U.S. Supreme Court Illinois v. Perkins, 496
U.S. 292 (1990) Illinois v. Perkins No. 88-1972 Argued Feb. 20, 1990 Decided June 4, 1990 496
U.S. 292 CERTIORARI TO THE APPELLATE COURT
OF ILLINOIS, FIFTH JUDICIAL DISTRICT Syllabus Police placed undercover agent Parisi in a jail cellblock with
respondent Perkins, who was incarcerated on charges unrelated to
the murder that Parisi was investigating. When Parisi asked him if
he had ever killed anybody, Perkins made statements implicating
himself in the murder. He was then charged with the murder. The
trial court granted respondent's motion to suppress his statements
on the ground that Parisi had not given him the warnings required
by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 ,
before their conversations. The Appellate Court of Illinois
affirmed, holding that Miranda prohibits all undercover
contacts with incarcerated suspects that are reasonably likely to
elicit an incriminating response. Held: An undercover law enforcement officer posing as a
fellow inmate need not give Miranda warnings to an
incarcerated suspect before asking questions that may elicit an
incriminating response. The Miranda doctrine must be
enforced strictly, but only in situations where the concerns
underlying that decision are present. Those concerns are not
implicated here, since the essential ingredients of a "police
dominated atmosphere" and compulsion are lacking. It is Miranda's premise that the danger of coercion results from
the interaction of custody and official interrogation, whereby the
suspect may feel compelled to speak by the fear of reprisal for
remaining silent or in the hope of more lenient treatment should he
confess. That coercive atmosphere is not present when an
incarcerated person speaks freely to someone whom he believes to be
a fellow inmate and whom he assumes is not an officer having
official power over him. In such circumstances, Miranda does not forbid mere strategic deception by taking advantage of a
suspect's misplaced trust. The only difference between this case
and Hoffa v. United States, 385 U.
S. 293 -- which upheld the placing of an undercover
agent near a suspect in order to gather incriminating information
-- is that Perkins was incarcerated. Detention, however, whether or
not for the crime in question, does not warrant a presumption that
such use of an undercover agent renders involuntary the
incarcerated suspect's resulting confession. Mathis v. United
States, 391 U. S. 1 -- which
held that an inmate's statements to a known agent were inadmissible
because no Miranda warnings were given -- is
distinguishable. Where the suspect does not Page 496 U. S. 293 know that he is speaking to a government agent, there is no
reason to assume the possibility of coercion. Massiah v. United
States, 377 U. S. 201 , and
similar cases -- which held that the government may not use an
undercover agent to circumvent the Sixth Amendment right to counsel
once a suspect has been charged -- are inapplicable, since, here,
no murder charges had been filed at the time of interrogation. Also
unavailing is Perkins' argument that a bright-line rule for the
application of Miranda is desirable, since law enforcement
officers will have little difficulty applying the holding of this
case. Pp. 496 U. S.
296 -300.

															176 Ill.App.3d 443, 126 Ill.Dec. 8, 531 N.E.2d 141 (1988),
reversed and remanded.

															KENNEDY, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which
REHNQUIST, C.J., and WHITE, BLACKMUN, STEVENS, O'CONNOR, and
SCALIA, JJ., joined. BRENNAN, J., filed an opinion concurring in
the judgment, post, p. 496 U. S. 300 .
MARSHALL, J., filed a dissenting opinion, post, p. 496 U. S.
303 . Page 496 U. S. 294 OPINION Justice KENNEDY delivered the opinion of the Court.

															An undercover government agent was placed in the cell of
respondent Perkins, who was incarcerated on charges unrelated to
the subject of the agent's investigation. Respondent made
statements that implicated him in the crime that the agent sought
to solve. Respondent claims that the statements should be
inadmissible because he had not been given Miranda warnings by the agent. We hold that the statements are admissible. Miranda warnings are not required when the suspect is
unaware that he is speaking to a law enforcement officer, and gives
a voluntary statement. I In November, 1984, Richard Stephenson was murdered in a suburb
of East St. Louis, Illinois. The murder remained unsolved until
March, 1986, when one Donald Charlton told police that he had
learned about a homicide from a fellow inmate at the Graham
Correctional Facility, where Charlton had been serving a sentence
for burglary. The fellow inmate was Lloyd Perkins, who is the
respondent here. Charlton told police that, while at Graham, he had
befriended respondent, who told him in detail about a murder that
respondent had committed in East St. Louis. On hearing Charlton's
account, the police recognized details of the Stephenson murder
that were not well known, and so they treated Charlton's story as a
credible one.

