On this day, March 2, in 1963, an 18-year-old Phoenix girl was kidnapped and raped in a case that the U.S. Supreme Court would use to establish that police must inform suspects in custody of their rights before questioning them, a principle now known as the Miranda warning.
Police said laborer Ernesto Miranda confessed to the attack. Miranda later recanted, unaware that he didn’t have to say anything to police.
He was found guilty, but the Supreme Court tossed the conviction and ruled that criminal suspects in custody must be informed of their right to remain silent and their right to consult with an attorney before questioning.
Ernesto Miranda was retried without the confession. He was found guilty.
Miranda spent six years in prison. He was fatally stabbed at a bar in 1976.
— Scott McCabe
