The Meaning of Custody During Traffic Stops Under Miranda v. Arizona and Berkemer v. McCarty

The 50th anniversary of the landmark ruling in Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966), will occur in a few weeks on June 13. As everyone knows, the case required a set of warnings and waiver of rights before a statement obtained during custodial interrogation could be introduced during the government’s presentation of its evidence at trial. The case spawned many thousands of appellate cases throughout federal and state courts. And the United States Supreme Court has issued several rulings that have clarified, extended, or confined Miranda’s scope. This post will briefly review the meaning of custody during traffic stops by focusing on the Supreme Court’s most significant opinion on this issue: Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U.S. 420 (1984). [For a discussion of all significant aspects of Miranda, see the text on pages 534-52 and case summaries on pages 578-640 of Arrest, Search, and Investigation in North Carolina (4th ed. 2011), and pages 87-89 (text) and 95-100 (case summaries) of the 2015 supplement.] Meaning of Custody. The United States Supreme Court ruled in Berkemer, California v. Beheler, 511 U.S. 318 (1994), and other cases that a person is in custody under the Miranda rule when officers have formally arrested the person—for any offense, whether a felony or misdemeanor—or have restrained a person’s movement to a degree associated with a formal arrest (for example, handcuffing plus other circumstances; see State v. Johnston, 154 N.C. App. 500 (2002)). The North Carolina Supreme Court in State v. Buchanan, 353 N.C. 332 (2001), later ruling, [...]