															By the time the police heard Charlton's account, respondent had
been released from Graham, but police traced him to a jail in
Montgomery County, Illinois, where he was being held pending trial
on a charge of aggravated battery, unrelated to the Stephenson
murder. The police wanted to investigate further respondent's
connection to the Stephenson murder, but feared that the use of an
eavesdropping device would prove impracticable and unsafe. They
decided instead to place an undercover agent in the cellblock with
respondent and Charlton. The plan was for Charlton and
undercover Page 496 U. S. 295 agent John Parisi to pose as escapees from a work release
program who had been arrested in the course of a burglary. Parisi
and Charlton were instructed to engage respondent in casual
conversation and report anything he said about the Stephenson
murder.

															Parisi, using the alias "Vito Bianco," and Charlton, both
clothed in jail garb, were placed in the cellblock with respondent
at the Montgomery County jail. The cellblock consisted of 12
separate cells that opened onto a common room. Respondent greeted
Charlton who, after a brief conversation with respondent,
introduced Parisi by his alias. Parisi told respondent that he
"wasn't going to do any more time," and suggested that the three of
them escape. Respondent replied that the Montgomery County jail was
"rinky-dink," and that they could "break out." The trio met in
respondent's cell later that evening, after the other inmates were
asleep, to refine their plan. Respondent said that his girlfriend
could smuggle in a pistol. Charlton said "Hey, I'm not a murderer,
I'm a burglar. That's your guys' profession." After telling
Charlton that he would be responsible for any murder that occurred,
Parisi asked respondent if he had ever "done" anybody. Respondent
said that he had, and proceeded to describe at length the events of
the Stephenson murder. Parisi and respondent then engaged in some
casual conversation before respondent went to sleep. Parisi did not
give respondent Miranda warnings before the
conversations.

															Respondent was charged with the Stephenson murder. Before trial,
he moved to suppress the statements made to Parisi in the jail. The
trial court granted the motion to suppress, and the State appealed.
The Appellate Court of Illinois affirmed, holding that Miranda
v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 (1966), prohibits all undercover contacts with incarcerated
suspects which are reasonably likely to elicit an incriminating
response.

															We granted certiorari, 493 U.S. 808 (1989), to decide whether an
undercover law enforcement officer must give Page 496 U. S. 296 Miranda warnings to an incarcerated suspect before
asking him questions that may elicit an incriminating response. We
now reverse. II In Miranda v. Arizona, supra, the Court held that the
Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination prohibits
admitting statements given by a suspect during "custodial
interrogation" without a prior warning. Custodial interrogation
means "questioning initiated by law enforcement officers after a
person has been taken into custody. . . ." Id., 384 U.S.
at 384 U. S. 444 .
The warning mandated by Miranda was meant to preserve the
privilege during "incommunicado interrogation of individuals in a
police-dominated atmosphere." Id. at 384 U. S. 445 .
That atmosphere is said to generate

															"inherently compelling pressures which work to undermine the
individual's will to resist and to compel him to speak where he
would not otherwise do so freely." Id. at 384 U. S.
467 .

															"Fidelity to the doctrine announced in Miranda requires
that it be enforced strictly, but only in those types of situations
in which the concerns that powered the decision are
implicated." Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U. S. 420 , 468 U. S. 437 (1984).

															Conversations between suspects and undercover agents do not
implicate the concerns underlying Miranda. The essential
ingredients of a "police-dominated atmosphere" and compulsion are
not present when an incarcerated person speaks freely to someone
that he believes to be a fellow inmate. Coercion is determined from
the perspective of the suspect. Rhode Island v. Innis, 446 U. S. 291 , 446 U. S. 301 (1980); Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U.
S. 420 , 468 U. S. 442 (1984). When a suspect considers himself in the company of
cellmates and not officers, the coercive atmosphere is lacking. Miranda, 384 U.S. at 384 U. S.
449 ("The principal psychological factor contributing
to a successful interrogation is privacy -- being alone with the
person under interrogation'"); id. at 384 U. S. 445 .
There is no empirical basis for the assumption that a suspect
speaking to those whom he assumes are not officers will feel
compelled to speak by the fear Page 496 U. S. 297 of reprisal for remaining silent or in the hope of more lenient
treatment should he confess.

