Antelope Valley Press

Police can’t be sued for Miranda violations

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court, on Thursday, ruled that law enforcement officers can’t be sued when they violate the rights of criminal suspects by failing to provide the familiar Miranda warning before questioning them.

The justices ruled 6-3 in favor of a sheriff’s deputy who was sued after he failed to read a Miranda warning — “You have the right to remain silent,” it begins — to a Los Angeles hospital worker accused of sexually assaulting a patient.

The issue in the case was whether the warning given to criminal suspects before they talk to authorities, which the court recognized in its Miranda v. Arizona decision, in 1966, and reaffirmed 34 years later, is a constitutional right or something less important and less defined.

Justice Samuel Alito wrote in his majority opinion that “a violation of Miranda is not itself a violation of the Fifth Amendment” and “we see no justification for expanding Miranda to confer a right to sue” under the federal law known as Section 1983.

In dissent for the court’s three liberals, Justice Elena Kagan wrote that the decision “prevents individuals from obtaining any redress when police violate their rights under Miranda.”

The case began when a woman who suffered a stroke said she was assaulted at a Los Angeles hospital and identified hospital worker Terrence Tekoh as her attacker. Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Carlos Vega talked to Tekoh, who signed a statement confessing to the assault.

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2022-06-24T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-06-24T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://avpress.pressreader.com/article/281560884473570

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