Have you waivered on this Universal statement being taken while Casey was "in custody?" I'm just wondering because Yuri denies telling George that he would not be bringing Casey back... Cindy had a completely different recollection of this event... and said it was John Allen that said this at the house.
Also with Casey being brought in through the front door with a visitors badge on? I won't be too upset if the Universal gets tossed out, but is there even a slim chance that it could come in now... after hearing some of the testimony?
After listening to Yuri's testimony, my opinion is that there is a slim chance HHJP might allow the Universal statement into evidence. But I hope he doesn't, because on appeal the appellate court will look at every single line of that transcript and IMO will ultimately determine that it should have been excluded.
Az & or others; (I haven't seen this asked or answered before -- TIA).
I have been wondering if this might have any kind of bearing with a Juror: If I were on the Jury, would I be aware of the fact that the defendent is 'indigent'? And if so, "why has this taken 3 years to come to Trial". It is hard to separate myself from the jury pool, knowing what I have seen and read since this case began. But, I would just like to know if this is a question that might arise in a jurors mind.... maybe causing them to question what is so 'special' about this case/defendant that it takes 3 years to procecute if the defendant has no funding for her defense.
No, as a juror you would not be aware of the indigency finding. Not sure what that has to do with the time it takes to get to trial, though. To me, 3 years seems just about right, but I guess if you're outside the system it seems kind of long.
Even if the jurors did wonder why it took 3 years to get to trial, I assume they wouldn't take that fact into account one way or the other in deciding whether Casey is guilty or not.
Related to why the handcuffs: I am confused. The young officer said he put handcuffs on Casey because Cindy wanted Casey to be detained.He agreed and put her in cuffs. Everyone was on board about Casey being taken into custody for theft. This sounds like Miranda-eligible stuff to me.
Any lawyer insight to this?
Not a lawyer,but it came out at the hearing that his supervisor quickly corrected this officer and the cuffs were removed within minutes.No harm,no foul,at this point.
Casey was absolutely in custody at that point, and Miranda rights would have been necessary IF anyone was going to ask her any questions. But they didn't. Instead they took off the handcuffs and (hopefully in her presence) said they were no longer interested in the theft and wanted to focus on finding Caylee. So IMO the "custody" period ended at that time, and her later written statement is fine. Yuri's questioning of her at the house is probably also fine, as I think she reasonably would have felt free to refuse to talk to him at that point--and if she didn't feel free to refuse, it was because of her mother, not because of Yuri or the prior 5-minute handcuffing episode.
As for the statements at Universal, I think once she got to the end of the hallway and inside the closed room (not locked, "just for privacy", "voluntarily," yes, I know
) and was told, repeatedly, "we know you are lying to us, now tell us what happened," she would NOT have felt reasonably free to get up and leave the building. Therefore she was in custody. Therefore she should have been given Miranda warnings IF the statement is to be used as evidence. Therefore, the statement should be excluded from evidence.
Kudos to Yuri for making a valiant effort to get her to talk while keeping the "custody" issue vague enough that if she said anything incriminating they might still have been able to use it. I think he knew exactly what he was doing and it was not a bad guess that this young mother with no criminal history would "crack" and tell them where Caylee was, as long as they didn't scare her off with Miranda warnings.