															It is the premise of Miranda that the danger of
coercion results from the interaction of custody and official
interrogation. We reject the argument that Miranda warnings are required whenever a suspect is in custody in a
technical sense and converses with someone who happens to be a
government agent. Questioning by captors, who appear to control the
suspect's fate, may create mutually reinforcing pressures that the
Court has assumed will weaken the suspect's will, but where a
suspect does not know that he is conversing with a government
agent, these pressures do not exist. The State Court here
mistakenly assumed that, because the suspect was in custody, no
undercover questioning could take place. When the suspect has no
reason to think that the listeners have official power over him, it
should not be assumed that his words are motivated by the reaction
he expects from his listeners. "[W]hen the agent carries neither
badge nor gun and wears not police blue,' but the same prison
gray" as the suspect, there is no "interplay between police
interrogation and police custody." Kamisar, Brewer v. Williams,
Massiah and Miranda: What is "Interrogation"? When
Does it Matter?, 67 Geo.L.J. 1, 67, 63 (1978). Miranda forbids coercion, not mere strategic deception
by taking advantage of a suspect's misplaced trust in one he
supposes to be a fellow prisoner. As we recognized in Miranda, "[c]onfessions remain a proper element in law enforcement. Any
statement given freely and voluntarily without any compelling
influences is, of course, admissible in evidence."

															384 U.S. at 384 U. S. 478 .
Ploys to mislead a suspect or lull him into a false sense of
security that do not rise to the level of compulsion or coercion to
speak are not within Miranda's concerns. Cf. Oregon v.
Mathiason, 429 U. S. 492 , 429 U. S.
495 -496 (1977) (per curiam); Moran v. Burbine, 475 U. S. 412 (1986) (where police fail to inform suspect of attorney's efforts
to reach him, Page 496 U. S. 298 neither Miranda nor Fifth Amendment require suppression
of prearraignment confession after voluntary waiver). Miranda was not meant to protect suspects from boasting
about their criminal activities in front of persons whom they
believe to be their cellmates. This case is illustrative.
Respondent had no reason to feel that undercover agent Parisi had
any legal authority to force him to answer questions or that Parisi
could affect respondent's future treatment. Respondent viewed the
cellmate-agent as an equal, and showed no hint of being intimidated
by the atmosphere of the jail. In recounting the details of the
Stephenson murder, respondent was motivated solely by the desire to
impress his fellow inmates. He spoke at his own peril.

															The tactic employed here to elicit a voluntary confession from a
suspect does not violate the Self-Incrimination Clause. We held in Hoffa v. United States, 385 U. S. 293 (1966), that placing an undercover agent near a suspect in order to
gather incriminating information was permissible under the Fifth
Amendment. In Hoffa, while petitioner Hoffa was on trial,
he met often with one Partin, who, unbeknownst to Hoffa, was
cooperating with law enforcement officials. Partin reported to
officials that Hoffa had divulged his attempts to bribe jury
members. We approved using Hoffa's statements at his subsequent
trial for jury tampering, on the rationale that "no claim ha[d]
been or could [have been] made that [Hoffa's] incriminating
statements were the product of any sort of coercion, legal or
factual." Id. at 385 U. S. 304 .
In addition, we found that the fact that Partin had fooled Hoffa
into thinking that Partin was a sympathetic colleague did not
affect the voluntariness of the statements. Ibid. Cf. Oregon v.
Mathiason, supra, 429 U.S. at 429 U. S.
495 -496 (officer's falsely telling suspect that
suspect's fingerprints had been found at crime scene did not render
interview "custodial" under Miranda ); Frazier v.
Cupp, 394 U. S. 731 , 394 U. S. 739 (1969); Procunier v. Atchley, 400 U.
S. 446 , 400 U. S.
453 -454 (1971). The only difference between this case
and Hoffa is that the suspect here was incarcerated,
but Page 496 U. S. 299 detention, whether or not for the crime in question, does not
warrant a presumption that the use of an undercover agent to speak
with an incarcerated suspect makes any confession thus obtained
involuntary.

