Petitioner and a companion were stopped for interrogation. When
each produced, in the course of demonstrating identification, items
bearing the name "Shard," they were arrested and taken to the
police station. There, the arresting officers learned of a robbery
of one "Shard" two days before. The officers sent for Shard, who
immediately identified petitioner and his companion as the robbers.
At the time of the confrontation, petitioner and his companion were
not advised of the right to counsel, nor did either ask for or
receive legal assistance. Six weeks later, petitioner and his
companion were indicted for the Shard robbery. At the trial, after
a pretrial motion to suppress his testimony had been overruled,
Shard testified as to his previous identification of petitioner and
his companion, and again identified them as the robbers. The
defendants were found guilty, and petitioner's conviction was
upheld on appeal, the appellate court holding that the
per
se exclusionary rule of
United States v. Wade,
388 U. S. 218, and
Gilbert v. California, 388 U. S. 263, did
not apply to pre-indictment confrontations.
Held: The judgment is affirmed. Pp.
406 U. S.
687-691.
121 Ill.App.2d 323, 257 N.E.2d 589, affirmed.
MR. JUSTICE STEWART, joined by THE CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE
BLACKMUN, and MR. JUSTICE REHNQUIST, concluded that a showup after
arrest, but before the initiation of any adversary criminal
proceeding (whether by way of formal charge, preliminary hearing,
indictment, information, or arraignment), unlike the
post-indictment confrontations involved in
Gilbert and
Wade, is not a criminal prosecution at which the accused,
as a matter of absolute right, is entitled to counsel. Pp.
406 U. S.
687-691.
MR. JUSTICE POWELL concurred in the result. P.
406 U. S.
691.
STEWART, J., announced the Court's judgment and delivered an
opinion in which BURGER, C.J., and BLACKMUN and REHNQUIST, JJ.,
joined. BURGER, C.J., filed a concurring statement,
post,
p.
406 U. S. 691.
POWELL, J., filed a statement concurring in the result,
post, p.
406 U. S. 691.
BRENNAN, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which DOUGLAS and
Page 406 U. S. 683
MARSHALL, JJ., joined,
post, p.
406 U. S. 691.
WHITE, J., filed a dissenting statement,
post, p.
406 U. S.
705.
MR. JUSTICE STEWART announced the judgment of the Court and an
opinion in which THE CHIEF JUSTICE, MR. JUSTICE BLACKMUN, and MR.
JUSTICE REHNQUIST join.
In
United States v. Wade, 388 U.
S. 218, and
Gilbert v. California, 388 U.
S. 263, this Court held
"that a post-indictment pretrial lineup at which the accused is
exhibited to identifying witnesses is a critical stage of the
criminal prosecution; that police conduct of such a lineup without
notice to and in the absence of his counsel denies the accused his
Sixth [and Fourteenth] Amendment right to counsel and calls in
question the admissibility at trial of the in-court identifications
of the accused by witnesses who attended the lineup."
Gilbert v. California, supra, at
388 U. S. 272.
Those cases further held that no "in-court identifications" are
admissible in evidence if their "source" is a lineup conducted in
violation of this constitutional standard. "Only a
per se
exclusionary rule as to such testimony can be an effective
sanction," the Court said, "to assure that law
Page 406 U. S. 684
enforcement authorities will respect the accused's
constitutional right to the presence of his counsel at the critical
lineup."
Id. at
388 U. S. 273.
In the present case, we are asked to extend the
Wade-Gilbert
per se exclusionary rule to identification testimony based
upon a police station showup that took place before the defendant
had been indicted or otherwise formally charged with any criminal
offense.
On February 21, 1968, a man named Willie Shard reported to the
Chicago police that the previous day two men had robbed him on a
Chicago street of a wallet containing, among other things,
traveler's checks and a Social Security card. On February 22, two
police officers stopped the petitioner and a companion, Ralph Bean,
on West Madison Street in Chicago. [
Footnote 1] When asked for identification, the petitioner
produced a wallet that contained three traveler's checks and a
Social Security card, all bearing the name of Willie Shard. Papers
with Shard's name on them were also found in Bean's possession.
When asked to explain his possession of Shard's property, the
petitioner first said that the traveler's checks were "play money,"
and then told the officers that he had won them in a crap game. The
officers then arrested the petitioner and Bean and took them to a
police station.
Only after arriving at the police station, and checking the
records there did the arresting officers learn of the Shard
robbery. A police car was then dispatched to Shard's place of
employment, where it picked up Shard and brought him to the police
station. Immediately upon entering the room in the police station
where the petitioner and Bean were seated at a table, Shard
positively identified them as the men who had
Page 406 U. S. 685
robbed him two days earlier. No lawyer was present in the room,
and neither the petitioner nor Bean had asked for legal assistance,
or been advised of any right to the presence of counsel.
More than six weeks later, the petitioner and Bean were indicted
for the robbery of Willie Shard. Upon arraignment, counsel was
appointed to represent them, and they pleaded not guilty. A
pretrial motion to suppress Shard's identification testimony was
denied, and, at the trial, Shard testified as a witness for the
prosecution. In his testimony, he described his identification of
the two men at the police station on February 22, [
Footnote 2] and identified them again in the
courtroom as the men
Page 406 U. S. 686
who had robbed him on February 20. [
Footnote 3] He was cross-examined at length regarding the
circumstances of his identification of the two defendants.
Cf.
Pointer v. Texas, 380 U. S. 400. The
jury found both defendants guilty, and the petitioner's conviction
was affirmed on appeal.
People v. Kirby, 121 Ill.App.2d
323, 257 N.E.2d 589. [
Footnote
4] The Illinois appellate court held that the admission of
Shard's testimony was not error, relying upon an earlier decision
of the Illinois Supreme Court,
People v.
