Coolidge v. New Hampshire

Mb. Justice Stewart delivered the opinion of the Court.[*] We are called upon in this case to decide issues under the Fourth and Fourteenth. Amendments arising in the context of a state criminal trial for the commission of a particularly brutal murder. As in every case, our single ’ duty is to determine the issues presented in accord with the Constitution and the law.

Pamela Mason, a 14-year-old girl, left her home •in Manchester, New Hampshire, on the evening of January *13, 1964, during a heavy snowstorm, apparently in response to a man’s telephone call for a babysitter. Eight days later, after a thaw, her body was found by the side of a major north-south highway several miles away. She had been murdered. The event created great alarm in the- area, and the police immediately began a massive investigation.

On January 28, having learned from a neighbor that the petitioner, Edward Coolidge, had been away from home on the evening of the girl’s disappearance, the police went to his house to question him: They asked [*446] him, among other things, if he owned any guns, and he produced three, two shotguns and a rifle. They also asked whether he would take a lie-detector test concerning his account of his activities on the night of the disappearance. He agreed to do so on the following Sunday, his day off. The police later described his attitude on the occasion of this visit as fully “cooperative.” His wife was in the house throughout the interview.