															Our decision in Mathis v. United States, 391 U. S.
1 (1968), is distinguishable. In Mathis, an
inmate in a state prison was interviewed by an Internal Revenue
Service agent about possible tax violations. No Miranda warning was given before questioning. The Court held that the
suspect's incriminating statements were not admissible at his
subsequent trial on tax fraud charges. The suspect in Mathis was aware that the agent was a government official,
investigating the possibility of noncompliance with the tax laws.
The case before us now is different. Where the suspect does not
know that he is speaking to a government agent, there is no reason
to assume the possibility that the suspect might feel coerced. (The
bare fact of custody may not in every instance require a warning,
even when the suspect is aware that he is speaking to an official,
but we do not have occasion to explore that issue here.)

															This Court's Sixth Amendment decisions in Massiah v. United
States, 377 U. S. 201 (1964), United States v. Henry, 447 U.
S. 264 (1980), and Maine v. Moulton, 474 U. S. 159 (1985), also do not avail respondent. We held in those cases that
the government may not use an undercover agent to circumvent the
Sixth Amendment right to counsel once a suspect has been charged
with the crime. After charges have been filed, the Sixth Amendment
prevents the government from interfering with the accused's right
to counsel. Moulton, supra, at 474 U. S. 176 .
In the instant case, no charges had been filed on the subject of
the interrogation, and our Sixth Amendment precedents are not
applicable.

															Respondent can seek no help from his argument that a bright-line
rule for the application of Miranda is desirable. Law
enforcement officers will have little difficulty putting into
practice our holding that undercover agents need not Page 496 U. S. 300 give Miranda warnings to incarcerated suspects. The use
of undercover agents is a recognized law enforcement technique,
often employed in the prison context to detect violence against
correctional officials or inmates as well as for the purposes
served here. The interests protected by Miranda are not
implicated in these cases, and the warnings are not required to
safeguard the constitutional rights of inmates who make voluntary
statements to undercover agents.

															We hold that an undercover law enforcement officer posing as a
fellow inmate need not give Miranda warnings to an
incarcerated suspect before asking questions that may elicit an
incriminating response. The statements at issue in this case were
voluntary, and there is no federal obstacle to their admissibility
at trial. We now reverse and remand for proceedings not
inconsistent with our opinion. It is so ordered. Justice BRENNAN, concurring in the judgment.

															The Court holds that Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.
S. 436 (1966), does not require suppression of a
statement made by an incarcerated suspect to an undercover agent.
Although I do not subscribe to the majority's characterization of Miranda in its entirety, I do agree that, when a suspect
does not know that his questioner is a police agent, such
questioning does not amount to "interrogation" in an "inherently
coercive" environment so as to require application of Miranda. Since the only issue raised at this stage of the
litigation is the applicability of Miranda, * I concur in
the judgment of the Court. Page 496 U. S. 301 This is not to say that I believe the Constitution condones the
method by which the police extracted the confession in this case.
To the contrary, the deception and manipulation practiced on
respondent raise a substantial claim that the confession was
obtained in violation of the Due Process Clause. As we recently
stated in Miller v. Fenton, 474 U.
S. 104 , 474 U. S.
109 -110 (1985):

															"This Court has long held that certain interrogation techniques,
either in isolation or as applied to the unique characteristics of
a particular suspect, are so offensive to a civilized system of
justice that they must be condemned under the Due Process Clause of
the Fourteenth Amendment. . . . Although these decisions framed the
legal inquiry in a variety of different ways, usually through the
'convenient shorthand' of asking whether the confession was
'involuntary,' Blackburn v. Alabama, 361 U. S.
199 (1960), the Court's analysis has consistently been
animated by the view that 'ours is an accusatorial and not an
inquisitorial system,' Rogers v. Richmond, 365 U. S.
534 , 365 U. S. 541 (1961), and
that, accordingly, tactics for eliciting inculpatory statements
must fall within the broad constitutional boundaries imposed by the
Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of fundamental fairness. Page 496 U. S. 302 That the right is derived from the Due Process Clause"

															"is significant because it reflects the Court's consistently
held view that the admissibility of a confession turns as much on
whether the techniques for extracting the statements, as applied to
this suspect, are compatible with a system that presumes innocence
and assures that a conviction will not be secured by inquisitorial
means as on whether the defendant's will was in fact
overborne."

