Stansbury v. California

Stansbury v. California, 511 U.S. 318 (1994), is a United States Supreme Court case in which the Court considered whether a police officer's subjective and undisclosed opinion whether a person who had been questioned was a suspect was relevant in determining whether that person had been in custody and thus entitled to the Miranda warnings. In a 9–0 ruling, the Court reversed and remanded the case. In a per curiam decision, the Court held that "an officer's subjective and undisclosed view concerning whether the person being interrogated is a suspect is irrelevant to the assessment [of] whether the person is in custody."

Robert Edward Stansbury v. California
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued March 30, 1994 Decided April 26, 1994
Full case name	Robert Edward Stansbury v. California
Citations	511 U.S. 318 (more) 114 S. Ct. 1526; 128 L. Ed. 2d 293
Argument	Oral argument
Case history
Prior	Defendant convicted; Calif. Sup. Ct. affirms
Subsequent	Case remanded to trial court.
Holding
The test for custody under Miranda v. Arizona is whether there was a formal arrest or restraint on freedom of movement of the degree associated with a formal arrest. The subjective views harbored by either the interrogating officers or the person being questioned are irrelevant. The key inquiry should be whether the individual had been placed under formal arrest, or whether the restraint placed on the individual's freedom of movement rose to the level of a formal arrest.
Court membership
Chief Justice William Rehnquist Associate Justices Harry Blackmun · John P. Stevens Sandra Day O'Connor · Antonin Scalia Anthony Kennedy · David Souter Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Case opinions
Per curiam
Concurrence	Blackmun
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. V

External links

• Text of Stansbury v. California, 511 U.S. 318 (1994) is available from: Cornell Justia Library of Congress Oyez (oral argument audio)