ALBANY – A police detective violated a defendant’s right to remain silent by continuing to quiz him about a killing after the suspect said repeatedly he was through answering questions, an upstate appeals court has determined.
A unanimous panel of the Appellate Division, Third Department, held in a May 16 opinion by Justice John Egan Jr. (See Profile) that a defendant’s invocation of the right to silence must be "scrupulously honored" once it is stated in an "unequivocal and unqualified" manner, which Shawndell Johnson did as the detective questioned him on Nov. 24, 2008, about the death of Ulysses Canty in Schenectady.