															Miller, supra, 474 U.S. at 474 U. S. 116 . See Spano v. New York, 360 U. S. 315 , 360 U. S.
320 -321 (1959) ("The abhorrence of society to the use of
involuntary confessions does not turn alone on their inherent
untrustworthiness. It also turns on the deep-rooted feeling that
the police must obey the law while enforcing the law; that in the
end life and liberty can be as much endangered from illegal methods
used to convict those thought to be criminals as from the actual
criminals themselves"); see also Degraffenreid v.
McKellar, 494 U. S. 1071 ,
1072-1074 (1990) (MARSHALL, J., joined by BRENNAN, J., dissenting
from denial of certiorari).

															The method used to elicit the confession in this case deserves
close scrutiny. The police devised a ruse to lure respondent into
incriminating himself when he was in jail on an unrelated charge. A
police agent, posing as a fellow inmate and proposing a sham escape
plot, tricked respondent into confessing that he had once committed
a murder as a way of proving that he would be willing to do so
again should the need arise during the escape. The testimony of the
undercover officer and a police informant at the suppression
hearing reveal the deliberate manner in which the two elicited
incriminating statements from respondent. See App. 43-53
and 66-73. We have recognized that

															"the mere fact of custody imposes pressures on the accused;
confinement may bring into play subtle influences that will make
him particularly susceptible to the ploys of undercover Government
agents." United States v. Henry, 447 U.
S. 264 , 447 U. S. 274 (1980). As Justice MARSHALL points out, the pressures of custody
make a suspect more likely to confide in others and to engage Page 496 U. S. 303 in "jailhouse bravado." See post at 496 U. S.
307 -308. The State is in a unique position to exploit
this vulnerability because it has virtually complete control over
the suspect's environment. Thus, the State can ensure that a
suspect is barraged with questions from an undercover agent until
the suspect confesses. Cf. Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.
S. 385 , 437 U. S. 399 (1978); Ashcraft v. Tennessee, 322 U.
S. 143 , 322 U. S.
153 -155 (1944). The testimony in this case suggests the
State did just that.

															The deliberate use of deception and manipulation by the police
appears to be incompatible "with a system that presumes innocence
and assures that a conviction will not be secured by inquisitorial
means," Miller, supra, 474 U.S. at 474 U. S. 116 ,
and raises serious concerns that respondent's will was overborne.
It is open to the lower court on remand to determine whether, under
the totality of the circumstances, respondent's confession was
elicited in a manner that violated the Due Process Clause. That the
confession was not elicited through means of physical torture, see Brown v. Mississippi, 297 U.
S. 278 (1936), or overt psychological pressure, see
Payne v. Arkansas, 356 U. S. 560 , 356 U. S. 566 (1958), does not end the inquiry.

															"[A]s law enforcement officers become more responsible, and the
methods used to extract confessions more sophisticated, [a court's]
duty to enforce federal constitutional protections does not cease.
It only becomes more difficult because of the more delicate
judgments to be made." Spano, supra, 360 U.S. at 360 U. S.
321 .

															Justice MARSHALL, dissenting.

															This Court clearly and simply stated its holding in Miranda
v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 (1966):

															"[T]he prosecution may not use statements, whether exculpatory
or inculpatory, stemming from custodial interrogation of the
defendant unless it demonstrates the use of procedural safeguards
effective to secure the privilege against self-incrimination." Id. at 384 U. S. 444 .
The conditions that require the police to apprise a defendant of
his constitutional rights -- custodial interrogation conducted by
an agent of the police -- were present in this Page 496 U. S. 304 case. Because Lloyd Perkins received no Miranda warnings before he was subjected to custodial interrogation, his
confession was not admissible.

