The Christian Burial Case: An Introduction to Criminal and Judicial Procedure

Citation

Fiftal Alarid, L. (2002), "The Christian Burial Case: An Introduction to Criminal and Judicial Procedure", Policing: An International Journal, Vol. 25 No. 3, pp. 651-653. https://doi.org/10.1108/pijpsm.2002.25.3.651.1

One of the most common public misconceptions of judicial decision making is that decisions are apolitical and based only on available case law. A second prevailing myth is that previous case law provides unambiguous guidance for police. The book, The Christian Burial Case: An Introduction to Criminal and Judicial Procedure, seeks to dispel both of these myths. Do not be deceived by the title, however, as this is no ordinary introductory textbook. This text, authored by Thomas N. McInnis, is outstanding in its illustration of what happens to a case after it is decided by the district court. This text also underscores the nature of police interrogations and investigations as being unpredictable even within a mountain of case law.

McInnis follows one case from the time the crime was committed on December 24, 1968 until it is decided by the Supreme Court for the second time on June 11, 1984. The victim, ten‐year old Pamela Powers, was abducted from a public rest‐room at a YMCA in Des Moines, Iowa. It is believed that she was taken to an apartment on the seventh floor of the building, where she was strangled to death. The suspect, Robert Williams, a licensed minister and mental hospital escapee who lived at the YMCA, was seen by eyewitnesses carrying a bundle out of the YMCA lobby. The bundle had “skinny white legs” protruding out from underneath the blanket. The suspect’s car and some of the victim’s clothes were later found at rest stops along the interstate. The suspect eventually turned himself in to the Davenport police, but the police had to transport him from Davenport to Des Moines. During the ride, in an effort to extract information from the suspect, the police made what is now known as the “Christian burial speech:”

I want to give you something to think about while we’re traveling down the road. … They are predicting several inches of snow for you tonight, and I feel that you yourself are the only person that knows where this little girl’s body is, that you yourself have only been there once, and if you get a snow on top of it you yourself may be unable to find it. And, since we will be going right past the area on the way into Des Moines, I feel that we could stop and locate the body, that the parents of this little girl should be entitled to a Christian burial for the little girl who was snatched away from them on Christmas Eve and murdered. And I feel we should stop and locate it on the way in rather than waiting until morning and trying to come back out after a snow storm and possibly not being able to find it at all (p. 8).

One of the key points of this case is whether the Christian burial speech constituted an interrogation. Other central questions focused on the suspect’s statements inside the car. For example, were these statements made voluntarily? Did the police respect the agreement made with his attorney not to question Williams until he had a chance to talk to his attorney? Should these statements and the evidence found as a result of these statements be admissible?

Immediately following the burial speech, Williams led the police to the body of Pamela Powers and he is ultimately tried and convicted for her murder. What seems like an “open and closed case” takes some very interesting twists and turns, as McInnis cleverly interweaves the role of “subjective fact” and law into judicial decision making to make it very clear that this is indeed a very complex case.

Chapter 1 sets the stage by describing how police believe the crime was committed. Chapter 2 details the arrest, the initial court appearance, grand jury indictment, and arraignment. The first trial began in April 1969. Chapter 3 describes the rules of evidence, as they refer to pre‐trial motions and trial strategy. This chapter details the entire trial, including the process of jury selection, deliberation and sentencing. One of the book’s strengths is how the author defines and explains each step of criminal procedure as it occurs, using crime control and due process as a theoretical framework. Chapter 4 explains the historical development of the self‐incrimination clause and the right to counsel clauses inherent within the Fifth and Sixth Amendments, respectively. The case is appealed with the State appellate court, only for the original conviction to be upheld. A petition for a writ of habeas corpus is filed by the convicted defendant with the Federal District court and the Federal court decides the case much differently from the state level. The next chapter explains how the process of appeals works at each of these levels. The case, Brewer v. Williams (detailed in Chapter 6)[1] goes to the US Supreme, where the Justices rule to uphold the US District court’s grant of habeas corpus to Williams, finding that the speech did constitute an interrogation, and that Williams did not properly waive his rights. However, the US Supreme Court did not address how much evidence, beyond the incriminating statements made in the police car, would be admissible as an exception to the exclusionary rule. So, this case goes through a second trial with the same judge as the original trial in Chapter 7. Despite the second conviction, there was a vague understanding of what this new exclusionary rule exception included. Thus, in the next chapter, the author provides a full account of the exclusionary rule and all the current exceptions that police have during the investigation process. This gives the reader a full appreciation of how our system works, despite the complicated and subjective interpretations that have evolved over many years. In Chapter 9, the case is appealed a second time to the Iowa Supreme Court. This court overturned the trial court decision, saying that the police had not acted in good faith and thus all the evidence gathered as a result of the incriminating statements could not be used. The State of Iowa filed a writ of certiorari, which was granted by the Supreme Court. Chapter 10 details the Constitutional questions at hand and the decision in Nix v. Williams. The final chapter in the text describes how the inevitable discovery exception to the exclusionary rule has broadened since Nix v. Williams[2]. This chapter emphasizes that laws are always being modified, and how important it is that police, attorneys and judges keep up with these changes. In reality, though, when the Williams case was finally decided, many of the officers and attorneys originally involved had retired. Robert Williams remains to this day a prisoner of the Iowa Department of Corrections.

This case was a part of both the State and Federal court system for 16 years after the crime was committed. I found that, when I used this book in a graduate class, my students found the reading compelling and interesting, but had problems with keeping all the court decisions straight. For the reader to understand better and keep track of what happened in this case at each stage of the courts process, it might have been helpful if the author had included a table of three items:

1. 1.

   (1) the central questions posed to the court on each appearance;

2. 2.

   (2) the tests used to decide these questions; and

3. 3.

   (3) the court’s decision on each of the questions.

McInnis underscores the function and importance of judicial discretion and how cases can be decided very differently, depending on the facts that are accepted to be true. This text has especially good sections on the history and case law on right to counsel, self‐incrimination, and the exclusionary rule. The Christian Burial Case is appropriate in an undergraduate criminal procedure, legal aspects of policing, or any courts class. This text also works very well as a complementary text in a graduate level course.

Notes

1. 1.

   Brewer v. Williams, [1977] 430 US 387.

2. 2.

   Nix v. Williams, [1984] 467 US 431.