THIS DAY IN HISTORY

1966

The Miranda rights are established

 

On this day in 1966, the Supreme Court hands down its decision in Miranda v. Arizona, establishing the principle that all criminal suspects must be advised of their rights before interrogation. Now considered standard police procedure, “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can, and will, be used against you in court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford one, one will be appointed to you,” has been heard so many times in television and film dramas that it has become almost cliche.

The roots of the Miranda decision go back to March 2, 1963, when an 18-year-old Phoenix woman told police that she had been abducted, driven to the desert and raped. Detectives questioning her story gave her a polygraph test, but the results were inconclusive. 
 However, tracking the license plate number of a car that resembled that of her attacker’s brought police to Ernesto Miranda, who had a prior record as a peeping tom. Although the victim did not identify Miranda in a line-up, he was brought into police custody and interrogated.
 What happened next is disputed, but officers left the interrogation with a confession that Miranda later recanted, unaware that he didn’t have to say anything at all.
The confession was extremely brief and differed in certain respects from the victim’s account of the crime. However, Miranda’s appointed defense attorney (who was paid a grand total of $100) didn’t call any witnesses at the ensuing trial, and Miranda was convicted. While Miranda was in Arizona state prison, the American Civil Liberties Union took up his appeal, claiming that the confession was false and coerced.

The Supreme Court overturned his conviction, but Miranda was retried and convicted in October 1966 anyway, despite the relative lack of evidence against him. Remaining in prison until 1972, Ernesto Miranda was later stabbed to death in the men’s room of a bar after a poker game in January 1976.
As a result of the case against Miranda, each and every person must now be informed of his or her rights when arrested.

also today in history;

• American Revolution

• 1777 Lafayette arrives in South Carolina

• Automotive

• 1895 First auto race held from Paris-Bordeaux-Paris

• Civil War

• 1864 Grant swings toward Petersburg

• Cold War

• 1971 “Pentagon Papers” damage credibility of Cold War policy

• Crime

• 2006 Jurors begin deliberations in Susan Polk trial

• Disaster

• 1972 Hurricane Agnes is born

• General Interest

• 1381 Peasant army marches into London
• 1967 Thurgood Marshall appointed to Supreme Court
• 1983 Pioneer 10 departs solar system
• 1986 Tutu meets with Botha
• 323 Alexander the Great dies

• Hollywood

• 1962 Stanley Kubrick’s Lolita released

• Literary

• 1893 Dorothy Sayers is born

• Music

• 1975 Linda Ronstadt has her first #1 hit on the country-music charts

• Old West

• 1805 Meriwether Lewis reaches the Great Falls

• Presidential

• 1807 Thomas Jefferson subpoenaed in Aaron Burr’s treason trial

• Sports

• 1905 Christy Matthewson throws second no-hitter

• Vietnam War

• 1971 The New York Times publishes the “Pentagon Papers”
• 1973 Kissinger and Le Duc Tho sign new peace agreement

• World War I

• 1914 Kaiser Wilhelm concludes meeting with Archduke Franz Ferdinand

• World War II

• 1944 Germans launch V-1 rocket attack against Britain