NEW YORK COURT OF APPEALS
People v. Harris
77 N.Y. 2d. 434 (1991)
SIMONS, J.
This matter is before us on remand from the United States Supreme Court following reversal and reinstatement of the judgment against defendant (see, New York v Harris, 495 US 14, (1990), revg People v Harris, 72 NY2d 614). We must now determine whether evidence submitted in support of defendant’s conviction, though admissible under Federal standards, should be suppressed under our State constitutional provision prohibiting unlawful searches and seizures (see, NY Const, art I, 12).
The challenged evidence consisted of statement defendant made to the police after they arrested him in his apartment for the murder of his girlfriend. The police had probable cause, developed during the five days between the crime and the arrest, but arrested defendant without a warrant in violation of the rule in Payton v New York (445 US 573). Defendant made an inculpatory statement in his apartment, another one an hour later at the police station and a third statement on videotape. The first statement was suppressed as the product of the illegal arrest and the third was suppressed because it was involuntary. Those rulings are not challenged. The issue now before us relates to the second statement. Defendant claimed that it should be suppressed under the Federal and State Constitutions (see, US Const 4th Amend; NY Const, art I, 12).
When we previously reviewed the question, we found that station house statement was tainted by the prior illegality and unredeemed by attenuation. Accordingly, we suppressed it on Fourth Amendment grounds (People v Harris, 72 NY 2d 614, 620 – 624, supra). The holding represented our view of what the Federal Constitution required and was consistent with an earlier decision in this Court on the subject (see, People v Conyers, 68 NY 2d 982; see also, United States v Johnson, 626 F2d 753, affd 457 US 537; United States v George, 883 F2d 1407).
The Supreme Court subsequently granted certiorari and reversed (New York v Harris, 495 US 14, supra). It held that the police illegality was in the entry, not the arrest, and that the exit from the apartment necessarily broke any causal connection between the wrong and the later statement. Inasmuch as the police had probable cause to arrest the defendant, the exclusionary rule did not bar use of his station house statement even though the warrantless arrest in defendant’s apartment violated the rule in Payton v New York (New York v Harris, 495 US -, -, 110 S Ct 1640, 1644 – 1645, supra). No attenuation was required, the Court held, because the deterrent value of suppressing this type of statement was minimal” “[i]t is doubtful *** that the desire to secure a statement from a criminal suspect would motivate the police to violate Payton” (New York v Harris, supra, at 1644).
Inasmuch as the Supreme Court ruled against defendant on his Federal claim, we are now obliged to consider on remand the other claim he advanced, whether the State Constitution requires suppression of the station house statement. We conclude that the Supreme Court’s rule does not adequately protect the search and seizure rights of citizens of New York. Accordingly, we hold that our State Constitution requires that statements obtained from an accused following a Payton violation must be suppressed unless the taint resulting from the violation has been attenuated.
Because the language of the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and section 12 of article I of the New York State Constitution prohibiting unreasonable searches and seizures is identical, it may be assumed, as a general proposition, that the two provisions confer similar rights (see People v P.J.Video, 68 NY2d 296; People v Johnson, 66 NY2d 398; People v Ponder, 54 NY2d 160). Such consistency is desirable because it facilitates implementation of search and seizure rules. Nonetheless, the two documents do not present a monolithic legal code. Our federalist system of government necessarily provides a double source of protection and State courts, when asked to do so, are bound to apply their own Constitutions notwithstanding the holdings of the United States Supreme Court (see, People ex rel. Arcara v Cloud Books, 68 NY2d 553, quoting People v Barber, 289 NY 378). Sufficient reasons appearing, a State court may adopt a different construction of a similar State provision unconstrained by a contrary Supreme Court interpretation of the Federal counterpart. The present case comes to us on remand to determine whether we should do so here.
We turn, therefore, to the circumstances peculiar to New York and conclude that although attenuation may not be necessary to deter Payton violations under Federal law or in the Nation generally, the Supreme Court’s rule is not adequate to protect New York citizens from Payton violations because of our right to counsel rule.
(Dissenting opinion omitted.)
