Name: Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent
Author: Felix Frankfurter

Quotes from Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent (Felix Frankfurter)

Felix Frankfurter, Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent

“ But if law officers learn that from now on they can coerce confessions without risk, since trial judges may admit such confessions provided only that, perhaps through the very process of extorting them, other evidence has been procured on which a conviction can be sustained, police in the future even more so than in the past will take the easy but ugly path of the third degree. I do not remotely suggest that any such result is contemplated by the Court. But it will not be the first time that results neither desired nor foreseen by an opinion have followed. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Felix Frankfurter, Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent

“ But the duty of deference cannot be allowed imperceptibly to slide into an abdication by this Court of its obligation to ascertain whether, under the circumstances of a particular case, a confession represents not the candor of a guilty conscience, the need of an accused to unburden himself, but the means of release from the tightening of the psychological police screws. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Felix Frankfurter, Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent

“ Unless I am mistaken about the reach of the Court's opinion, and I profoundly hope that I am, the Court now holds that a criminal conviction sustained by the highest court of a State, and more especially one involving a sentence of death, is not to be reversed for a new trial, even though there entered into the conviction a coerced confession which in and of itself disregards the prohibition of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Felix Frankfurter, Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent

“ It is common ground that the third degree-the colloquial term for subjecting an accused to police pressures in order to extract confessions-may reach a point where confessions, although not resulting from the application of physical force, are as a matter of human experience equally the results of coercion in any fair meaning of that term and therefore not 'voluntary' in any relevant sense. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Felix Frankfurter, Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent

“ Differences of view inevitably arise among judges in deciding when that point has been reached. Such differences are reflected in a long series of cases in this Court. An important factor, no doubt, influencing the different conclusions is the varying intensity of feeling on the part of different judges that coercive police methods not only may bring into question the trustworthiness of a confession but tend to brutalize habits of feeling and action on the part of the police, thereby adversely affecting the moral tone of the community. ”

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Source: Wikisource

Felix Frankfurter, Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent

“ In addressing himself to law enforcement officials, Director J. Edgar Hoover of the Federal Bureau of Investigation has made these observations: 'One of the quickest ways for any law enforcement officer to bring public disrepute upon himself, his organization and the entire profession is to be found guilty of a violation of civil rights. * * * Civil rights violations are all the more regrettable because they are so unnecessary. Professional standards in law enforcement provide for fighting crime with intelligence rather than force.' (FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin, September, 1952, p. 1.) ”

Felix Frankfurter

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Quotes from Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent (Felix Frankfurter)

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Felix Frankfurter

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Quotes from Stein v. New York Wissner — Dissent (Felix Frankfurter)

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