Palmer, 41 Ill. 2d
571,
244 N.E.2d
173, holding that the
Wade-Gilbert per se exclusionary
rule is not applicable to pre-indictment confrontations.
Page 406 U. S. 687
We granted certiorari, limited to this question. 402 U.S. 995.
[
Footnote 5]
I
We note at the outset that the constitutional privilege against
compulsory self-incrimination is in no way implicated here. The
Court emphatically rejected the claimed applicability of that
constitutional guarantee in
Wade itself:
"Neither the lineup itself nor anything shown by this record
that Wade was required to do in the lineup violated his privilege
against self-incrimination. We have only recently reaffirmed that
the privilege"
"protects an accused only from being compelled to testify
against himself, or otherwise provide the State with evidence of a
testimonial or communicative nature. . . ."
"
Schmerber v. California, 384 U. S.
757,
384 U. S. 761. . . ."
388 U.S. at
388 U. S.
221.
"
* * * *"
"We have no doubt that compelling the accused merely to exhibit
his person for observation by a prosecution witness prior to trial
involves no compulsion of the accused to give evidence having
testimonial significance. It is compulsion of the accused
Page 406 U. S. 688
to exhibit his physical characteristics, not compulsion to
disclose any knowledge he might have. . . ."
Id. at
388 U. S.
222.
It follows that the doctrine of
Miranda v. Arizona,
384 U. S. 436, has
no applicability whatever to the issue before us; for the
Miranda decision was based exclusively upon the Fifth and
Fourteenth Amendment privilege against compulsory
self-incrimination, upon the theory that custodial interrogation is
inherently coercive.
The
Wade-Gilbert exclusionary rule, by contrast, stems
from a quite different constitutional guarantee -- the guarantee of
the right to counsel contained in the Sixth and Fourteenth
Amendments. Unless all semblance of principled constitutional
adjudication is to be abandoned, therefore, it is to the decisions
construing that guarantee that we must look in determining the
present controversy.
In a line of constitutional cases in this Court stemming back to
the Court's landmark opinion in
Powell v. Alabama,
287 U. S. 45, it
has been firmly established that a person's Sixth and Fourteenth
Amendment right to counsel attaches only at or after the time that
adversary judicial proceedings have been initiated against him.
See Powell v. Alabama, supra; Johnson v. Zerbst,
304 U. S. 458;
Hamilton v. Alabama, 368 U. S. 52;
Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U. S. 335;
White v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 59;
Massiah v. United States, 377 U.
S. 201;
United States v. Wade, 388 U.
S. 218;
Gilbert v. California, 388 U.
S. 263;
Coleman v. Alabama, 399 U. S.
1.
This is not to say that a defendant in a criminal case has a
constitutional right to counsel only at the trial itself. The
Powell case makes clear that the right attaches at the
time of arraignment, [
Footnote
6] and the Court
Page 406 U. S. 689
has recently held that it exists also at the time of a
preliminary hearing.
Coleman v. Alabama, supra. But the
point is that, while members of the Court have differed as to
existence of the right to counsel in the contexts of some of the
above cases, all of those cases have involved points of time at or
after the initiation of adversary judicial criminal proceedings --
whether by way of formal charge, preliminary hearing, indictment,
information, or arraignment.
The only seeming deviation from this long line of constitutional
decisions was
Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U.
S. 478. But
Escobedo is not apposite here, for
two distinct reasons. First, the Court. in retrospect. perceived
that the "prime purpose" of
Escobedo was not to vindicate
the constitutional right to counsel as such, but, like
Miranda, "to guarantee full effectuation of the privilege
against self-incrimination. . . ."
Johnson v. New Jersey,
384 U. S. 719,
384 U. S. 729.
Secondly, and perhaps even more important for purely practical
purposes, the Court has limited the holding of
Escobedo to
its own facts,
Johnson v. New Jersey, supra, at
384 U. S.
733-734, and those facts are not remotely akin to the
facts of the case before us.
The initiation of judicial criminal proceedings is far from a
mere formalism. It is the starting point of our whole system of
adversary criminal justice. For it is only then that the government
has committed itself to prosecute, and only then that the adverse
positions of government and defendant have solidified. It is then
that a defendant finds himself faced with the prosecutorial forces
of organized society, and immersed in the intricacies of
substantive and procedural criminal law.
Page 406 U. S. 690
It is this point, therefore, that marks the commencement of the
"criminal prosecutions" to which alone the explicit guarantees of
the Sixth Amendment are applicable. [
Footnote 7]
See Powell v. Alabama, 287 U.S. at
287 U. S. 66-71;
Massiah v. United States, 377 U.
S. 201;
Spano v. New York, 360 U.
S. 315,
360 U. S. 324
(DOUGLAS, J., concurring).
In this case, we are asked to import into a routine police
investigation an absolute constitutional guarantee historically and
rationally applicable only after the onset of formal prosecutorial
proceedings. We decline to do so. Less than a year after
Wade and
Gilbert were decided, the Court
explained the rule of those decisions as follows:
"The rationale of those cases was that an accused is entitled to
counsel at any 'critical stage of the
prosecution,' and
that a post-indictment lineup is such a 'critical stage.'"
(Emphasis supplied.)
Simmons v. United States,
390 U. S. 377,
390 U. S.
382-383. We decline to depart from that rationale today
by imposing a
per se exclusionary rule upon testimony
concerning an identification that took place long before the
commencement of any prosecution whatever.
II
What has been said is not to suggest that there may not be
occasions during the course of a criminal investigation when the
police do abuse identification procedures. Such abuses are not
beyond the reach of the Constitution. As the Court pointed out in
Wade itself, it is always necessary to "scrutinize any
pretrial confrontation. . . ."
