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State v. Cooper10/28/2005
{ } Jeffrey Cooper appeals from his conviction and sentence following a no-contest plea to one count of aggravated robbery.
{ } In his three assignments of error, Cooper challenges the trial court's refusal to suppress evidence seized after police entered his home and incriminating statements he made in the residence and later at the police station. In support, Cooper argues (1) that police unlawfully entered his home without a search warrant, (2) that his subsequent consent to a search was invalid because it was tainted by the unlawful entry, (3) that an incriminating statement he made in the home was the product of custodial interrogation without Miranda warnings, (4) that Mirandized incriminating statements he made at the police station were inadmissible because they were tainted by the prior illegal entry into his home, and (5) that the incriminating statements made at the police station were inadmissible for the additional reason that the waiver of his Miranda rights was not knowing, voluntary, and intelligent.
{ } Based on the reasoning set forth below, we agree that police unlawfully entered Cooper's home after seizing him on the porch pursuant to a valid arrest warrant. As a result, we conclude that incriminating evidence seen inside the home was not admissible under the plain-view exception to the Fourth Amendment's search warrant requirement. Although we believe Cooper's consent to a search of his home shortly after the illegal entry was "voluntary," we nevertheless conclude that the consent was invalid because it resulted from exploitation of, and therefore was tainted by, the unlawful entry. Consequently, the physical evidence found inside the home was not admissible under the State's consent-to-search theory and should have been suppressed. We also agree with Cooper's argument that an incriminating statement he made inside the home should have been suppressed because it resulted from a custodial interrogation prior to the waiver of his Miranda rights. Finally, with regard to incriminating statements Cooper later made at the police station, we reject the argument that he did not knowingly, voluntarily, and intelligently waive his Miranda rights before making the statements. On the record before us, however, we cannot determine whether the incriminating statements made at the police station were impermissibly tainted by the prior unlawful entry into Cooper's home or whether the link between the statements and the unlawful entry was so attenuated that the statements were admissible despite the prior unlawful entry. Accordingly, the trial court's judgment will be reversed, and the cause will be remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
I. Factual and Procedural Background
{ } Detective Alan Miller and nine other officers arrived at Cooper's residence on the morning of May 11, 2004, with the intent to arrest him on an outstanding DUI warrant and to question him about the robbery of an area department store. The officers surrounded the house, and Miller knocked on the front door with his gun drawn. When Cooper opened the door appearing sleepy and shirtless, Miller identified himself as a police detective. He then explained that he had a warrant for Cooper's arrest and that Cooper also was a suspect in the robbery of an Elder-Beerman store. Cooper responded by allowing himself to be handcuffed. When he handcuffed Cooper, Miller was standing on the front porch, and Cooper was standing either on the porch or in the doorway. After taking Cooper into custody, Miller and the other officers put their weapons away and "stepped inside the house." Miller then placed Cooper on a couch. On a chair across from the couch, Miller observed a blue j
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