STATE OF NEW JERSEY VS. NESTOR FRA... - Published

As part of a homicide investigation, defendant gave a statement to a detective following the administration and waiver of Miranda¹ rights before the filing of a complaint-warrant or the issuance of an arrest warrant. Shortly after the statement began, defendant asked whether it would cause problems with his record because he was an undocumented noncitizen. The detective responded, "No. No," and told defendant his "status has nothing to do with this. I am not going to ask you any questions on your status, or how you got here to this country. Absolutely nothing." Defendant did not invoke any of his Miranda rights during the statement, initially denied involvement, asserted an alibi, and later in the statement made incriminating admissions.

Defendant opposed the State's motion to admit the statement, arguing he did not knowingly and voluntarily waive his Miranda rights because the detective falsely responded to his immigration status concerns. Following an evidentiary hearing, the trial court granted the motion.

The trial court also granted the State's motion to admit evidence of defendant's impecuniosity and prior thefts of personal property from the homicide victim's family, finding the four-part Cofield² test was satisfied.

Defendant was convicted by a jury of murder, related weapons offenses, and tampering with evidence but acquitted of robbery and theft. He was sentenced to a fifty-year term for the murder, subject to a forty-two and onehalf-year period of parole ineligibility under the No Early Release Act, N.J.S.A.2C:43-7.2, and concurrent terms on the other offenses. Defendant appealed his conviction and sentence.

In State v. Sims, the Court determined that "officers need not speculate about additional charges that may later be brought" and declined to adopt a bright-line rule that requires police officers to inform a suspect, "based on information learned to date in a developing investigation, of what charges may be filed" against him in the future. ___ N.J. ___ (2022) (slip op. 28, 30).

Applied here, the clear import of Sims is that police officers need not speculate about or disclose possible immigration consequences of charges that may be brought in the future. Requiring police officers to do so is unwarranted, impractical, and contrary to the holding in Sims.

The court declined to adopt: (1) a bright-line rule requiring officers to engage in such speculation and to inform an interrogee that their statements could result in deportation or other immigration consequences; or (2) a brightline rule requiring suppression of a statement following inaccurate advice regarding its potential immigration consequences, even where the officer knowingly provides affirmative misadvice (e.g., making false assurances to a suspect that that they will not be deported even if they admit to committing the offense). Instead, as was done in this case, the trial court should consider any bad-faith conduct as part of the totality-of-the-circumstances test when determining whether defendant knowingly and voluntarily waived his Miranda rights. The court affirmed the admission of defendant's statement.

The court also declined to expand Miranda warnings to include advising interrogees of the right to consult with an immigration attorney about the impact of the statement on their immigration status.

Due to the complexity of federal immigration law, the court recommended that law enforcement officers not engage in speculation and risk misadvising an interrogee. If an interrogee asks about the immigration impact of giving a statement, the officer can merely state that they cannot give any legal advice, and reiterate that the interrogee has the right to consult with an attorney and to have an attorney present during questioning.

The court rejected the argument that the State improperly shifted the burden of proof to defendant to produce a witness to corroborate a central facet of his defense, and the claim of prosecutorial misconduct during summation.

The court affirmed the admission of evidence of defendant's impecuniosity as he had placed his financial status in issue by asserting an alibi, claiming he was working in New York on the day of the homicide, and thus had no motive to rob the victim. The court also affirmed that the evidence of defendant's thefts and impecuniosity satisfied the four-part Cofield test, concluding the record showed the thefts were close in time to the homicide and led to defendant's firing, the evidence was clear and convincing, and its probative value outweighed the risk of unfair prejudice to the defendant.

The court affirmed defendant's sentence, finding the trial court properly applied and weighed the aggravating and mitigating factors, which were in equipoise. Accordingly, a midpoint sentence was appropriate. Because the length of the term and period of parole ineligibility were lower than midpoint, the sentence was not manifestly excessive or unduly punitive.

________________________________________________________________
¹ Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1996).
² State v. Cofield 127 N.J. 328, 338 (1992).