Opinion
No. 12–1083.
2013-10-23
STATE of Iowa, Plaintiff–Appellee, v. Jeremy Thomas PITZ, Defendant–Appellant.
I note this appeal could have been avoided by the officer simply clarifying, through follow-up questioning, any ambiguities in Pitz's statements. Yet, I fully understand an officer's reluctance to seemingly encourage a call to counsel at the risk of having some “Chatty Cathy” clam up. Even so, the right to counsel being so fundamental, I believe a policy should be implemented to require follow-up questioning designed solely to resolve any ambiguity. See State v. Effler, 769 N.W.2d 880, 897 (Iowa 2009) (Appel, J., specially concurring) (“[E]ven if clarification of ambiguous requests for counsel is not constitutionally required, follow-up questioning designed solely to resolve any ambiguity before questioning continues represents good policy.”). To date, we have no such policy. See id.