Special Considerations and Disposition for Persons With Intellectual Disabilities in the Criminal Justice System

Facts of the Case

In February of 2004, M.A. was arrested and charged with sexual assault and lewd or lascivious conduct with a child, following a police investigation into two reports of possible sexual abuse of a nine-year-old girl. The arrest was made after Mr. A. voluntarily agreed to go to the police station for an interview, during which he admitted to committing numerous sexual acts with the identified minor over the course of the previous three years, beginning when he was in his late 20s and the child was 6 years old.

During the four-hour videotaped interrogation, a detective employed a variety of techniques to elicit a confession, including pretending to be Mr. A.'s friend, reassuring him that he was not in custody or in trouble, and implying that it was acceptable for Mr. A. to engage in a sexual relationship with a minor as long as they were “in love.” Near the conclusion of the interview, Mr. A. produced a love letter that he had written to the child that implied that he had some understanding that his relationship with her could land him in trouble.

Before his trial, Mr. A. attempted to suppress the statements that he had made during the interrogation as “involuntarily made and the result of oppressive interrogation techniques and his intellectual limitations” (M.A., p 412). Based on the videotape of the interrogation and mental health experts' opinion, the district court denied this motion, concluding that although the interrogation had involved “intense” periods, it was not coercive nor were Mr. A.'s statements made under duress. The court also noted the “essential consistency” of his confession with the alleged victim's testimony. Ultimately, it held his confession to be voluntary.

At jury selection, the defense counsel questioned Mr. A.'s competency to stand trial. Dr. Paul Cotton, MD, a forensic psychiatrist, evaluated Mr. A. He noted that Mr. A.'s full-scale IQ was 52 and testified that, because of his intellectual limitations, he was “incapable of moving beyond a simple fact” and did not have a rational understanding of the trial process or plea agreements (M.A., p 413). The court found him incompetent to stand trial and ordered a placement hearing.

At the placement hearing, during which both the detective and the alleged victim testified, the trial court found by clear and convincing evidence that Mr. A. had “committed sexual assaults and lewd or lascivious behavior” against the child and was “therefore a danger to others” (M.A., p 413). Under Vermont's placement statute (Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 18, § 8843 (2008)), he was placed in the custody of the Commissioner of DAIL. He appealed to the Supreme Court of Vermont.

Ruling and Reasoning

The Supreme Court of Vermont affirmed the district court's decision to place Mr. A. in the custody of the Commissioner of DAIL. Mr. A. argued two points: that the district court lacked jurisdiction and that there was insufficient evidence to support the finding that he presented a danger of harm to others. On the first point, the court determined that the Vermont statutes clearly indicated that the criminal court had jurisdiction over his commitment proceedings. On the second point, the supreme court reviewed for clear error the lower court's finding that Mr. A. was a danger to others. It opined that, given the evidence presented—namely, the alleged victim's testimony corroborating Mr. A.'s confession, as well as the letter Mr. A. had written to the child declaring his love—the trial court might reasonably have concluded that he had engaged in lewd and lascivious conduct with the child and therefore posed a danger to others.

The court noted that Vt. Stat. Ann. tit. 13, § 4820(4) (2008) requires a hearing to determine whether a defendant who is found “incompetent to stand trial due to a mental disease or mental defect…should be committed to the custody of the commissioner of mental health.” The basis for such placement is clear and convincing evidence of the “defendant's mental retardation, dangerousness to others, and availability of least restrictive appropriate treatment” (M.A., p 414).

In writing the majority opinion, Judge Burgess dismissed Mr. A.'s claim that his confession was unreliable due to his developmental disability causing his will to be overwhelmed by sophisticated interrogation techniques, stating, “[T]here is no basis in either the law or the facts presented to conclude that defendant's cognitive limitations, standing alone, rendered his statements involuntary or unreliable” (M.A., p 417).

While concurring with the majority decision to affirm the lower court's findings, Judge Johnson wrote separately to express his concern that neither district judge had sufficiently considered whether Mr. A.'s confession was voluntary and whether his intellectual disability made him overly susceptible to coercive interrogation tactics. The judge cited several examples from the interrogation where Mr. A. seemed to have been unwittingly led to make self-incriminating statements. The judge also referred to several cases in which experts had testified to the “heightened vulnerabilities and susceptibilities of defendants with mental retardation” to the type of interrogation tactics used in this case (M.A., p 420) and asserted that the confession obtained during Mr. A.'s interrogation should have been suppressed. However, he ultimately opined that this suppression would not have changed the credibility of other case facts, which supported that Mr. A. had, at the very least, engaged in lewd or lascivious acts with a child and therefore posed a danger to others (M.A., p 423).