Page 406 U. S. 691
388 U.S. at
388 U. S. 227.
The Due Process Clause of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments
forbids a lineup that is unnecessarily suggestive and conducive to
irreparable mistaken identification.
Stovall v. Denno,
388 U. S. 293;
Foster v. California, 394 U. S. 440.
[
Footnote 8] When a person has
not been formally charged with a criminal offense,
Stovall
strikes the appropriate constitutional balance between the right of
a suspect to be protected from prejudicial procedures and the
interest of society in the prompt and purposeful investigation of
an unsolved crime.
The judgment is affirmed.
[
Footnote 1]
The officers stopped the petitioner and his companion because
they thought the petitioner was a man named Hampton, who was
"wanted" in connection with an unrelated criminal offense. The
legitimacy of this stop and the subsequent arrest is not before
us.
[
Footnote 2]
"Q. All right. Now, Willie, calling your attention to February
22, 1968, did you receive a call from the police asking you to come
down to the station?"
"A. Yes, I did."
"Q. When you went down there, what, if anything, happened,
Willie?"
"A. Well, I seen the two men was down there who robbed me."
"Q. Who took you to the police station?"
"A. The policeman picked me up."
"MR. POMARO: Q. When you went to the police station, did you see
the two defendants?"
"A. Yes, I did."
"Q. Do you see them in Court today?"
"A. Yes, sir."
"Q. Point them out, please?"
"A. Yes, that one there and the other one. (Indicating.)"
"MR. POMARO: Indicating for the record the defendants Bean and
Kirby."
"Q. And you positively identified them at the police station, is
that correct?"
"A. Yes."
"Q. Did any police officer make any suggestion to you
whatsoever?"
"THE WITNESS: No, they didn't."
[
Footnote 3]
"Q. Willie, when you looked back, when you were walking down the
street and first saw the defendants, when you looked back, did you
see them then?"
"A. Yes, I seen them."
"Q. Did you get a good look at them then?"
"A. Yes, I did."
"Q. All right. Now, when they grabbed you and took your money,
did you see them then?"
"A. Yes, I did."
"Q. Did you get a good look at them then?"
"A. Yes."
"Q. Both of them?"
"A. Correct."
"Q. When they walked away did you see them then?"
"A. Yes."
"Q. Did you look at them, Willie?"
"A. Yes."
"Q. Did you get a good look at them?"
"A. Yes."
"Q. Are those the same two fellows? Look at them, Willie."
"A. Correct."
"Q. Are those the same two that robbed you?"
"A. Yes."
"Q. You are sure, Willie?"
"A. Yes."
[
Footnote 4]
Bean's conviction was reversed.
People v. Bean, 121
Ill.App.2d 332, 257 N.E.2d 562.
[
Footnote 5]
The issue of the applicability of
Wade and
Gilbert to pre-indictment confrontation has severely
divided the courts.
Compare State v. Fields, 104 Ariz.
486,
455 P.2d 964;
Perkins v. State, 228 So. 2d 382
(Fla.);
Buchanan v. Commonwealth, 210 Va. 664, 173 S.E.2d
792;
State v. Walters, 457 S.W.2d
817 (Mo.),
with United States v. Greene, 139
U.S.App.D.C. 9, 429 F.2d 193;
Rivers v. United States, 400
F.2d 935 (CA5);
United States v. Phillips, 427 F.2d 1035
(CA9);
Commonwealth v. Guillory, 356 Mass. 591,
254
N.E.2d 427;
People v. Fowler, 1 Cal. 3d 335,
461 P.2d 643;
Palmer v. State, 5 Md.App. 691,
249
A.2d 482;
People v. Hutton, 21 Mich.App. 312, 175
N.W.2d 860;
Commonwealth v. Whiting, 439 Pa. 205, 266 A.2d
738;
In re Holley, 107 R.I. 615,
268
A.2d 723;
Hayes v. State, 46 Wis.2d 93,
175
N.W.2d 625.
[
Footnote 6]
"[D]uring perhaps the most critical period of the proceedings
against these defendants, that is to say, from the time of their
arraignment until the beginning of their trial, when consultation,
thoroughgoing investigation and preparation were vitally important,
the defendants did not have the aid of counsel in any real sense,
although they were as much entitled to such aid during that period
as at the trial itself."
Powell v. Alabama, 287 U. S. 45,
287 U. S.
57.
[
Footnote 7]
"In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right
to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and
district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which
district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be
informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be
confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory
process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the
Assistance of Counsel for his defence."
U.S.Const., Amdt. VI.
[
Footnote 8]
In view of our limited grant of certiorari, we do not consider
whether there might have been a deprivation of due process in the
particularized circumstances of this case. That question remains
open for inquiry in a federal habeas corpus proceeding.
MR. CHIEF JUSTICE BURGER, concurring.
I agree that the right to counsel attaches as soon as criminal
charges are formally made against an accused and he becomes the
subject of a "criminal prosecution." Therefore, I join in the
plurality opinion and in the judgment.
Cf. Coleman v.
Alabama, 399 U. S. 1,
399 U. S. 21
(dissenting opinion).
MR. JUSTICE POWELL, concurring in the result.
As I would not extend the
Wade-Gilbert per se
exclusionary rule, I concur in the result reached by the Court.
MR. JUSTICE BRENNAN, with whom MR. JUSTICE DOUGLAS and MR.
JUSTICE MARSHALL join, dissenting.
After petitioner and Ralph Bean were arrested, police officers
brought Willie Shard, the robbery victim, to a room in a police
station where petitioner and Bean were seated at a table with two
other police officers. Shard testified at trial that the officers
who brought him to the
Page 406 U. S. 692
room asked him if petitioner and Bean were the robbers, and that
he indicated they were. The prosecutor asked him, "And you
positively identified them at the police station, is that correct?"
