Written by Brooke Hoppe, L’26

     In its landmark case, Miranda v. Arizona, the Supreme Court created a procedural prophylactic to protect against compelled self-incriminating statements in violation of the Fifth Amendment.^[1] These aptly called “Miranda warnings” (or their functional equivalent) are required before statements “stemming from the custodial interrogation of the defendant” can be used against the defendant in court.^[2] These warnings ensure that individuals are explicitly informed of rights that they may assert during interrogation, such as the rights to remain silent and to have legal counsel present during questioning.^[3] However, these warnings are not required before every police and citizen contact, only those resulting in obtaining statements made in response to custodial interrogation.^[4] This two-pronged test requires both a showing of interrogation and that the interrogation was custodial.^[5]

      Courts must often grapple with the line between custodial and non-custodial interrogations to determine whether Miranda is implicated.^[6] Though whether a custodial interrogation has occurred is examined on a case-by-case basis, courts have increasingly held that interrogations taking place within the familiar confines of one’s home—even during the execution of a search warrant—are non-custodial.^[7] This classification raises serious concerns regarding the erosion of Miranda protections and the implications for individual rights.

      In Miranda, the Court distinguished between custodial and non-custodial interrogations,  finding that interrogations that occur in a custodial setting involve “inherently compelling pressures” that do not exist in non-custodial settings.^[8] But the Court also recognized that this coercion exists in contexts other than formal arrest, and defined interrogations as custodial when a defendant had been taken into custody or “deprived of his freedom of action in any significant way” so as to be functionally arrested.^[9]

      In determining whether a person is functionally in custody, courts examine whether “a reasonable person would have felt he or she was not at liberty to terminate the interrogation and leave” in light of all of the circumstances of the interrogation.^[10] This freedom-to-leave test is necessary but not sufficient for custody.^[11] Almost antithetically, determining that the defendant was not actually free to leave does not satisfy the custodial requirement on its own, as “[n]ot all restraints on freedom of movement amount to custody for purposes of Miranda.”^[12] For example, a driver is not considered to be in custody for the purposes of Miranda when they are questioned during a routine traffic stop, even though they are not “free to leave.”^[13]

      The Miranda custody inquiry is an objective examination – an examination of all circumstances, including those that “would have affected how a reasonable person in the suspect’s position would perceive his freedom to leave.”^[14]Whether the defendant felt free to leave themselves is not considered, nor is the subjective intent of the officers.^[15]Relevant factors to this determination include: (1) the length of the interrogation; (2) the statements of both the police and defendant during the interview; (3) whether the defendant was physically restrained at any point; and (4) whether the defendant was arrested or released at the end of the interview.^[16]

            Since Miranda aims to protect defendants against the overbearing influence of the station interrogation, courts must examine whether the relevant environment presents the same “inherently coercive pressures” as the “station house questioning at issue in Miranda.”^[17] The Supreme Court has said that when the interrogation exists in surroundings that are “expected and familiar [they] do not involve the same ‘inherently compelling pressures’ that are often present when a suspect is yanked from familiar surroundings.”^[18] Courts have even cited Miranda itself for the “accepted logic” that an interrogation in “familiar surroundings such as one’s home softens the hard aspects of police interrogation and moderates a suspect’s sense of being held in custody.”^[19]

       The underlying premise of this interpretation suggests that individuals in their homes maintain a level of control over the situation, inherently minimizing the potential for coercion. It is considered a “psychological advantage” to be subjected to interrogation in one’s own home, as a defendant in his own home “is more keenly aware of his rights.”^[20]However, this assumption fails to account for the dynamics at play during police searches, where the emotional and psychological impact of law enforcement presence can significantly alter an individual’s perception of control.^[21] In contrast, being in a relaxed environment such as one’s home might serve to minimize the seriousness of the interrogation, giving a defendant a false sense of security and potentially leading to false confessions.^[22]

