"You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney, if you can't afford one, one will be provided for you at no cost." These are the Miranda Warnings; nearly everyone has heard this statement in some form or another. I wonder, though, how many people know why that phrase is said? How many people know what it means, I mean what it really means? I think that people often look at this statement as a way that criminals get away with crimes. You can see this on t.v. all the time, criminals get away with crimes because the police did not read them their rights. Does this happen in real life like it does on t.v. Do people really walk free after confessing of a crime simply because the police didn't tell them that they could be silent?
             Well these are some of the issues that I will be discussing in this paper. I will be looking into the history of the Miranda Warnings. I will be looking at where they came from and why they came about. I will be looking at the impact the Miranda Warnings have on the U.S. in toady's society.
             What exactly are the Miranda Warnings and what is there purpose? The Miranda Warnings are a set of rights that are read to a suspect when he or she is detained by he police. These rights are designed to ensure that the police do not coerce confession from a suspect. Under the law only a voluntary confession may be admissible I court.
             Until the U.S. Supreme Court decided the Miranda v. Arizona case in 1966 there were no such warnings protecting the rights of suspects. Prior to the decision in Miranda, the admissibility of a confession in state criminal case was governed by the due process "volentariness" or "totality of the circumstances" test. (Oxford, Pg. 552) This means that the circumstances surrounding the confession for the judge looked at a particular case. The j...