If you represent children in delinquency proceedings and you haven’t already read the May 1 North Carolina Supreme Court (NCSC) decision In re W.R., then you might want to check it out. (You can find the decision here.) And if you’re not familiar with the 2006 Court of Appeals (COA) decision it reversed, you might want to check it out, too. (You can find that decision here.) For purposes of clarity, I will refer to the NCSC decision as W.R. ‘09 and to the COA decision as W.R. ‘06.
In a nutshell, here is what happened procedurally: In 2005, W.R. was adjudicated delinquent for having a weapon on school property in 2005. The only evidence of his delinquency was his own confession to the school’s principal and vice principal, and a school resource officer (SRO). W.R. appealed. In a 2006 unanimous decision, the COA vacated the adjudication. On discretionary review, the NCSC reversed the COA’s decision.
The facts that the COA relied on in W.R. ‘06 were pretty straightforward: After receiving a tip from a concerned parent, the school’s principal and vice principal escorted W.R. from class to an office where they questioned him about a knife he supposedly brought to school the preceding day. At some point, the SRO-an officer employed by the Guilford Police Department who was armed and in uniform at the time-joined the questioning. The SRO also searched W.R. Although the principal, vice principal, and SRO left the room at various times, W.R. was never left unsupervised. Finally, when W.R. was confronted with the tip, he confessed that he brought a knife to school the day before. He was detained under the supervision of the SRO until his mother picked him up over an hour later. The COA held that W.R.’s confession was obtained during a custodial interrogation and in violation of his 5th Amendment and juvenile warning rights.
The problem is that no one mentioned custodial interrogation until the COA. At the district court hearing, W.R.’s confession was admitted without objection. But, given the “totality of the circumstances” the COA held that admitting W.R.’s statement was not only error, it was plain error because it was so fundamental that it resulted in a miscarriage of justice. In reaching that conclusion, the COA seemed swayed by the fact that the confession was the only evidence of W.R.’s responsibility.
The NCSC was swayed more by the fact that neither a motion to suppress nor an objection was raised during the hearing in district court, and was reluctant to thrust upon the trial court a duty to make findings of fact and conclusions of law where no conflicting evidence was presented. They also refused to find that the SRO’s presence and participation automatically converted the questioning into a custodial interrogation.
At the end of the day, W.R. ‘09 serves as a cautionary tale for defense attorneys: make the motion to suppress and if your motion is denied, object at the presentation of the evidence. On the other hand, because W.R.’09 was a plain error review, W.R. ‘06 is probably still an important analysis of custodial interrogation of a juvenile within the context of a school based offense. At least that’s the way I read it.