      The home constitutes a unique space within our legal understanding. The adage that a “man’s home is his castle” has common-law origins that instills a right to defend one’s home against invasion.^[23] The Framers believed strongly that “the freedom of one’s house was one of the most vital elements of . . . liberty.”^[24] This ideal can be seen in the still-existing Castle Doctrine and Stand Your Ground Laws found in a majority of states.^[25] “The pervasiveness of the castle doctrine and of the special treatment of homes by the law . . . [is] reflective of a cultural consensus to protect homes as unique zones of individual safety, autonomy, and privacy.”^[26] The Supreme Court has explicitly recognized the unique zone of the home in other areas of criminal law, such as holding that entries to homes without warrants are “presumptively unreasonable.”^[27]

        Once armed with a warrant, officers are permitted to enter the residence, effectively shifting the power balance to the officers and not the so-called “king.” Much like interrogation manuals, which promote deception and other coercive measures in the interrogation room, police officers are sometimes encouraged to seek entry “by deception or means of a ruse” when executing a search warrant.^[28] During the execution of a search warrant, officers regularly restrict defendants’ freedom of movement in order to preserve the evidence sought after in the warrant and ensure officers’ safety.^[29] This regular restriction of movement includes not allowing the defendant to: (1) move about the house without an escort; (2) use the bathroom unattended; or (3) enter areas of the home entirely.^[30] Yet defendants are expected to parse and distinguish the difference between restriction of movement due to administrative concerns in effecting a search warrant and functional arrest. Further, courts’ understanding of “objective reasonableness” does not comport with the actual psychological implications of undergoing interrogation.^[31]

            In United States v. Hargrove, ten to fifteen officers arrived at John Hargrove’s home shortly after 6:00 a.m. to execute a search warrant.^[32] While securing the premises, several agents had drawn their weapons.^[33] While other officers searched Hargrove’s home, two agents accompanied Hargrove to his kitchen and conducted an interview that the Court describes as “amicable” and “nonthreatening.”^[34] One officer sat with Hargrove at the table, while the other stood in the only doorway to the room, effectively blocking Hargrove from leaving the room.^[35] During the interview, Hargrove made requests to move about his home that were denied by officers.^[36] The Court held that the interview was non-custodial and noted that “[t]he mere presence of armed law enforcement officers during the interview is not sufficient to create a custodial situation.”^[37] In reaching this holding, the Court noted that Hargrove’s own belief that he was functionally arrested was irrelevant to their analysis, but that his “cooperative [and] loquacious” demeanor pointed to the noncustodial nature of the interview.^[38] Instead, the Court focuses on the fact that a home, generally, is a “more relaxed environment” which indicates “less formal police control”—which goes directly against the encouraged tight control of defendants police are encouraged to display during the execution of search warrants.^[39]

            During the execution of a search warrant, surrounded by multiple officers all wielding weapons while traipsing through his “castle,” a reasonable person would not “feel as if he could ‘empty his home of his interrogators until they . . . completed their search.’”^[40] The implicit coercion in the desire to empty one’s home of intruders creates the same inherent pressure the Supreme Court cautioned against in Miranda.

^[1] Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 444 (1966); U.S. Const. Amend. V.

^[2] Miranda, 384 U.S. at 444.

^[3] See id. at 492.

^[4] Id. at 444; see also Ill. v. Perkins, 496 U.S. 292, 297 (1990).

^[5] Georgetown L.J., Custodial Interrogations, 49 Geo. L.J. Ann. Rev. Crim Proc. 218, 220 (2020).

^[6] See e.g., United States v. Pressley, 990 F.3d 383 (4th Cir. 2021); United States v. Leggette, 57 F.4th 406 (4th Cir. 2023).

^[7] See e.g., State v. Dodson, 195 N.W.2d 684, 686 (Iowa 1972); United States v. Faux, 828 F. 3d 130, 132 (2d Cir. 2016); see also Oregon v. Elstad, 470 U.S. 298, 315 (1985) (finding the interrogation officers conducted with defendant while executing an arrest warrant noncustodial in part due to the environment of being in his own kitchen).

^[8] Miranda, 384 U.S. at 467; see also Lauren E. Clatch, Interrogating Miranda’s Custody Requirement, 103 N.C. L. Rev. 69, 71 (2024).

^[9] Miranda, 384 U.S. at 444.

