| OCR Text |
Show A competent confession By DAVID A. SELLERS Copley News Service Thomas is accused of shooting Michael in a parking park-ing lot. The next day Thomas makes a statement state-ment to police confessing to the crime. Thomas then asks the court to reconsider his admission ad-mission of guilt, claiming that he is mentally incompetent incom-petent and lacks the capacity capac-ity to voluntarily confess to the crime. The judge says Thomas' confession must stand and he is convicted of first degree de-gree murder. Thomas appeals. Should the conviction convic-tion have been reversed because be-cause of Thomas' admission? admis-sion? A. Yes, Thomas may change his mind mind anytime any-time before trial. B. Yes, Thomas may change his mind before he is sentenced. C. No, if a judge can determine Thomas was aware of what he was doing when he admitted his guilt. D. Yes, Thomas' constitutional consti-tutional rights say he does not have to incriminate himself. The court said there were psychological reports concluding that Thomas' functions were impaired. However, there was another anoth-er report that indicated Thomas had the mental abilities to understand the legal process. The officer who took Thomas' confession said Thomas indicated he understood un-derstood his rights. Even without Thomas' statement, state-ment, the court said, there was ample evidence to support sup-port the conviction and the court ruled C. Williamson vs. State, Ark. 639, SW 2d 55, 1982 Sellers is currently court reporter for The Washington Washing-ton Times and former editor edi-tor of the District of Colombia Col-ombia Bar Association newspaper. |
