Sigler v. Parker/Dissent Black

by Hugo Black

United States Supreme Court

396 U.S. 482

Sigler  v.  Parker

Mr. Justice BLACK, with whom THE CHIEF JUSTICE joins, dissenting.

This Court in Jackson v. Denno, 378 U.S. 368, 84 S.Ct. 1774, 12 L.Ed.2d 908 (1964), held over my dissent that the question of the voluntariness of a defendant's alleged confession must be made by the trial judge in a separate proceeding prior to the submission of the confession to the jury, and that insofar as federal questions concerning coercion under the Fifth Amendment were involved the decision of the trial judge forecloses the jury from passing upon the voluntariness question. In my dissent I said:

'Whatever might be a judge's view of the voluntariness of a confession, the jury in passing on a defendant's guilt or innocence is, in my judgment, entitled to hear and determine voluntariness of a confession along with other factual issues on which its verdict must rest.' Id., at 401, 84 S.Ct., at 1794.

I adhere to that dissent and hope that at some future time this Court will restore to defendants their right to have the voluntariness of alleged confessions determined by the jury as the Sixth Amendment requires.

I would not object if the Court were remanding the case for a new and complete retrial in which a Nebraska jury of the defendant's peers could determine after hearing the evidence whether the alleged confessions had been voluntarily given. Clearly, when a jury passes upon the truthfulness of a confession, as it must do when a confession is offered, the jury must also be allowed to determine whether the confession was caused by police coercion or whether it was freely given. Jackson v. Denno thus took away a defendant's traditional right to have the jury decide for itself whether a confession was tainted and probably untrue because it was coerced. The vital importance of this issue to defendants tried in this country is a sufficient reason for me to continue my protest against the Court's holding in Jackson v. Denno.

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