^[10] Howes v. Fields, 565 U.S. 499, 509 (2012) (quoting Thompson v. Keohane, 516 U.S. 99, 112 (1995)).

^[11] Clatch, supra note 8, at 103-04.

^[12] Fields, 565 U.S. at 509.

^[13] Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U.S. 420, 440 (1984).

^[14] J.D.B. v. North Carolina, 564 U.S. 261, 262 (2011).

^[15] See id.

^[16] See e.g., United States v. King, 604 F.3d 125, 138 (3d Cir. 2010); United States v. Coulter, 41 F.4th 451, 458 (5th Cir. 2022); State v. Lammers, 479 S.W.3d 624, 632 (Mo. 2016); United States v. Cowan, 674 F.3d 947, 957 (8th Cir. 2012).

^[17] Fields, 565 U.S. at 509.

^[18] Id. at 511 (quoting Maryland v. Shatzer, 559 U.S. 98, 110 (2010)).

^[19] United States v. Griffin, 922 F.2d 1343, 1355 n. 15 (8th Cir. 1990) (citing Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, 450 (1966)).

^[20] Miranda, 384 U.S. at 449 (quoting the techniques described in O’Hara, Fundamentals of Criminal Investigation (1956)).

^[21] See Amy Dusto, The Physical and Mental Impact of Contact With Police, Pub. Health (Mar. 9, 2022), https://magazine.publichealth.jhu.edu/2022/physical-and-mental-impact-contact-police; Jerrod Brown et al., Suggestibility in Police Interviews and Interrogations, Police Chief Mag.(Apr. 6, 2022), https://www.policechiefmagazine.org/suggestibility-in-police-interviews-and-interrogations/.

^[22] See Christian Jarrett, The Type of Interrogation Likely to Lead to False Confessions, Psych. (Jan. 30, 2008), https://www.bps.org.uk/research-digest/type-interrogation-likely-lead-false-confessions.

^[23] See Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 596 (1980); D. Benjamin Barros, Home as a Legal Concept, 46 Santa Clara L. Rev. 2 255, 260 (2005-2006), https://heinonline.org/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/saclr46&i=273.

^[24] Payton, 445 U.S. at 596.

^[25] See Castle Doctrine States 2024, World Population Rev., https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/castle-doctrine-states (last visited Feb. 1, 2025).

^[26] D. Benjamin Barros, supra note 27, at 259.

^[27] Payton, 445 U.S. at 586.

^[28] See e.g., Search and Seizure, Gen. Ord. No. 23.1, Brookline Police, Mass. (Apr. 9, 2024), https://www.brooklinepolice.com/DocumentCenter/View/1600/General-Order-231—Search-and-Seizure?bidId=.

^[29] See id.

^[30] See e.g., United States v. Vidal, 85 F. App’x 858, 860 (3d Cir. 2004); United States v. Jefferson, 562 F. Supp. 2d 707, 711 (E.D. Va. 2008); State v. Hagen, 361 N.W.2d 407, 411 (Minn. Ct. App. 1985).

^[31] See Clatch, supra note 8, at 72.

^[32] United States v. Hargrove, 925 F.3d 170, 173 (2010).

^[33] Id. at 174.

^[34] Id. at 175.

^[35] Id. at 174, 181 (finding that the agents’ “mere presence in the doorway” was not sufficient to demonstrate a restriction of movement in a “manner consistent with being in custody”).

^[36] See id. at 175 (detailing Hargrove’s requests to retrieve his cigarettes from his computer desk and go onto his porch with his daughter to smoke. The agents testified they denied these requests for administrative reasons as the computer was subject to the search warrant and his daughter was being interviewed at the time of the request).

^[37] Id. at 179.

^[38] Id. at 182.

^[39] Id. at 180; see e.g., Search Warrants, Ferguson Police Dep’t Gen. Ord. 6 (Jan. 30, 2021) (permitting officers executing search warrants to restrict all persons to one secured location for the length of the search).

^[40] United States v. Long, No. 2:22cr139, 2024 WL 4711946, at *7 (E.D. Va. Nov. 7, 2024) (quoting United States v. Hashime, 734 F.3d 278, 284 (4th Cir. 2013)).