Shard answered, "Yes." Consequently, the question in this case is
whether, under
Gilbert v. California, 388 U.
S. 263 (1967), it was constitutional error to admit
Shard's testimony that he identified petitioner at the pretrial
station house showup when that showup was conducted by the police
without advising petitioner that he might have counsel present.
Gilbert held, in the context of a post-indictment lineup,
that
"[o]nly a
per se exclusionary rule as to such testimony
can be an effective sanction to assure that law enforcement
authorities will respect the accused's constitutional right to the
presence of his counsel at the critical lineup."
Id. at
388 U. S. 273.
I would apply
Gilbert and the principles of its companion
case,
United States v. Wade, 388 U.
S. 218 (1967), and reverse. [
Footnote 2/1]
In
Wade, after concluding that the lineup conducted in
that case did not violate the accused's right against
self-incrimination,
id. at
388 U. S.
221-223, [
Footnote 2/2]
the Court addressed
Page 406 U. S. 693
the argument
"that the assistance of counsel at the lineup was indispensable
to protect Wade's most basic right as a criminal defendant -- his
right to a fair trial at which the witnesses against him might be
meaningfully cross-examined,"
id. at
388 U. S.
223-224. The Court began by emphasizing that the Sixth
Amendment guarantee "encompasses counsel's assistance whenever
necessary to assure a meaningful
defence.'" Id. at
388 U. S. 225.
After reviewing Powell v. Alabama, 287 U. S.
45 (1932); Hamilton v. Alabama, 368 U. S.
52 (1961); and Massiah v. United States,
377 U. S. 201
(1964), the Court, 388 U.S. at 388 U. S. 225,
focused upon two cases that involved the right against
self-incrimination:
"In
Escobedo v. Illinois, 378 U. S.
478, we drew upon the rationale of
Hamilton and
Massiah in holding that the right to counsel was
guaranteed at the point where the accused, prior to arraignment,
was subjected to secret interrogation despite repeated requests to
see his lawyer. We again noted the necessity of counsel's presence
if the accused was to have a fair opportunity to present a defense
at the trial itself. . . ."
United States v. Wade, 388 U.S. at
388 U. S.
225-226. [
Footnote
2/3]
"
* * * *
Page 406 U. S.
694
"
"[I]n
Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S.
436, the rules established for custodial interrogation
included the right to the presence of counsel. The result was
rested on our finding that this and the other rules were necessary
to safeguard the privilege against self-incrimination from being
jeopardized by such interrogation."
Id. at
388 U. S. 226.
The Court then pointed out that
"nothing decided or said in the opinions in [
Escobedo
and
Miranda] links the right to counsel only to protection
of Fifth Amendment rights."
Ibid. To the contrary, the Court said, those decisions
simply reflected the constitutional
"principle that in addition to counsel's presence at trial, the
accused is guaranteed that he need not stand alone against the
State at any stage of the prosecution, formal or informal, in court
or out, where counsel's absence might derogate from the accused's
right to a fair trial. The security of that right is as much the
aim of the right to counsel as it is of the other guarantees of the
Sixth Amendment. . . ."
Id. at
388 U. S.
226-227. This analysis led to the Court's formulation of
the controlling principle for pretrial confrontations:
"In sum, the principle of
Powell v. Alabama and
succeeding cases requires that we scrutinize
any pretrial
confrontation of the accused to determine whether the presence of
his counsel is necessary to preserve the defendant's basic right to
a fair trial as affected by his right meaningfully to cross-examine
the witnesses against him and to have effective assistance of
counsel at the trial itself. It calls upon us to analyze whether
potential substantial prejudice to defendant's rights inheres in
the particular confrontation and the ability of counsel to help
avoid that prejudice."
Id. at
388 U. S. 227
(emphasis in original).
Page 406 U. S. 695
It was that constitutional principle that the Court applied in
Wade to pretrial confrontations for identification
purposes. The Court first met the government's contention that a
confrontation for identification is "a mere preparatory step in the
gathering of the prosecution's evidence," much like the scientific
examination of fingerprints and blood samples. The Court responded
that, in the latter instances,
"the accused has the opportunity for a meaningful confrontation
of the Government's case at trial through the ordinary processes of
cross-examination of the Government's expert witnesses and the
presentation of the evidence of his own experts."
The accused thus has no right to have counsel present at such
examinations:
"they are not critical stages, since there is minimal risk that
his counsel's absence at such stages might derogate from his right
to a fair trial."
Id. at
388 U. S.
227-228.
In contrast, the Court said,
"the confrontation compelled by the State between the accused
and the victim or witnesses to a crime to elicit identification
evidence is peculiarly riddled with innumerable dangers and
variable factors which might seriously, even crucially, derogate
from a fair trial."
Id. at
388 U. S. 228.
Most importantly,
"the accused's inability effectively to reconstruct at trial any
unfairness that occurred at the lineup may deprive him of his only
opportunity meaningfully to attack the credibility of the witness'
courtroom identification."
Id. at
388 U. S.
231-232. The Court's analysis of pretrial confrontations
for identification purposes produced the following conclusion:
"Insofar as the accused's conviction may rest on a courtroom
identification in fact, the fruit of a suspect pretrial
identification which the accused is helpless to subject to
effective scrutiny at trial, the accused is deprived of that right
of cross-examination
Page 406 U. S. 696
which is an essential safeguard to his right to confront the
witnesses against him.
Pointer v. Texas, 380 U. S.
400. And even though cross-examination is a precious
safeguard to a fair trial, it cannot be viewed as an absolute
assurance of accuracy and reliability. Thus, in the present
context, where so many variables and pitfalls exist, the first line
of defense must be the prevention of unfairness and the lessening
of the hazards of eyewitness identification at the lineup itself.
