The Miranda [court] opinion applies to "custodial" questioning. The Supreme Court of the United States stated that "By custodial interrogation, we mean questioning initiated by law enforcement officers after a person has been taken into custody or otherwise deprived of his freedom of action in any significant way."
Usually, interrogation will take form of a direct question addressed to the suspect. However there are other techniques of eliciting information by indirect means. In the Supreme Court case Rhode Island v. Innis, the Supreme Court held that interrogation, for purposes of Miranda, occurs "whenever a person in custody is subjected to either express questioning or its functional equivelant. That to say the term interrogation... refers not only to express questioning, but also to any words or actions on the part of the police that the police should know are reasonably likely to elicit an incriminating response from the suspect."
The Miranda warnings must be given in a clear and unambiguous manner so that the individual understands his rights and feels free to exercise them. The police do not have to quote the exact words of the Miranda decision, but their rendition of the warnings must convey the substance of the decision (depending on the circumstances some ambiguity in the warnings might be allowed).
The Miranda warnings were created from the famous case of Miranda v. Arizona. These warnings are as follows:
1. Right To Remain Silent: The warning must convey to the suspect that he has the right to remain
silent and that anything he says may be used against him.
2. Right To An Attorney: The warning must make it clear to the suspect that he has a right to have a lawyer
present during the questioning. "If And When You Go To Court" The essence of the
warning about an attorney is not that a suspect has an automatic right to have the police provide him with a lawyer while
they hold him in custody - all the police must do is choose between providing a lawyer during any immediate questioning,
so they are always free to defer their questioning until some later date if they can't (or don't want to) provide a lawyer. Consequently,
the warning merely has to get this fact across. Thus so long as the police indicate that they won't question the
defendant without a lawyer, unless he waives this right, the warning does not become inadequate merely because the police
say the sentence "We will provide a lawyer for you if and when you go to court."
Additional Note: The warnings must be given even if the police have reason to believe that the suspect is already aware of his right to remain silent and to have a lawyer. If the police are in the process of reading the Miranda Rights and the suspect interrupts and says "You don't have to read that to me - I know my rights," The Police nonetheless must finish the warnings (Brown v. Heyd).
One Type of 6th Amendment Protection ... Once a suspect has been indicted or otherwise charged, it will be a violation [of his 6th Amendment Right to Counsel] for a secret agent to deliberately obtain incriminating statements from him in the absence of counsel, and pass these onto the prosecution (Massiah v. U.S.).
The issues surrounding Miranda are more vast than any explanation presented before you, so its imperative that if you, or a loved one, has been arrested and read the Miranda warnings and are facing Interrogation by the police, to Call John M. Kogut now!!!