Second District Applies J.D.B.’s “Reasonable Child” to Miranda Invocation

Art T, B251083, holds: 13-year-old boy’s statement—“Could I have an attorney? Because that’s not me”—made during the course of a custodial interrogation after watching a video of a shooting was an unequivocal and unambiguous invocation of his rights under Miranda.

What’s great about this case is it extends J.D.B.’s reasonable child standard in the context of custody to invocation of Miranda rights, holding: “as in the custody context addressed in J.D.B., a court should consider a juvenile’s age for purposes of analyzing whether the juvenile has unambiguously invoked his or her right to counsel.”

 

Here’s the opinion: http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/B251083.PDF