United States Supreme Court has the authority to make the final decisions regarding our Constitutional rights of American citizens. Some court cases are relatively straightforward. However, due to the wide nature of potential situations, cases often appear that ask fundamental and difficult questions about the nature of legal principles. One famous case that comes to mind is the Miranda v. Arizona, which reached the Supreme Court in 1966.
Police investigations varied between departments throughout the United States. Some procedures which some became labeled coercive began to be observed, in some urban centers. Police officers want to determine the facts in cases of criminality and to protect the public by apprehending the perpetrators of crime. Some argued that taking overly aggressive actions undermined the civil liberties upon which the American Nation was founded.
Given these competing arguments, and the Warren Court’s then recent trend toward increases activism, the setting was set for a hearing of these matters in the highest court of the United States. That came in the form of Ernesto Miranda. Ernesto Miranda was arrested in a serious criminal case, it involved the kidnapping and rape of a young women. His arrest was based on generally circumstantial evidence, without any clear proof.
Police investigators decided to interrogate Miranda in order to ascertain the facts of the matter. Evidence in the case indicates that under police interrogation, Miranda confessed to the charges against him. A written statement was drawn up, which had included waivers in which Miranda attested that he was not coerced and that he understood his legal rights. Miranda signed this document, providing clear means for any prosecution to secure his conviction in a court of law. Important to the legal challenge is the fact that, despite this wavier, Miranda was never actually told he had certain Constitutional rights.
The Fifth Amendment of the United States Constitution provides that no person can be forced to testify against themselves and that they have the right to remain silent. This was the core right of which Miranda’s lawyers would go on to argue it had been unaware of. Under the centuries old exclusionary rule, evidence obtained inappropriately by investigators cannot be used in a conviction. This might seem counter-intuitive, since this could result in an obviously guilty person not been convicted. However, the courts have held that any other solution would not give as clear a disincentive to the police to stay within the Constitutional bounds and thus protecting the liberties that Americans cherish.
Miranda was convicted and sentenced to many decades in prison on the basis of the aforementioned confession. Miranda’s attorneys filed an appeal petitions alleging that the exclusionary rule should be applied because Miranda’s unawareness of his rights made his confession not genuinely voluntary. This case eventually reached the United States Supreme Court.
In a divided decision, four associate justices joined Chief Justice Earl Warren in overturning the conviction of Miranda, and remanded the case back to the trial court to be reheard without the use of the confession. Their reasoning in doing so changed the face of interrogative law enforcement best practice around the nation. Since coercive pressures are used in interrogations, Warren wrote that a person must be clearly informed of their Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights before any questioning occurs. Warren also noted that a person must be told of his rights, and then have the right to wait for an attorney.
The real importance of Miranda v. Arizona came from the fact that from then on, police departments across the United States were requested to implement policies to inform arrestees of their legal rights before questioning. This Miranda warning as it came to be called, varies slightly between agencies, but must include informing the interreges of their right to remain silent and the right to have legal counsel present.
This opened up a wide field of new laws, including certain exception to the Miranda warning, such as in cases involving sudden and spontaneous comments by individuals. These requirements placed on law enforcement officials changed the manner in which law enforcement interviews are conducted. Since individuals are formed of your legal rights, they are more likely to demand an attorney or otherwise avoid answering any questions. For this reason, the police investigators have to come up with a new interrogative practices are needed to question the individual in an appropriate manner and one which still elicits useful information. Certain techniques which may be used include an investigator telling the suspect about other statement and evidence, in hopes he or she will waive their right silence out of desire to contradict said statement or evidence, or merely hoping that they will make voluntary comments.
In the law enforcement world, one area in which certain case law being reviewed is in relation to terrorism suspects. That is, should the Miranda right and other rights be applied to those suspects for those suspected for these most serious charges?
Terrorist interviews differ in rights, urgency, authority, and scope. The public safety is the issue, providing for the increased demands of urgency. The authority and scope of the interview may involve a variety of differing agencies due to the potential for international terrorism. The terrorist may have knowledge of other terrorism plans, unlike the criminal whose actions are usually the past. Foreign intelligence, personal monitoring, communications monitoring, and domestic intelligence (under the U. S. Patriot Act) are for methods of gathering information on the terrorists.
Considering the background of the Miranda warning and the increasing urgency of the terrorist threats, one comes to the question of rather such rights are to apply to the terrorist. One would have to draw a distinction between U.S. citizens suspected of terrorism and a foreign nationals suspected. Foreign nationals are unlawful enemy combatants, and therefore are not subject to the United States constitutional rights. Any United States citizens caught in an international threat of war (Iraq) are similarly combatants in the war, and would not have any civilian rights. Many people would argue that even domestic citizens under suspicion of terrorism should have their constitutional rights abridged.
United States citizens of American borders must continue to be accorded all rights, including the Miranda warnings, even when they are suspected of terrorist. This lawful interrogation is necessary to preserve democratic civil liberties; the police do essential and important work, and are usually conscientious. The Miranda warning system has helped the criminal justice system by giving the police clear boundaries to work within their quest to keep the United States safe. To avoid the arrival of a police state, the investigators cannot be given discretion to decide whether constitutional rights apply these must naturally devolve onto all.

References:
Dyson, W. (2008). Terrorism: An investigator's handbook 3rd ed. Newark, NJ: Elsevier Science/LexisNexis. http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/Miranda_warning http://biotech.law.lsu.edu/cases/criminal/miranda.htm
http://professors.nesl.edu/2010/05/modifying-miranda-in-terrorism-cases.html