The trial which might determine the accused's fate may well not be
that in the courtroom but that at the pretrial confrontation, with
the State aligned against the accused, the witness the sole jury,
and the accused unprotected against the overreaching, intentional
or unintentional, and with little or no effective appeal from the
judgment there rendered by the witness -- 'that's the man.'"
Id. at
388 U. S.
235-236. The Court then applied that conclusion to the
specific facts of the case.
"Since it appears that there is grave potential for prejudice,
intentional or not, in the pretrial lineup, which may not be
capable of reconstruction at trial, and since presence of counsel
itself can often avert prejudice and assure a meaningful
confrontation at trial, there can be little doubt that for
Wade the post-indictment lineup was a critical stage of
the prosecution at which he was 'as much entitled to such aid [of
counsel] . . . as at the trial itself.'"
Id. at
388 U. S.
236-237.
While it should go without saying, it appears necessary, in view
of the plurality opinion today, to reemphasize that
Wade
did not require the presence of counsel at pretrial confrontations
for identification purposes simply on the basis of an abstract
consideration of the words "criminal prosecutions" in the Sixth
Amendment. Counsel is required at those confrontations because
"the
Page 406 U. S. 697
dangers inherent in eyewitness identification and the
suggestibility inherent in the context of the pretrial
identification,"
id. at
388 U. S. 235,
[
Footnote 2/4] mean that protection
must be afforded to the
"most basic right [of] a criminal defendant -- his right to a
fair trial at which the witnesses against him might be meaningfully
cross-examined,"
id. at
388 U. S. 224.
Indeed, the Court expressly stated that
"[l]egislative or other regulations, such as those of local
police departments, which eliminate the risks of abuse and
unintentional suggestion at lineup proceedings and the impediments
to meaningful confrontation at trial may also remove the basis for
regarding the stage as 'critical.'"
Id. at
388 U. S. 239;
see id. at
388 U. S. 239
n. 30;
Gilbert v. California, 388 U.S. at
388 U. S. 273.
Hence, "the initiation of adversary judicial criminal proceedings,"
ante at
406 U. S. 689,
is completely irrelevant to whether counsel is necessary at a
pretrial confrontation for identification in order to safeguard the
accused's constitutional rights to confrontation and the effective
assistance of counsel at his trial.
In view of
Wade, it is plain, and the plurality today
does not attempt to dispute it, that there inhere in a
confrontation
Page 406 U. S. 698
for identification conducted after arrest [
Footnote 2/5] the identical hazards to a fair trial that
inhere in such a confrontation conducted "after the onset of formal
prosecutorial proceedings."
Id. at
406 U. S. 690.
The plurality apparently considers an arrest, which for present
purposes we must assume to be based upon probable cause, to be
nothing more than part of "a routine police investigation,"
ibid., and thus not "the starting point of our whole
system of adversary criminal justice,"
id. at
406 U. S. 689.
[
Footnote 2/6] An arrest, according
to the plurality, does not face the accused "with the prosecutorial
forces of organized society," nor immerse him "in the intricacies
of substantive and procedural criminal law." Those consequences
ensue, says the plurality, only with "[t]he initiation of judicial
criminal proceedings,"
"[f]or it is only then that the government has committed itself
to prosecute, and only then that the adverse positions of
government and defendant have solidified."
Ibid. [
Footnote 2/7] If
these propositions do not amount to
Page 406 U. S. 699
"mere formalism,"
ibid., it is difficult to know how to
characterize them. [
Footnote 2/8]
An arrest evidences the belief of the police that the perpetrator
of a crime has been caught. A post-arrest confrontation for
identification is not "a mere preparatory step in the gathering of
the prosecution's evidence."
Wade, supra, at
388 U. S. 227.
A primary, and frequently sole, purpose of the confrontation for
identification at that stage is to accumulate proof to buttress the
conclusion of the police that they have the offender in hand. The
plurality offers no reason, and I can think of none, for concluding
that a post-arrest confrontation for identification, unlike a
post-charge confrontation, is not among those
"critical confrontations of the accused by the prosecution at
pretrial proceedings where the results might well settle the
accused's fate and reduce the trial itself to a mere
formality."
Id. at
388 U. S.
224.
The highly suggestive form of confrontation employed in this
case underscores the point. This showup was particularly fraught
with the peril of mistaken
Page 406 U. S. 700
identification. In the setting of a police station squad room,
where all present except petitioner and Bean were police officers,
the danger was quite real that Shard's understandable resentment
might lead him too readily to agree with the police that the pair
under arrest, and the only persons exhibited to him, were indeed
the robbers.
"It is hard to imagine a situation more clearly conveying the
suggestion to the witness that the one presented is believed guilty
by the police."
Id. at
388 U. S. 234.
The State had no case without Shard's identification testimony,
[
Footnote 2/9] and safeguards
against that consequence were therefore of critical importance.
Shard's testimony itself demonstrates the necessity for such
safeguards. On direct examination, Shard identified petitioner and
Bean not as the alleged robbers on trial in the courtroom, but as
the pair he saw at the police station. His testimony thus lends
strong support to the observation, quoted by the Court in
Wade, 388 U.S. at
388 U. S. 229, that
"[i]t is a matter of common experience that, once a witness has
picked out the accused at the line-up, he is not likely to go back
on his word later on, so that, in practice, the issue of identity
may (in the absence of other relevant evidence) for all practical
purposes be determined there and then, before the trial."
Williams & Hammelmann, Identification Parades, Part I,
[1963] Crim.L.Rev. 479, 482.
