Wexler v. Texas (original by judge keel)
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Police were told that the house at 318 Avenue A in South Houston was a site of drug dealing. During a week of surveillance, narcotics K-9 officers arrested four people leaving the house in possession of methamphetamine, and police got a warrant to search the house. While uniformed officers in marked police cars blocked both ends of the street, 20 to 25 HROU officers surrounded the house, announced via loudspeaker from an armored vehicle that they had a search warrant, and directed occupants to exit the house. Appellant Suzanne Wexler came out and was detained by HROU officers and put in the back of a patrol car. While HROU did a protective sweep of the house, narcotics detective Jerome Hill questioned Appellant. Hill suspected that Appellant and someone named Jimmy were involved in distributing drugs, but Hill did not tell Appellant that she was a suspect, and he did not give her any warnings. Hill testified that he said, "We have a search warrant. Tell me where the narcotics are. It will save us some time doing the search. We're going to find it no matter what." Appellant told him that the drugs were Ain her bedroom in a dresser drawer. Appellant challenged the admissibility of that statement she made to police during the
execution of a search warrant, claiming that the statement was a product of custodial interrogation. The court of appeals determined that Appellant made the statement before she was in custody, and it was properly admitted by the trial court. Finding no reversible error, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the trial court.
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