State v. Morales

NOTICE: NOT FOR OFFICIAL PUBLICATION.
UNDER ARIZONA RULE OF THE SUPREME COURT 111(c), THIS DECISION IS NOT PRECEDENTIAL
AND MAY BE CITED ONLY AS AUTHORIZED BY RULE.

IN THE
ARIZONA COURT OF APPEALS
DIVISION ONE

STATE OF ARIZONA, Appellee,

v.

MAURICIO MORALES, Appellant.

No. 1 CA-CR 22-0159
FILED 2-14-2023

Appeal from the Superior Court in Maricopa County
No. CR2019-135157-001
The Honorable Scott S. Minder, Judge
The Honorable Michael W. Kemp, Judge
The Honorable Geoffrey H. Fish, Judge

AFFIRMED

COUNSEL

Arizona Attorney General’s Office, Phoenix
By Deborah Celeste Kinney
Counsel for Appellee

Law Office of Stephen M. Johnson, Inc., Phoenix
By Stephen M. Johnson
Counsel for Appellant
 STATE v. MORALES
Decision of the Court

MEMORANDUM DECISION

Judge Michael S. Catlett delivered the decision of the Court, in which
Presiding Judge Paul J. McMurdie and Judge Michael J. Brown joined.

C A T L E T T, Judge:

¶1 Mauricio Morales (“Morales”) was convicted and sentenced
for aggravated assault and misconduct involving weapons. Morales asserts
one ground for reversal—the superior court should have suppressed
statements Morales made in the absence of a Miranda1 warning while being
transported to a police station. Because Morales did not make those
spontaneous statements during a custodial interrogation, and thus no
Miranda warning was required, we affirm.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

¶2 Ryan,2 the owner of a 7-Eleven convenience store, was
working in the store’s back office when Morales suddenly burst in
screaming, “where is she? Where is she?” The two men had never met
before.

¶3 Morales then searched the entire store, claiming to be looking
for someone. Unable to locate whatever he was searching for, Morales
abruptly left and drove away in his truck. But Morales returned shortly
thereafter. He entered the store a second time, bought merchandise, and
left as if nothing happened. Rather than returning to his truck, Morales got
into another customer’s car, explaining to the (undoubtedly concerned)
customer that Morales needed help looking for someone. The customer
attempted to calm Morales, who then got out of her car.

¶4 Morales entered the store yet a third time, demanding that
Ryan allow him to search Ryan’s car. When Ryan refused, Morales
returned to his own truck and retrieved a metal pipe. Morales told Ryan
that if he did not “open the damn door,” he would “smash the glass” and
“mess up” Ryan’s car. When Ryan refused, Morales threatened, “[I]f you

1 Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966).
2 We use pseudonyms to protect victim privacy. See generally Ariz. R.
Crim. P. 31.10(f); Ariz. Ct. App., Div. 1, Admin. Order No. 2013-1.

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don’t open it, I’m going to mess you up.” Desiring to avoid further
escalation, Ryan allowed Morales to search Ryan’s car. Finding nothing,
Morales raised the pipe and made a “flinching action” toward Ryan. Ryan
fled back into the store and held the door closed. Morales tried to pry the
door open, yelling that he needed to find someone. A police officer
eventually arrived and arrested Morales.

¶5 While being transported to the police station, Morales told the
officer they “needed to go back to his truck to get his handgun” located
inside a shoebox in the bed of his truck. The officer returned to the store’s
parking lot and found the handgun, along with ammunition, in the exact
location Morales provided.

¶6 The State charged Morales with one count each of aggravated
assault and misconduct involving weapons. Before trial on both charges,
Morales moved to suppress his statements regarding the handgun, and any
evidence derived therefrom. He contended the statements and evidence
were obtained during custodial interrogation without a Miranda warning,
in violation of his constitutional rights. The State opposed the motion,
arguing Morales’s statements regarding the handgun were voluntary and
spontaneous and did not occur during a custodial interrogation.

¶7 The superior court conducted a suppression hearing, during
which the court heard testimony from the officer who retrieved the
handgun and admitted the officer’s body-worn camera footage. According
to the evidence, the officer never provided a Miranda warning. The officer
questioned Morales about the assault following his arrest for that charge.
Upon completing the assault investigation, the officer turned off his body-
worn camera and began transporting Morales to the police station. The
officer testified that all questioning had ceased at that point. On the way to
the station, Morales, without prompting, told the officer to go back and “get
his handgun which he had left in the back of the truck.” Morales then
provided the specific location of the handgun, either voluntarily or through
follow-up questioning by the officer. With this information, the officer
found the handgun in the bed of Morales’s truck. The officer testified that
he did not know Morales was a prohibited possessor and seized the
handgun based solely on public safety concerns.

¶8 The superior court denied the motion to suppress, finding
that (1) the officer’s interrogation ended when he began transporting
Morales from the store; (2) Morales’s unprompted statements were not the
result of an interrogation; (3) the officer did not know about Morales’s
prohibited possessor status at the time; (4) any follow-up questions were

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necessary to secure a handgun located in an open, publicly accessible area;
and (5) the evidence did not support that the officer engaged in intentional
misconduct.