The plurality today "decline[s] to depart from [the] rationale"
of
Wade and
Gilbert. Ante at
406 U. S. 690.
The plurality discovers that "rationale" not by consulting those
decisions themselves, which would seem to be the appropriate
course, but by reading one sentence in
Simmons v. United
States, 390 U. S. 377,
390 U. S.
382-383 (1968), where no right to counsel claim was
either asserted or considered. The "rationale" the plurality
discovers is, apparently,
Page 406 U. S. 701
that a post-indictment confrontation for identification is part
of the prosecution. The plurality might have discovered a different
"rationale" by reading one sentence in
Foster v.
California, 394 U. S. 440,
394 U. S. 442
(1969), a case decided after
Simmons, where the Court
explained that, in
Wade and
Gilbert,
"this Court held that, because of the possibility of unfairness
to the accused in the way a lineup is conducted, a lineup is a
'critical stage' in the prosecution, at which the accused must be
given the opportunity to be represented by counsel."
In
Foster, moreover, although the Court mentioned that
the lineups took place after the accused's arrest, it did not say
whether they were also after the information was filed against him.
[
Footnote 2/10] Instead, the
Court simply pointed out that, under
Stovall v. Denno,
388 U. S. 293
(1967),
Wade and
Gilbert were "applicable only to
lineups conducted after those cases were decided." 394 U.S. at
394 U. S. 442.
Similarly, in
Coleman v. Alabama, 399 U. S.
1 (1970), another case involving a pre-
Wade
lineup, no member of the Court saw any significance in whether the
accused had been formally charged with a crime before the lineup
was held. [
Footnote 2/11]
Page 406 U. S. 702
The plurality might also have discovered a different "rationale"
for
Wade and
Gilbert had it examined
Stovall
v. Denno, supra, decided the same day. In
Stovall,
the confrontation for identification took place one day after the
accused's arrest. Although the accused was first brought to an
arraignment, it "was postponed until [he] could retain counsel."
388 U.S. at
388 U. S. 295.
Hence, in the plurality's terms today, the confrontation was held
"before the commencement of any prosecution."
Ante at
406 U. S. 690.
[
Footnote 2/12] Yet, in that
circumstance, the Court in
Stovall
Page 406 U. S. 703
stated that the accused raised "the same alleged constitutional
errors in the admission of allegedly tainted identification
evidence that were before us" in
Wade and
Gilbert. The Court therefore found that the case
"provide[d] a vehicle for deciding the extent to which the rules
announced in
Wade and
Gilbert -- requiring the
exclusion of identification evidence which is tainted by exhibiting
the accused to identifying witnesses before trial in the absence of
his counsel -- are to be applied retroactively."
388 U.S. at
388 U. S. 294.
Indeed, the Court's explicit holding was
"that
Wade and
Gilbert affect only those cases
and all future cases which involve confrontations for
identification purposes conducted in the absence of counsel after
this date. The rulings of
Wade and
Gilbert are
therefore inapplicable in the present case."
Id. at
388 U. S. 296.
Hence, the accused in
Stovall did not receive the benefit
of the new exclusionary rules, because they were not applied
retroactively; he was not denied their benefit because his
confrontation took place before he had "been formally charged with
a criminal offense."
Ante at
406 U. S. 691.
Moreover, in the course of its retroactivity discussion, 388 U.S.
at
388 U. S.
296-301, the Court repeated the phrase "pretrial
confrontations for identification" or its equivalent no less than
10 times. Not once did the Court so much as hint that
Wade
and
Gilbert applied only to confrontations after the
accused "had been indicted or otherwise formally charged with [a]
criminal offense."
Ante at
406 U. S. 684.
In fact, at one point, the Court summarized
Wade as
holding "that the confrontation [for identification] is a
critical stage,' and that counsel
Page 406 U. S.
704
is required at all confrontations." 388 U.S. at
388 U. S. 298
(emphasis added).
Wade and
Gilbert, of course, happened to
involve post-indictment confrontations. Yet even a cursory perusal
of the opinions in those cases reveals that nothing at all turned
upon that particular circumstance. [
Footnote 2/13] In short, it is fair to conclude that,
rather than "declin[ing] to depart from [the] rationale" of
Wade and
Gilbert, ante at
406 U. S. 690,
the plurality today, albeit purporting to be engaged in "principled
constitutional adjudication,"
id. at
406 U. S. 688,
refuses even to recognize that "rationale." For my part, I do not
agree that we "extend"
Wade and
Gilbert, id. at
406 U. S. 684,
by holding that the principles of those cases apply to
confrontations for identification conducted after arrest. [
Footnote 2/14] Because Shard testified at
trial
Page 406 U. S. 705
about his identification of petitioner at the police station
showup, the exclusionary rule of
Gilbert, 388 U.S. at
388 U. S.
272-274, requires reversal.
[
Footnote 2/1]
There is no room here for the application of the harmless error
doctrine. Because the admission of Shard's testimony about his
showup identification thus requires reversal, there is no need for
me to consider whether a remand would otherwise be necessary to
afford the State an opportunity to demonstrate that Shard's
in-court identification of petitioner, if that is what it was,
see ante at
406 U. S. 686
n. 3, had an independent source.
See United States v.
Wade, 388 U. S. 218,
388 U. S.
239-242 (1967);
Gilbert v. California,
388 U. S. 263,
388 U. S. 272
(1967).
[
Footnote 2/2]
The plurality asserts that, in view of that holding in
Wade, "the doctrine of
Miranda v. Arizona,
384 U. S. 436, has
no applicability whatever to the issue before us."
Ante at
406 U. S. 688.
That assertion is necessary for the plurality because
Miranda requires the presence of counsel before "the time
that. adversary judicial proceedings have been initiated against"
the accused.
Ibid. The assertion is nonetheless erroneous,
for
Wade specifically relied upon
Miranda in
establishing the constitutional principle that controls the
applicability of the Sixth Amendment guarantee of the right to
counsel at pretrial confrontations.