															The Court reaches the contrary conclusion by fashioning an
exception to the Miranda rule that applies whenever "an
undercover law enforcement officer posing as a fellow inmate . . .
ask[s] questions that may elicit an incriminating response" from an
incarcerated suspect. Ante at 496 U. S. 300 .
This exception is inconsistent with the rationale supporting Miranda, and allows police officers intentionally to take
advantage of suspects unaware of their constitutional rights. I
therefore dissent.

															The Court does not dispute that the police officer here
conducted a custodial interrogation of a criminal suspect. Perkins
was incarcerated in county jail during the questioning at issue
here; under these circumstances, he was in custody as that term is
defined in Miranda. 384 U.S. at 384 U. S. 444 ; Mathis v. United States, 391 U. S. 1 , 391 U. S. 4 -5
(1968) (holding that defendant incarcerated on charges different
from the crime about which he is questioned was in custody for
purposes of Miranda ). The Solicitor General argues that
Perkins was not in custody for purpose of Miranda because
he was familiar with the custodial environment as a result of being
in jail for two days and previously spending time in prison. Brief
for United States 11. Perkins' familiarity with confinement,
however, does not transform his incarceration into some sort of
noncustodial arrangement. Cf. Orozco v. Texas, 394 U. S. 324 (1969) (holding that suspect who had been arrested in his home and
then questioned in his bedroom was in custody, notwithstanding his
familiarity with the surroundings).

															While Perkins was confined, an undercover police officer, with
the help of a police informant, questioned him about a serious
crime. Although the Court does not dispute that Perkins was
interrogated, it downplays the nature of the 35-minute questioning
by disingenuously referring to it as a Page 496 U. S. 305 "conversatio[n]." Ante at 496 U. S.
295 -296. The officer's narration of the "conversation"
at Perkins' trial, however, reveals that it clearly was an
interrogation.

															"[Agent:] You ever do anyone?"

															"[Perkins:] Yeah, once in East St. Louis, in a rich white
neighborhood."

															"Informant: I didn't know they had any rich white neighborhoods
in East St. Louis."

															"Perkins: It wasn't in East St. Louis, it was by a race track in
Fairview Heights. . . . "

															"[Agent]: You did a guy in Fairview Heights?"

															"Perkins: Yeah, in a rich white section where most of the houses
look the same."

															"[Informant]: If all the houses look the same, how did you know
you had the right house?"

															"Perkins: Me and two guys cased the house for about a week. I
knew exactly which house, the second house on the left from the
corner."

															"[Agent]: How long ago did this happen?"

															"Perkins: Approximately about two years ago. I got paid $5,000
for that job."

															"[Agent]: How did it go down?"

															"Perkins: I walked up to . . . this guy['s] house with a
sawed-off under my trenchcoat."

															"[Agent]: What type gun[?]"

															"Perkins: A .12 gauge Remmington [sic] Automatic Model 1100
sawed-off."

															App. 49-50. The police officer continued the inquiry, asking a
series of questions designed to elicit specific information about
the victim, the crime scene, the weapon, Perkins' motive, and his
actions during and after the shooting. Id. at 50-52. This
interaction was not a "conversation"; Perkins, the officer, and the
informant were not equal participants in a free-ranging discussion,
with each man offering his views on different topics. Rather, it
was an interrogation: Perkins was subjected to express questioning
likely to evoke an incriminating response. Page 496 U. S. 306 Rhode Island v. Innis, 446 U.
S. 291 , 446 U. S.
300 -301 (1980).

