew that had these rights, why didn't they exercise them in the FIRST place?? Everyone has watched enough television to know that "You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and WILL be used against you..." We all know this part verbatim, regardless of what the rest of the Miranda rights say. So how come nobody ever decides to STFU when it counts??

The number one answer I get from clients is "I was trying to be honest with the cop, I thought it would help." Ok, I get that but umm, if you were doing something wrong in the first place, why do you think you'd get yourself OUT of trouble by telling the truth?? Don't you remember when you were ten and your mom told you "Just tell me who broke the window. If you tell me the truth, I wont get mad and you won't get spanked"? And didn't you fall for it and tell the truth that you broke the window? And didn't she whoop the flames out of your behind anyway?? Yea, it's kind of like that. Of course a cop is going to put on the buddy voice, act like he's leveling with you, make it sound like you can talk your way out of trouble if you keep talking, and all the while, all the talking you're doing is just helping him build a case against you. His whole job is to arrest you and find evidence to incriminate you of wrongdoing, why in the world would you do anything to make it easier for him? I'm just sayin...

The truth about Miranda Rights though is that regardless of whether the officer reads them to you, there's a 90% chance you'll be on the hook for whatever incriminating things you say. If a cop approaches you and asks "So what happened here?" or "I smell weed, were you smoking?" or "Is this knife/car/bag of coke yours?" and you answer that question, the DA is allowed to use that statement against you because the cop's questions were "of an investigative nature". That's basically a loophole that gets the prosecution around the Miranda issue. You have to actually be in police custody and under arrest in order for Miranda rights to kick in (you're not under arrest yet if the officer pulls you over and asks about the weed smell). Usually, by the time the handcuffs go on, the cop already knows all he needs to know and has written down any statements you've made, so he doesnt need to read you Miranda since he doesn't need you to say anything else.

So basically the best thing to do in a situation where it looks likely you'll be arrested is to either shut the hell up and not admit to anything, or to talk about what someone ELSE did, not what you did (ie if you got into a fight, it's all about how the OTHER guy punched you in the face and hit you with a beer bottle. You were just blocking).