See 388 U.S. at
388 U. S.
226-227.
[
Footnote 2/3]
The plurality asserts that "
Escobedo is not apposite
here."
Ante at
406 U. S. 689.
It was, of course, "apposite" in
Wade. Hence, to say that
Johnson v. New Jersey, 384 U. S. 719,
384 U. S.
733-34 (1966), a case decided before
Wade,
"limited the holding of
Escobedo to its own facts,"
ante at
406 U. S. 689,
even if true, is to say nothing at all that is relevant to the
present case. The plurality also utilizes
Johnson for the
proposition
"that the 'prime purpose' of
Escobedo was not to
vindicate the constitutional right to counsel as such, but, like
Miranda, 'to guarantee full effectuation of the privilege
against self-incrimination. . . .'"
Ibid. In view of
Wade's specific reliance upon
Escobedo and
Miranda, that, obviously, is no
distinction either. Moreover, it implies that the purpose of
Wade was "to vindicate the constitutional right to counsel
as such." That was not the purpose of
Wade, as my extended
summary of the opinion demonstrates.
[
Footnote 2/4]
The plurality refers to "occasions during the course of a
criminal investigation when the police do abuse identification
procedures" and asserts that "[s]uch abuses are not beyond the
reach of the Constitution."
Ante at
406 U. S. 690.
The constitutional principles established in
Wade,
however, are not addressed solely to police "abuses," as
Wade explicitly pointed out:
"The few cases that have surfaced therefore reveal the existence
of a process attended with hazards of serious unfairness to the
criminal accused and strongly suggest the plight of the more
numerous defendants who are unable to ferret out suggestive
influences in the secrecy of the confrontation. We do not assume
that these risks are the result of police procedures intentionally
designed to prejudice an accused. Rather, we assume they derive
from the dangers inherent in eyewitness identification and the
suggestibility inherent in the context of the pretrial
identification."
388 U.S. at
388 U. S.
234-235.
[
Footnote 2/5]
This case does not require me to consider confrontations that
take place before custody,
see, e.g., Bratten v.
Delaware, 307 F.
Supp. 643 (Del.1969);
People v. Cesarz, 44 Ill. 2d
180,
255 N.E.2d 1
(1969);
State v. Moore, 111 N.J.Super. 528,
269 A.2d 534 (1970), nor accidental confrontations not arranged
by the police,
see, e.g., United States v. Pollack, 427
F.2d 1168 (CA5 1970);
State v. Bibbs, 461 S.W.2d
755 (Mo.1970), nor on-the-scene encounters shortly after the
crime,
see, e.g., Russell v. United States, 133
U.S.App.D.C. 77, 408 F.2d 1280 (1969);
United States v.
Davis, 399 F.2d 948 (CA2 1968).
[
Footnote 2/6]
Cf. Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.
S. 436,
384 U. S. 477
(1966) (emphasis added):
"The principles announced today deal with the protection which
must be given to the privilege against self-incrimination when the
individual is first subjected to police interrogation
while in
custody at the station or otherwise deprived of his freedom of
action in any significant way. It is at this point that our
adversary system of criminal proceedings commences,
distinguishing itself at the outset from the inquisitorial system
recognized in some countries."
[
Footnote 2/7]
The plurality concludes that
"[i]t is this point, therefore, that marks the commencement of
the 'criminal prosecutions' to which alone the explicit guarantees
of the Sixth Amendment are applicable."
Ante at
406 U. S. 690.
This Court has taken the contrary position with respect to the
speedy trial guarantee of the Sixth Amendment:
"Invocation of the speedy trial provision thus need not await
indictment, information, or other formal charge. But we decline to
extend the reach of the amendment to the period prior to arrest. .
. . In the case before us, neither appellee was arrested, charged,
or otherwise subjected to formal restraint prior to indictment. It
was this event, therefore, which transformed the appellees into
'accused' defendants who are subject to the speedy trial
protections of the Sixth Amendment."
United States v. Marion, 404 U.
S. 307,
404 U. S. 321,
404 U. S. 325
(1971).
[
Footnote 2/8]
As the California Supreme Court pointed out, with an eye toward
the real world,
"the establishment of the date of formal accusation as the time
wherein the right to counsel at lineup attaches could only lead to
a situation wherein substantially all lineup would be conducted
prior to indictment or information."
People v. Fowler, 1 Cal. 3d 335,
344, 461 P.2d 643, 650 (1969).
[
Footnote 2/9]
Bean took the stand and testified that he and petitioner found
Shard's traveler's checks and Social Security card two hours before
their arrest strewn upon the ground in an alley.
[
Footnote 2/10]
In fact, the lineups in
Foster took place before the
information was filed. The crime occurred on January 25, 1966.
After the accused was arrested, he was exhibited to the witness in
two lineups, both conducted within two weeks of January 25. The
information was not filed until March 17.
Foster v.
California, No. 47, O.T. 1968, Brief for Respondent 3-8.
[
Footnote 2/11]
In fact, the lineup in
Coleman took place before the
accused were formally charged. The crime occurred on July 24, 1966.
The accused were arrested on September 29, and the lineup was held
on October 1. The preliminary hearing was not until October 14, and
the indictments were not returned until November 11.
Coleman v.
Alabama, No. 72, O.T. 1969, Brief for Petitioners 5-7; App.
84;
see 399 U.S. at
399 U. S. 26
(STEWART, J., joined by BURGER, C.J., dissenting).
On those facts, the plurality opinion adverted to the timing of
the lineup only to the extent of pointing out that it was held
"about two months after the assault and seven months before
petitioners' trial."