															Because Perkins was interrogated by police while he was in
custody, Miranda required that the officer inform him of
his rights. In rejecting that conclusion, the Court finds that
"conversations" between undercover agents and suspects are devoid
of the coercion inherent in stationhouse interrogations conducted
by law enforcement officials who openly represent the State. Ante at 496 U. S. 296 . Miranda was not, however, concerned solely with police
coercion. It dealt with any police tactics that may operate to
compel a suspect in custody to make incriminating statements
without full awareness of his constitutional rights. See
Miranda, supra, 384 U.S. at 384 U. S. 468 (referring to "inherent pressures of the interrogation
atmosphere"); Estelle v. Smith, 451 U.
S. 454 , 451 U. S. 467 (1981) ("The purpose of [the Miranda ] admonitions is to
combat what the Court saw as inherently compelling pressures'
at work on the person and to provide him with an awareness of the
Fifth Amendment privilege and the consequences of forgoing it")
(quoting Miranda, 384 U.S. at 384 U. S.
467 ). Thus, when a law enforcement agent structures a
custodial interrogation so that a suspect feels compelled to reveal
incriminating information, he must inform the suspect of his
constitutional rights and give him an opportunity to decide whether
or not to talk. The compulsion proscribed by Miranda includes deception
by the police. See Miranda, supra, 384 U.S. at 384 U. S. 453 (indicting police tactics "to induce a confession out of trickery,"
such as using fictitious witnesses or false accusations); Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U. S. 420 , 468 U. S. 433 (1984) ("The purposes of the safeguards prescribed by Miranda are to ensure that the police do not coerce or trick captive suspects into confessing") (emmphasis Page 496 U. S. 307 deleted, emphasis added). Cf. Moran v. Burbine, 475 U. S. 412 , 475 U. S. 421 (1986) ("[T]he relinquishment of the right [protected by the Miranda warnings] must have been voluntary in the sense
that it was the product of a free and deliberate choice rather than
intimidation, coercion, or deception") (emphasis added).
Although the Court did not find trickery by itself sufficient to
constitute compulsion in Hoffa v. United States, 385 U. S. 293 (1966), the defendant in that case was not in custody. Perkins,
however, was interrogated while incarcerated. As the Court has
acknowledged in the Sixth Amendment context:

															"[T]he mere fact of custody imposes pressures on the accused;
confinement may bring into play subtle influences that will make
him particularly susceptible to the ploys of undercover Government
agents." United States v. Henry, 447 U.
S. 264 , 447 U. S. 274 (1980). See also Massiah v. United States, 377 U.
S. 201 , 377 U. S. 206 (1964) (holding, in the context of the Sixth Amendment, that
defendant's constitutional privilege against self-incrimination was
"more seriously imposed upon . . . because he did not even know
that he was under interrogation by a government agent") (citation,
internal quotation marks omitted).

															Custody works to the State's advantage in obtaining
incriminating information. The psychological pressures inherent in
confinement increase the suspect's anxiety, making him likely to
seek relief by talking with others. Dix, Undercover Investigations
and Police Rulemaking, 53 Texas L.Rev. 203, 230 (1975). See
also Gibbs, The First Cut is the Deepest: Psychological
Breakdown and Survival in the Detention Setting, in The Pains of
Imprisonment 97, 107 (R. Johnson & H. Toch eds. 1982);
Hagel-Seymour, Environmental Sanctuaries for Susceptible Prisoners,
in The Pains of Imprisonment, supra, at 267, 279; Chicago
Tribune, Apr. 15, 1990, p. D3 (prosecutors have found that
prisoners often talk freely with fellow inmates). The inmate is
thus more susceptible to efforts by undercover agents to elicit
information from him. Similarly, where the suspect is incarcerated,
the constant threat of physical danger peculiar to the prison
environment may make him demonstrate his toughness to other inmates
by recounting or inventing past violent acts.

															"Because the suspect's ability to select people with whom he can
confide is completely within their control, the police have a Page 496 U. S. 308 unique opportunity to exploit the suspect's vulnerability. In
short, the police can insure that if the pressures of confinement
lead the suspect to confide in anyone, it will be a police
agent."

															White, Police Trickery in Inducing Confessions, 127 U.Pa.L.Rev.
581, 605 (1979). In this case, the police deceptively took
advantage of Perkins' psychological vulnerability by including him
in a sham escape plot, a situation in which he would feel compelled
to demonstrate his willingness to shoot a prison guard by revealing
his past involvement in a murder. See App. 49 (agent
stressed that a killing might be necessary in the escape and then
asked Perkins if he had ever murdered someone).

															Thus, the pressures unique to custody allow the police to use
deceptive interrogation tactics to compel a suspect to make an
incriminating statement. The compulsion is not eliminated by the
suspect's ignorance of his interrogator's true identity. The Court
therefore need not inquire past the bare facts of custody and
interrogation to determine whether Miranda warnings are
required.

