## Facts

- Tampa police entered an apartment rented by Kevin Dewayne Powell’s girlfriend while investigating a robbery and saw Powell emerge from a bedroom.
- Officers searched the bedroom and found a loaded 9mm handgun under the bed.
- Powell, a convicted felon, was arrested and taken to police headquarters for questioning.
- Before questioning, officers read Powell a written warning stating: he could remain silent; statements could be used in court; he had the right to talk to a lawyer before answering questions; if he could not afford a lawyer one would be appointed without cost and before questioning; and he could use these rights at any time during the interview.
- Powell stated he understood his rights, signed the form, and admitted owning the handgun and knowing he was prohibited from possessing a firearm.
- Florida charged Powell with possession of a weapon by a convicted felon under Fla. Stat. § 790.23(1).

## Issues

1. Whether the U.S. Supreme Court had jurisdiction where the state court relied on both federal Miranda doctrine and the Florida Constitution, potentially presenting an adequate and independent state ground.
2. Whether a Miranda warning is constitutionally adequate when it states the right to talk to a lawyer “before” questioning and the right to invoke rights “at any time” during the interview, without expressly stating a right to have counsel physically present during questioning.

## Decision

- The Court held it had jurisdiction because the state decision appeared to rest primarily on, or be interwoven with, federal law and did not clearly rest on an independent state ground.
- The Court reversed the Florida Supreme Court.
- The Court held the warnings reasonably conveyed Powell’s Miranda rights, including the right to have counsel during interrogation.
- The Court rejected a strict, literal parsing that treated “before questioning” language as excluding the right to counsel while questioning was ongoing.

## Legal Principles

- Under Michigan v. Long, the Supreme Court presumes a state-court decision rests on federal law when it fairly appears to do so and the opinion does not clearly state an adequate and independent state ground.
- Miranda does not require a fixed script; warnings need not use Miranda’s exact phrasing.
- The constitutional test is whether the warnings, taken as a whole, reasonably convey the rights Miranda requires, including the right to consult counsel and to have counsel during custodial interrogation.
- Language advising a suspect of a right to consult a lawyer before questioning, combined with notice that rights may be invoked at any time during the interview, can reasonably communicate an ongoing right to counsel during questioning.

## Conclusion

The Court held that the challenged warning, read in context, adequately informed the suspect of the continuing right to counsel during custodial interrogation and that the state court’s suppression ruling rested on federal law, giving the Supreme Court jurisdiction to reverse.


Florida v. Powell, 559 U.S. 50 (2010)