You Know The Warning

But Do you Know Who Miranda Was?

by The Ace of Spades

Well mainly a career criminal and pervy rapist:

[In 1963] an 18-year-old Phoenix woman reported to police that she was kidnapped, taken to the desert and raped. The woman was able to provide details about the car her kidnapper drove; those details took police to Ernesto Miranda. Though the woman couldn’t identify him in a lineup, police took him into custody and performed an interrogation anyway. The grilling resulted in a Miranda-signed confession.
Miranda later said he was forced into confessing because he was never made aware of his constitutional right to say nothing. His case wound up in front of the Supreme Court in 1966; they ruled that nothing Miranda “confessed” to could be used to try him because he was improperly educated on his rights. Almost immediately following the trial, the Miranda warning became a mandatory part of arrests.

Which is why pretty much anyone who's ever watched TV cop shows can recite the following:

“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to speak to an attorney, and to have an attorney present during any questioning. If you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be provided for you at government expense.”

This the most common form but it turns that what the Supreme Court gave was only a guideline and the actual Miranda Warning wording varies from department to department.

So what happened to Miranda? Well he was re-tried minus the confession in 1967 and convicted. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison but was released in 1972 after only five. [Gotta love that 1970's lenient justice] And after bouncing in and out of jail for minor offenses he was stabbed to death in 1974 during a bar fight in Phoenix. Ironically the main suspect in his stabbing was read his Miranda rights and used them effectively:

A suspect was arrested, but he chose to exercise his right to remain silent after being read his Miranda rights. The suspect was released and supposedly fled to Mexico. The Miranda murder case was closed without ever apprehending the murderer.