SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

New York v. Harris

495 U.S. 14 (1990)

Justice WHITE delivered the opinion of the Court.

On January 11, 1984, New York City police found the body of Ms. Thelma Staton murdered in her apartment. Various facts gave the officers probable cause to believe that the respondent in this case, Bernard Harris, had killed Ms. Staton. As a result, on January 16, 1984, three police officers went to Harris’s apartment to take him into custody. They did not first obtain an arrest warrant.

When the police arrived, they knocked on the door, displaying their guns and badges. Harris let them enter. Once inside, the officers read Harris his Miranda rights. Harris acknowledged that he understood the warnings, and agreed to answer the officers’ questions. At that point, he reportedly admitted that he had killed Ms. Staton.

Harris was arrested, taken to the station house, and again informed of his Miranda rights. He then signed a written inculpatory statement. The police subsequently read Harris the Miranda warnings a third time and videotaped an incriminating interview between Harris and a district attorney, even though Harris had indicated that he wanted to end the interrogation.

The trial court suppressed Harris’ first and third statements; the State does not challenge those rulings. The sole issue in this case is whether Harris’s second statement – the written statement made at the station house – should have been suppressed because the police, by entering Harris’ home without a warrant and without his consent, violated Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 63 L.Ed2d 639 (1980), which held that the Fourth Amendment prohibits the police from effecting a warrantless and nonconsensual entry into a suspect’s home in order to make a routine felony arrest. The New York trial court concluded that the statement was admissible. Following a bench trial, Harris was convicted of second – degree murder. The Appellate Division affirmed.

A divided New York Court of Appeals reversed. That court first accepted the trial court’s finding that Harris did not consent to the police officers’ entry into his home and that the warrantless arrest therefore violated Payton even though there was probable cause. Applying Brown v. Illinois, 422 U.S. 590 (1975), and its progeny, the court then determined that the station house statement must be deemed to be the inadmissible fruit of the illegal arrest because the connection between the statement and the arrest was not sufficiently attenuated. The Court noted that some courts had reasoned that the “wrong in Payton cases… lies not in the arrest, ‘but in the unlawful entry into a swelling without proper judicial authorization” and had therefore declined to suppress confessions that were made following Payton violations. (citations omitted). The New York Court disagreed with this analysis, finding it contrary to Payton and its own decisions interpreting Payton’s scope. We granted certiorari to resolve the admissibility of the station house statement (citations omitted).

[1] For present purposes, we accept the finding below that Harris did not consent to the police officers’ entry into his home and the conclusion that the police had probable cause to arrest him. It is also evident, in light of Payton, that arresting Harris in his home without an arrest warrant violated the Fourth Amendment. But, as emphasized in earlier cases, “we have declined to adopt a ‘per se’ or ‘but for rule’” that would make inadmissible any evidence , whether tangible or live – witness testimony, which somehow came to light through a chain of causation that began with an illegal arrest.” United States v. Ceccolini, 435 U.S. 268 (1978). Rather, in this context, we have stated that “[t]he penalties visited upon the Government, and in turn upon the public, because its officers have violated the law must bear some relation to the purposes which the law is to serve.” Id., at 279. In light of these principles, we decline to apply the exclusionary rule in this context because the rule in Payton was designed to protect the physical integrity of the home; it was not intended to grant criminal suspects, like Harris, protection for statements made outside their premises where the police have probable cause to arrest the suspect for committing a crime.

Harris’s statement taken at the police station was not the product of being in unlawful custody. Neither was it the fruit of having been arrested in the home rather than someplace else. The case is analogous to United States v. Crews, supra. In that case, we refused to suppress a victim’s in-court identification despite the defendant’s illegal arrest. The Court found that the evidence was not “‘come at by exploitation’ of… the defendant’s Fourth Amendment rights,: and that it was not necessary to inquire whether the “taint” of the Fourth Amendment violation was sufficiently attenuated to permit the introduction of the evidence. 445 U.S., at 471. Here, likewise, the police had a justification to question Harris prior to his arrest; therefore, his subsequent statement was not an exploitation of the illegal entry into Harris’ home.

[5] To put the matter another way, suppressing the statement taken outside the house would not serve the purpose of the rule that made Harris’s in-house arrest illegal. The warrant requirement for an arrest in the home is imposed to protect the home, and anything incriminating the police gathered from arresting Harris in his home, rather than elsewhere, has been excluded, as it should have been; the purpose of the rule has thereby been vindicated. We are not required by the Constitution to go further and suppress statements later made by Harris in order to deter police from violating Payton. “As cases considering the use of unlawfully obtained evidence in criminal trials themselves make clear, it does not follow from the emphasis on the exclusionary rule’s deterrent value that ‘anything which deters illegal searches is thereby commanded by the Fourth Amendment.'” United States v. Leon, 468 U.S. 897 (1984) (citation omitted). Even though we decline to suppress statements made outside the home following a Payton violation, the principal incentive to obey Payton still obtains: the police know that a warrantless entry will lead to the suppression of any evidence found or statements taken inside the home. If we did suppress statements like Harris’, moreover, the incremental deterrent value would be minimal. Given that the police have probable causes to arrest a suspect in Harris’ position, they need not violate Payton in order to interrogate the suspect. It is doubtful therefore that the desire to secure a statement from a criminal suspect would motivate the police to violate Payton. As a result, suppressing a station – house statement obtained after a Payton violation will have little effect on the officers’ actions, one way or another.

We hold that, where the police have probable cause to arrest a suspect, the exclusionary rule does not bar the State’s use of a statement made by the defendant outside of his home, even though the statement is taken after an arrest made in the home in violation of Payton. The judgment of the court below is accordingly.

Reversed.