Can a defendant successfully suppress incriminating statements he made during a confession because of violent conduct from the police? In short, sometimes. A recent case coming out of the Court of Appeals of Arizona, First Division explores this question, and the case ultimately decided that when the police officers’ violent conduct happens separately from the interrogation itself, there are not necessarily grounds to suppress the defendant’s incriminating statements.
Facts of the Case
In the May 2024 case, the defendant was a suspect in a local homicide. The defendant’s wife thought he might have had something to do with the crime, and she reported it to the police. Officers eventually arrested the defendant and brought him in for a six-hour interrogation. After five hours, the defendant confessed to the crime. He filed a motion to suppress this confession, which the trial court denied.
On appeal, though, the defendant argued that the officers’ restriction on his freedom of movement meant that he made his confession involuntarily (and therefore, he argued, it should have been suppressed). According to the defendant, officers arrived to arrest him with rifles and canines, which was violent, and which contributed to his involuntary statement. He asked the court to consider this violent conduct when ruling on his appeal.