A suspect who receives and understands the Miranda warnings, and does not invoke his or her Miranda rights, waives the right to remain silent by making an uncoerced statement to the police. A suspect must state that he or she wishes to assert his or her right to remain silent. The police are not required to obtain a waiver of the defendant's right to remain silent before interrogation.

If a defendant claims mistreatment by police officers and a hearing is held on the issue of the voluntariness of his or her confession, those officers must testify. Otherwise, a confession can not be satisfactorily shown to have been voluntary.

The voluntary, knowing, and intelligent waiver standard applies to children, and the waiver must be reviewed in the context of the totality of the circumstances. This includes an inquiry into the juvenile's age, experience, education, background, and intelligence, and into whether he or she has the capacity to understand the warnings, the nature of his or her Fifth Amendment rights, and the consequences of waiving those rights.

The inquiry into whether a suspect is "in custody" for Miranda purposes is an objective one; a state court's failure to consider the suspect's youth and inexperience when evaluating whether that suspect was in custody does not provide a proper basis for finding that the state court's decision was an unreasonable application of clearly established law.

A statement taken in violation of Miranda and later suppressed may be used to impeach a defendant who testifies at trial. However, a coerced or involuntary statement may not be used for any purpose at trial.

School police officers must Mirandize students before taking a statement. School police are judicially appointed and explicitly authorized to exercise the same powers as municipal police on school property. Moreover, when the officers wear uniforms and badges during an interrogation, and the interrogation ultimately leads to charges by the municipal police, school police officers are "law enforcement officers" within the purview of Miranda.

"[V]erbal evidence which derives immediately from unlawful entry and unauthorized arrest . . . is no less the 'fruit' of official illegality than more common tangible fruits of unwarranted intrusion." The Fourth Amendment protects against the overhearing of a verbal statement as well as against the more traditional seizure of papers and effects.

"[T]he prosecution may not use statements, whether exculpatory or inculpatory, stemming from custodial interrogation of the defendant unless it demonstrates the use of procedural safeguards effective to secure the privilege against self-incrimination. By custodial interrogation, we mean questioning initiated by law enforcement officers after a person has been taken into custody or otherwise deprived of his [or her] freedom of action in any significant way. As for the procedural safeguards to be employed, unless other fully effective means are devised to inform accused persons of their right of silence and to assure a continuous opportunity to exercise it, the following measures are required. Prior to any questioning, the person must be warned that he [or she] has a right to remain silent, that any statement he [or she] does make may be used as evidence against him [or her], and that he has a right to the presence of an attorney, either retained or appointed. The defendant may waive effectuation of these rights, provided the waiver is made voluntarily, knowingly and intelligently. If, however, he [or she] indicates in any manner and at any stage of the process that he [or she] wishes to consult with an attorney before speaking there can be no questioning. Likewise, if the individual is alone and indicates in any manner that he [or she] does not wish to be interrogated, the police may not question him [or her]. The mere fact that he [or she] may have answered some questions or volunteered some statements on his [or her] own does not deprive him [or her] of the right to refrain from answering any further inquiries until he [or she] has consulted with an attorney and thereafter consents to be questioned."

When the circumstances surrounding a photo identification procedure make the accuracy of the identifications highly suspect, the identifications must be suppressed. Here, four witnesses discussed the photographic display in an effort to select the robber, and the witnesses watched one another make a selection.

Following a suggestive pre-trial identification procedure, a witness should not be permitted to make an in-court identification unless the prosecution establishes by clear and convincing evidence that the totality of the circumstances affecting the witness's identification did not involve a substantial likelihood of misidentification. A consideration of the totality of the circumstances requires a close examination of (1) the suggestive factors involved in the identification process, and (2) whether or not, despite the suggestive factors involved in the process, other factors are present which clearly and convincingly establish that the witness's identification has an 'independent origin' in the witness's observations at the time of the crime.