Maine v. Moulton

1985-12-10

Headline: Court bars use of taped post-indictment conversations with a secretly wired codefendant, limiting police use of undercover recordings and protecting indicted defendants’ ability to consult a lawyer before defense meetings.

Holding: The Court held that admitting post-indictment statements made to a secretly cooperating codefendant, recorded by police who knew the meeting was to plan the defense, violated the defendant’s right to have counsel present because the State knowingly circumvented that right.

Real World Impact:

Prevents prosecutors from using post-indictment statements elicited via a wired informant about pending charges.
Limits police practice of secretly recording co-defendants discussing strategy after indictment.
Allows recordings about other, separate crimes to be used in trials of those offenses.

Topics: right to counsel, secret informants, recorded conversations, criminal investigations

Summary

Background

A man charged with several thefts met with his codefendant, Gary Colson, to plan their defense after both had been indicted. Unknown to the defendant, Colson had agreed to cooperate with police, had his home phone recorded, and later wore a hidden transmitter when the two met on December 26 to discuss the case. The police used portions of that meeting at trial to convict the defendant of burglary and theft; the Maine courts found problems with admitting those recordings and ordered a new trial, and the case reached the Supreme Court.

Reasoning

The Court asked whether using the defendant’s words, recorded after indictment when he expected to talk privately with a friend, violated his constitutional right to have a lawyer present. The majority relied on earlier decisions holding that once formal charges exist, the accused has a right to rely on counsel as a buffer from the State. The Court concluded the police knowingly used Colson’s role to obtain statements about the pending charges and therefore deprived the defendant of his right to have counsel present; other legitimate investigative aims did not excuse using those statements at trial on the pending charges. The Supreme Court affirmed the Maine court’s decision.

Real world impact

The ruling restricts law enforcement from using secret recordings made through cooperative codefendants to prove guilt on charges already filed when the State knowingly exploited the opportunity to obtain statements without counsel present. Recordings about separate, uncharged crimes may still be used in prosecutions of those different offenses, but statements about pending charges are inadmissible when obtained in this way.

Dissents or concurrances

The dissent argued the police acted in good faith to protect witnesses and investigate separate crimes and would have allowed the evidence, warning the majority’s rule hampers legitimate investigations and creates an unnecessary new rule.