Miranda and the Equivocal Invocation

Miranda and the Equivocal Invocation

            Robert C. Phillips

Deputy District Attorney (Ret.)
August, 2014

            In a gruesome series of murders as graphically described in the California Supreme Court decision of People v. Suff,[1] and reminiscent of the television series “Criminal Minds,” twelve prostitutes disappeared off the streets of the Cities of Lake Elsinore and Riverside between June, 1989, and December, 1991.  Their bodies were eventually found, one by one, abandoned in fields and other rural areas.  Commonalities indicating that they had all been murdered by the same serial killer included, in addition to being prostitutes, that each victim met her end by asphyxiation due to strangulation, four of the victims had also suffered stab wounds to the chest, and the right breast of three of the victims having been excised and left near the bodies.  Fibers, hair samples, DNA, unique mismatched tire tracks, and shoeprints were recovered from most of the victims and the areas where they were dumped.  A special law enforcement task force was created to catch the killer.

            In January, 1989, one of the killer’s intended victims, a prostitute named Rhonda Jetmore, escaped.  After being picked up off Main Street in the City of Lake Elsinore by an individual later identified as William Lester Suff, and while negotiating the cost of her services, Suff suddenly attacked her, cutting off her airway with his bare hands.  While face to face with her assailant as he choked her, Jettmore was able to get a good look at his face.  She also noted at one point that he wore a belt buckle with the name “Bill” on ....

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