Two Thornton detectives made multiple misleading statements to a murder suspect before asking him to give up his Miranda rights, effectively coercing the man into talking, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled on Monday.

Detectives repeatedly reassured Thorvyn Bullcalf Evan Smiley he would leave the interrogation room a free person and was “not in trouble.” They also attempted to paint Smiley’s Miranda rights as a minor paperwork issue. In reality, Smiley was their only suspect in an unsolved murder and the detectives would arrest him after Smiley agreed to talk.

By 4-3, the Supreme Court agreed with an Adams County trial judge that Smiley’s statements in the interrogation room, including his confession to the murder, cannot be used as evidence. Given the detectives’ misleading promises about his freedom, Smiley’s decision to give up his Miranda rights – namely the right to remain silent and to consult with an attorney – was not voluntary, the majority concluded.

“By telling Smiley that he was not in trouble and that he would be leaving the police station that day, the detectives were engaging in a form of psychological coercion for which the law has less tolerance,” wrote Justice William W. Hood III in the June 12 opinion.

Writing in dissent, Justice Carlos A. Samour Jr. slammed the majority’s opinion, claiming it would cripple the ability of police to “effectively investigate crimes.”

“At most, the detectives’ statements lulled Smiley into feeling comfortable and safe. But that does not constitute coercion – psychological or otherwise,” Samour argued, writing for himself, Chief Justice Brian D. Boatright and Justice Monica M. Márquez.

Although the Supreme Court’s majority readily acknowledged law enforcement is not required to be completely forthright during interrogations, Smiley’s case examined the degree to which police can mislead suspects immediately before asking them to give up their constitutional protections and potentially incriminate themselves.

In September 2021, Thornton police received a break in a murder case. They had encountered Jamie William Whitehead near a restaurant dumpster 10 months prior, dead. Now, authorities learned Smiley’s DNA and fingerprints were found on items at the scene.

Detectives Melissa Hawkins and Eloy Silva traveled to Farmington, N.M., where Smiley was recently arrested for an unrelated offense. They came equipped with an order to take Smiley’s DNA, fingerprints and palm prints. While Smiley was their only suspect, Hawkins and Silva did not yet have probable cause to arrest him.

In the interrogation room, the detectives elicited a key piece of incriminating information from Smiley: that he had been in the Denver area at the time of Whitehead’s murder. Hawkins then mentioned the need to read Smiley his Miranda rights – a product of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Miranda v. Arizona decision, which found it necessary to protect suspects from being pressured into incriminating themselves. Hawkins’ mention of Miranda rights prompted a visible reaction from Smiley.

“You’re not in trouble,” she reassured Smiley. “You are leaving here today.”

After Silva echoed that Smiley would walk out of the interrogation room and Hawkins repeated it for the third time, Hawkins said, falsely, the detectives needed to read Smiley’s Miranda rights “just because we are from out of state and stuff like that.”

Silva then characterized Smiley’s rights against self-incrimination and to a lawyer as “just a form … like on TV.” Smiley agreed to relinquish his rights and speak to the detectives. After Smiley confessed to the murder, the detectives arrested him.

In October 2022, District Court Judge Robert W. Kiesnowski Jr. considered whether Smiley had voluntarily given up his rights, in which case his incriminating statements could be used against him, or, alternatively, whether the detectives coerced him into talking. Kiesnowski concluded Hawkins and Silva’s deceit played a significant role in Smiley’s decision to forgo his constitutional protections.

“Here, central to the voluntariness issue is the fact that immediately before Mr. Smiley was Mirandized, Detectives Hawkins and Silva stated to Mr. Smiley that he was not in trouble and twice that he would be leaving the Farmington Police Department ‘today’,” Kiesnowski wrote. “Detectives Hawkins and Silva knew that their statements that Mr. Smiley was not in trouble were false and that they acted with a reckless disregard as to the truth or falsity of whether Mr. Smiley was leaving the Farmington Police Department as a free man.”

The 17th Judicial District Attorney’s Office appealed directly to the state Supreme Court. Hawkins and Silva’s statements about Smiley’s freedom were technically true, the prosecution argued, because they only developed probable cause after hearing Smiley talk.

“Simply put, it is unreasonable to require law enforcement to anticipate that a suspect will confess to a crime – particularly one as serious as murder – and choose their words beforehand accordingly,” wrote Senior Deputy District Attorney Todd Bluth.

The Supreme Court’s majority disagreed. Hood described a suspect’s Miranda rights as akin to throwing someone a lifeline who is floating down a river. The suspect can invoke his rights – taking the lifeline – or choose to continue unaided. But if police claim the lifeline is unnecessary, the suspect’s choice to give up his constitutional protections may have been corrupted by the false promise.

Hawkins and Silva made “affirmative misrepresentations apparently employed to trick Smiley into waiving his rights and making inculpatory statements,” Hood wrote. “The detectives also couldn’t honestly promise that Smiley would be leaving after talking to them. Yet, they did anyway.”

Consequently, the detectives’ actions played an improper role in coercing Smiley’s decision to talk, the majority decided. The Innocence Project has estimated that false confessions, which can be the product of coercive interrogations, were a factor in 29% of exonerations by DNA.

The dissenting justices downplayed the relevance of Hawkins and Silva’s statements. Samour disagreed the detectives had promised Smiley anything, and argued they had not said Smiley would “never” be in trouble. He noted the interrogation took place in a “spacious” room and the detectives had not even threatened Smiley.

“Where was the exploitation here?” Samour asked. “If that’s all it takes, then every legitimate police interrogation will inherently involve exploitation of a defendant’s vulnerability. The reality is that there was zero exploitation.”

The case is People v. Smiley.