Id. at
399 U. S. 3
(BRENNAN, J., joined by DOUGLAS, WHITE, and MARSHALL, JJ.). The
plurality opinion then simply noted that
"[p]etitioners concede that, since the lineup occurred before
[
Wade and
Gilbert] were decided . . . , they
cannot invoke the holding of those cases requiring the exclusion of
in-court identification evidence which is tainted by exhibiting the
accused to identifying witnesses before trial in the absence of
counsel."
Id. at
399 U. S. 3-4.
Mr. Justice Black, in his concurring opinion, took no notice at
all of when the lineup was conducted. Instead, reiterating his view
that
Wade "should be held fully retroactive," he insisted
"that petitioners in this pre-
Wade case were entitled to
court-appointed counsel at the time of the lineup in which they
participated and that Alabama's failure to provide such counsel
violated petitioners' rights under the Sixth and Fourteenth
Amendments."
Id. at
399 U. S. 13. Nor
did Mr. Justice Harlan refer to the timing of the lineup in
expressing his
"dissent from the refusal to accord petitioners the benefit of
the
Wade holding, neither petitioner having been afforded
counsel at the police 'lineup' identification."
Mr. Justice Harlan's summary of
Wade, like that of the
prevailing opinion, did not limit its "rationale" to post-charge
confrontations:
"The
Wade rule requires the exclusion of any in-court
identification preceded by a pretrial Lineup where the accused was
not represented by counsel, unless the in-court identification is
found to be derived from a source 'independent' of the tainted
pretrial viewing."
Id. at
399 U. S. 21.
[
Footnote 2/12]
The chain of events in
Stovall was as follows: the
crime occurred on the night of August 23, 1961. The accused was
arrested on the afternoon of August 24, and appeared for
arraignment on the morning of August 25. The arraignment was
postponed until August 31 so that he could retain counsel. The
confrontation with the witness took place about noon on August 25.
At the arraignment on August 31, the committing magistrate
appointed counsel for the accused and set the felony examination
for September 1. That examination was never held, for, on August
31, the indictment was returned.
Stovall v. Denno, No.
254, O.T. 1966, Brief for Respondent 34.
[
Footnote 2/13]
The
Wade dissenters found no such limitation:
"The rule applies to any lineup, to any other techniques
employed to produce an identification and
a fortiori to a
face-to-face encounter between the witness and the suspect alone,
regardless of when the identification occurs in time or place, and
whether before or after indictment or information."
United States v. Wade, 388 U.S. at
388 U. S. 251
(WHITE, J., joined by Harlan and STEWART, JJ., dissenting in part
and concurring in part).
[
Footnote 2/14]
The plurality rather surprisingly asserts that "[t]he issue of
the applicability of
Wade and
Gilbert to
pre-indictment confrontation has
severely divided the
courts."
Ante at
406 U. S. 687
n. 5 (emphasis added). As the plurality's citations reveal, there
are decisions from five States, including Illinois, that have
refused to apply
Wade and
Gilbert to
pre-indictment confrontations for identification. Ranged against
those five, however, are decisions from at least 13 States.
See
People v. Fowler, 1 Cal. 3d 335,
461 P.2d 643 (1969);
State v. Singleton, 253 La. 18,
215 So. 2d
838 (1968);
Commonwealth v. Guillory, 356 Mass. 591,
254
N.E.2d 427 (1970);
Palmer v. State, 5 Md.App. 691,
249 A.2d 482 (1969);
People v. Hutton, 21 Mich.App.
312, 175 N.W.2d 860 (1970);
Thompson v. State, 85 Nev.
134,
451 P.2d 704
(1969);
State v. Wright, 274 N.C. 84,
161 S.E.2d
581 (1968);
State v. Isaacs, 24 Ohio App.2d 115, 265
N.E.2d 327 (1970);
Commonwealth v. Whiting, 439 Pa. 205,
266 A.2d 738 (1970);
In re Holley, 107 R.I. 615,
268
A.2d 723 (1970);
Martinez v. State, 437
S.W.2d 842 (Tex.Ct.Crim.App. 1969);
State v.
Hicks, 76 Wash. 2d
80,
455 P.2d
943 (1969);
Hayes v. State, 46 Wis.2d 93,
175
N.W.2d 625 (1970).
In addition, every United States Court of Appeals that has
confronted the question has applied
Wade and
Gilbert to pre-indictment confrontations.
See United
States v. Greene, 139 U.S.App.D.C. 9, 429 F.2d 193 (1970);
Cooper v. Picard, 428 F.2d 1351 (CA1 1970);
United
States v. Ayers, 426 F.2d 524 (CA2 1970);
Government of
Virgin Islands v. Callwood, 440 F.2d 1206 (CA3 1971);
Rivers v. United States, 400 F.2d 935 (CA5 1968);
United States v. Broadhead, 413 F.2d 1351 (CA7 1969);
United States v. Phillips, 427 F.2d 1035 (CA9 1970);
Wilson v. Gaffney, 454 F.2d 142 (CA10 1972). As Chief
Judge Lewis, speaking for the Court of Appeals for the Tenth
Circuit, put it in the last-cited case:
"In both
Wade and
Gilbert, the lineups were
conducted after indictments had been returned; in the case at bar,
the lineup occurred before petitioner had been formally charged.
But surely the assistance of counsel, now established as an
absolute post-indictment right, does not arise or attach because of
the return of an indictment. The confrontation of a lineup . . .
cannot have a constitutional distinction based upon the lodging of
a formal charge. Every reason set forth by the Supreme Court in
Wade . . . for the assistance of counsel post-indictment
has equal or more impact when projected against a pre-indictment
atmosphere. We hold that petitioner had a right to counsel at the
lineup here considered."
Id. at 144.
MR. JUSTICE WHITE, dissenting.
United States v. Wade, 388 U.
S. 218 (1967), and
Gilbert v. California,
388 U. S. 263
(1967), govern this case and compel reversal of the judgment
below.