¶9 At Morales’s request, the superior court severed the charges
for trial. The superior court conducted a jury trial on the aggravated assault
charge and a bench trial on the misconduct involving weapons charge. At
the jury trial on the aggravated assault charge, the State did not present
Morales’s statements or evidence related to the handgun. During the bench
trial, however, the State offered, and the superior court admitted, Morales’s
statements and evidence related to the handgun. The jury and the superior
court, respectively, both found Morales guilty.

¶10 The superior court sentenced Morales to concurrent
presumptive terms totaling 11.25 years’ imprisonment. Morales timely
appealed. We have jurisdiction under A.R.S. §§ 12-120.21(A)(1), 13-4031,
and -4033(A)(1).

DISCUSSION

¶11 The sole issue presented is whether the superior court abused
its discretion in refusing to suppress the statements and evidence about the
handgun. We review the superior court’s denial of a motion to suppress
for an abuse of discretion, but we review any legal conclusions de novo. State
v. Rosengren, 199 Ariz. 112, 115–16 ¶ 9 (App. 2000). We view the facts in the
light most favorable to sustaining the superior court’s ruling, considering
only the evidence admitted during the suppression hearing. State v.
Manuel, 229 Ariz. 1, 4 ¶ 11 (2011). We defer to the superior court’s factual
findings, including its findings as to officer credibility. State v. Gonzalez-
Gutierrez, 187 Ariz. 116, 118 (1996).

¶12 Morales asserts that the superior court misapplied Miranda
and its progeny, and that the statements he made about the handgun were
the product of a “continuous” custodial interrogation without a required
Miranda warning. The State concedes that Morales was in custody during
the relevant period but argues that the unprompted statements regarding
the handgun were not the result of a custodial interrogation. The State also
contends that any follow-up questioning fell within the public-safety
exception.

¶13 We agree with the State. Miranda’s prophylactic procedural
protections apply only during a custodial interrogation. 384 U.S. at 444.
Such an interrogation occurs when police engage in express questioning or
the “functional equivalent.” Rhode Island v. Innis, 446 U.S. 291, 300–01

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(1980). But if a suspect voluntarily initiates a conversation, a custodial
interrogation does not result, and Miranda does not apply. State v. Mauro, 159 Ariz. 186, 192 (1988). So, for example, spontaneous statements not
made in response to an interrogation do not implicate Miranda. State v.
Carter, 145 Ariz. 101, 106 (1985).

¶14 There is also a public-safety exception to Miranda, which
applies when police inquiries are “motivated by public safety concerns and
were not designed to obtain evidence of a crime.” State v. Ramirez, 78 Ariz.
116, 124 (1994). A suspect’s voluntary response to necessary questions to
ensure the public’s safety is admissible, even without a Miranda warning.
In re Roy L., 197 Ariz. 441, 446 ¶ 15 (App. 2000) (citing New York v. Quarles, 467 U.S. 649, 659 (1984)).

¶15 The superior court did not abuse its discretion in denying
Morales’s motion to suppress. Although the parties agree that Morales did
not receive a Miranda warning, his statements regarding the handgun were
not made during a custodial interrogation. Instead, Morales volunteered
information about the handgun to secure the weapon following his arrest.
The officer testified that all questioning had ceased when Morales made the
statements, and the officer had no knowledge of Morales’s prohibited
possessor status at the time of the statements. Morales did not establish
that his unilateral statement informing the transporting officer about the
existence and location of the handgun was obtained in violation of Miranda.

¶16 The officer’s subsequent questions fall within the public-
safety exception to Miranda. In following up on Morales’s unprompted
statement about the handgun, the record supports that the officer intended
only to secure a publicly accessible handgun. If any follow-up questioning
occurred, the questions were designed to locate that weapon in Morales’s
truck bed. The record reflects that the transporting officer did not know
Morales was a prohibited possessor at the time of questioning. Follow-up
questions about the handgun, therefore, fall under the public-safety
exception to Miranda. See id. (applying the public-safety exception to post-
arrest questions about gun possession).

¶17 Morales’s contention that the officer obtained the statements
as part of a “continuous” interrogation is similarly unavailing. Evidence
must be suppressed as “fruit of the poisonous tree” if gained through the
exploitation of a previous constitutional violation. State v. Schinzel, 202
Ariz. 375, 382 ¶ 28 (App. 2002). The inquiry turns on whether the evidence
was seized “by exploitation of that illegality or instead by means
sufficiently distinguishable to be purged of the primary taint.” Wong Sun

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v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 488 (1963). Even if a suspect has caused a
custodial interrogation to end (by, for example, invoking the right to
counsel), once a “suspect reinitiates contact with the police, he waives his
rights and questioning can continue.” State v. Smith, 193 Ariz. 452, 458 ¶ 22
(1999).

¶18 Believing the investigation of the assault complete, all on-
scene questioning of Morales ceased and the officer began transporting
Morales to the police station. Without provocation, Morales reinitiated
contact and informed the officer of the location of the handgun. By simply
listening and then following up to retrieve a publicly accessible handgun,
the officer did not exploit any purported illegality that may have previously
occurred at the convenience store. Again, Morales’s statements did not
pertain to the assault and the officer did not know that Morales was a
prohibited possessor (and thus that Morales’s statements could be self-
incriminating). The evidence regarding the handgun was obtained by
means sufficiently distinguishable from any prior Miranda violation; that
evidence was, therefore, legally acquired.

CONCLUSION

¶19 We affirm Morales’s convictions and resulting sentences.

AMY M. WOOD • Clerk of the Court
FILED: AA

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