															The Court's adoption of an exception to the Miranda doctrine is incompatible with the principle, consistently applied
by this Court, that the doctrine should remain simple and clear. See, e.g., Miranda, supra, 384 U.S. at 384 U. S.
441 -42 (noting that one reason certiorari was granted
was "to give concrete constitutional guidelines for law enforcement
agencies and courts to follow"); McCarty, supra, 468 U.S.
at 468 U. S. 430 (noting that one of "the principal advantages of the
[ Miranda ] doctrine . . . is the clarity of that rule"); Arizona v. Roberson, 486 U. S. 675 , 486 U. S. 680 (1988) (same). See also New York v. Quarles, 467 U.
S. 649 , 467 U. S.
657 -658 (1984) (recognizing need for clarity in Miranda doctrine and finding that narrow "public safety"
exception would not significantly lessen clarity and would be easy
for police to apply). We explained the benefits of a bright-line
rule in Fare v. Michael C., 442 U.
S. 707 (1979):

															" Miranda's holding has the virtue of informing police
and prosecutors with specificity as to what they may do in
conducting custodial Page 496 U. S. 309 interrogation, and of informing courts under what circumstances
statements obtained during such interrogation are not
admissible." Id. at 442 U. S.
718 .

															The Court's holding today complicates a previously clear and
straightforward doctrine. The Court opines that

															"[l]aw enforcement officers will have little difficulty putting
into practice our holding that undercover agents need not give Miranda warnings to incarcerated suspects." Ante at 496 U. S.
299 -300. Perhaps this prediction is true with respect to
fact patterns virtually identical to the one before the Court
today. But the outer boundaries of the exception created by the
Court are by no means clear. Would Miranda be violated,
for instance, if an undercover police officer beat a confession out
of a suspect, but the suspect thought the officer was another
prisoner who wanted the information for his own purposes?

															Even if Miranda, as interpreted by the Court, would not
permit such obviously compelled confessions, the ramifications of
today's opinion are still disturbing. The exception carved out of
the Miranda doctrine today may well result in a
proliferation of departmental policies to encourage police officers
to conduct interrogations of confined suspects through undercover
agents, thereby circumventing the need to administer Miranda warnings. Indeed, if Miranda now requires
a police officer to issue warnings only in those situations in
which the suspect might feel compelled "to speak by the fear of
reprisal for remaining silent or in the hope of more lenient
treatment should he confess," ante at 496 U. S.
296 -297, presumably it allows custodial interrogation by
an undercover officer posing as a member of the clergy or a
suspect's defense attorney. Although such abhorrent tricks would
play on a suspect's need to confide in a trusted adviser, neither
would cause the suspect to "think that the listeners have official
power over him," ante at 496 U. S. 297 .
The Court's adoption of the "undercover agent" exception to the Miranda rule thus is necessarily also the adoption of a
substantial loophole in our jurisprudence protecting suspects'
Fifth Amendment rights.

															I dissent.

															* As the case comes to us, it involves only the question whether Miranda applies to the questioning of an incarcerated
suspect by an undercover agent. Nothing in the Court's opinion
suggests that, had respondent previously invoked his Fifth
Amendment right to counsel or right to silence, his statements
would be admissible. If respondent had invoked either right, the
inquiry would focus on whether he subsequently waived the
particular right. See Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U.
S. 477 (1981); Michigan v. Mosley, 423 U. S.
96 , 423 U. S. 104 (1975). As the Court made clear in Moran v. Burbine, 475 U. S. 412 , 475 U. S. 421 (1986), the waiver of Miranda rights "must [be] voluntary
in the sense that it [must be] the product of a free and deliberate
choice rather than intimidation, coercion or deception. "
(Emphasis added). Since respondent was in custody on an unrelated
charge when he was questioned, he may be able to challenge the
admission of these statements if he previously had invoked his Miranda rights with respect to that charge. See
Arizona v. Roberson, 486 U. S. 675 (1988); Mosley, supra, 423 U.S. at 423 U. S. 104 .
Similarly, if respondent had been formally charged on the unrelated
charge and had invoked his Sixth Amendment right to counsel, he may
have a Sixth Amendment challenge to the admissibility of these
statements. See Michigan v. Jackson, 475 U.
S. 625 , 475 U. S.
629 -636 (1986). Cf. Roberson, supra, 486 U.S.
at 486 U. S.
683 -85.