State of Indiana v. Brian J. Taylor

Summary

The Indiana Supreme Court held that law-enforcement eavesdropping on a criminal suspect’s privileged consultation with counsel violated the suspect’s constitutional rights. The court ruled that the resulting testimony is presumptively tainted, but rejected prospective blanket suppression of all testimony from officers who invoked the Fifth Amendment. It remanded for the State to disprove testimonial taint beyond a reasonable doubt for each item of testimony while preserving potentially untainted foundational testimony.

Holdings

1. Eavesdropping by law-enforcement personnel on a criminal suspect's confidential consultation with counsel violates the suspect's federal and Indiana constitutional rights to counsel.
2. Prospective blanket suppression of all testimony from witnesses who invoked the Fifth Amendment about the eavesdropping was premature and inappropriate because some limited testimony may be independently sourced and may not materially impair Taylor's confrontation rights.
3. The State must rebut the presumption that the testimony of eavesdropping witnesses is tainted by proving beyond a reasonable doubt, for the entire substance of each witness's testimony, an independent source that does not implicate the witness's Fifth Amendment privilege or derogate Taylor's confrontation rights.
4. The court did not need to decide the prosecutorial-misconduct claim because the State's required burden to disprove testimonial prejudice could prevent the tainted fruits from reaching the jury, and the claim therefore could not yet determine the outcome.

Questions Presented

1. Whether eavesdropping on Taylor's attorney-client consultation violated his federal and Indiana constitutional rights to counsel.
2. Whether the trial court properly imposed prospective blanket suppression of all testimony from witnesses who invoked the Fifth Amendment regarding the eavesdropping.
3. What burden the State must satisfy to establish that testimony by presumptively tainted witnesses has an independent, untainted source.
4. Whether the witnesses' invocation of the Fifth Amendment and the prosecutor's conduct required suppression of their testimony under the Sixth Amendment Confrontation Clause or as a remedy for prosecutorial misconduct.

Disposition

reversed_and_remanded