Even though a Clark County sheriff’s deputy was unclear when advising a Woodland man about his Miranda rights, the man’s robbery conviction will be upheld, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday.
The ruling was in response to an appeal by Nicholas K. Mayer of a Clark County jury’s 2012 decision that found him guilty of 10 crimes, including robbery, burglary, theft of a firearm and unlawful possession of a firearm. He was sentenced to 25 1/2 years in prison.
Mayer petitioned for a discretionary review on three separate grounds, but the state’s high court granted review on the Miranda challenge only.
Deputies arrested Mayer, who was 23 at the time, his sister, Emily Mayer, and John Taylor on suspicion of robbing employees at KC Teriyaki in Salmon Creek at gunpoint in January 2012.
When Mayer was interviewed, “the deputy did not clarify that the defendant was not obligated to respond to questions until he had the opportunity to confer with a lawyer,” the state Supreme Court opinion said.
The deputy, Clark County Deputy Tom Dennison, initially gave a correct Miranda advisement, according to the opinion. However, when Mayer posed questions, Dennison told Mayer that a lawyer would be appointed for him prior to the interview if he could not afford one, but also said that no lawyer would be appointed for him unless he was arrested, jailed, and taken to court, according to the opinion.
During the interview, Mayer confessed to being involved in the robbery, the opinion states.
The state Supreme Court ruled that although the Miranda advisement was “contradictory and confusing and thus violated the defendant’s Miranda rights, the error was harmless in light of the overwhelming untainted evidence of Nicholas Mayer’s guilt.”
“The evidence of Mayer’s guilt is so overwhelming that the jury necessarily would have reached the same conclusion even in the absence of Mayer’s confession,” the opinion read.
Barbara Corey, Mayer’s attorney during the appeal, said “the important part of the decision, obviously, is the court found that the police violated Nick’s rights because they misadvised him of his Miranda rights and they were deceptive when they did that.”
The next step, Corey said, will be to do some legal analysis to potentially fight the idea that the deputy’s error was harmless. That particular strategy, however, could be more difficult to win, she added.
Clark County Undersheriff Mike Cooke said that court decisions such as Mayer’s are routinely reviewed by staff as potential training opportunities.
“Every court decision is based on a unique set of circumstances and is an opportunity for us to refine how we do business,” he said.
