Terry Jones Maysv.State of Georgia
While jailed awaiting a probation-revocation hearing, Terry Jones Mays was questioned by a Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent about community-service letters related to the alleged probation violation. The trial court denied suppression of the pre-invocation portion of her statement, finding the interview noncustodial, but granted suppression for the portion after Mays invoked her right to counsel. On interlocutory appeal, the Court of Appeals held that the total circumstances made the interview custodial: Mays had been jailed for a week, the questions concerned conduct underlying the pending revocation petition, and the agent did not tell her she was free to leave until more than 15 minutes into the 23-minute interview. Although the short, nonthreatening interview and room conditions favored the State, a reasonable person in Mays’s position would not have felt free to leave. The court vacated the order insofar as it denied suppression of her full statement on the ground that she was not in custody and remanded for an order consistent with its opinion.
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