Importance of Good Police Work

Connecticut's Supreme Court of Errors was obviously bothered by the case it was considering. The crime, said Judge John M. Comley speaking for a unanimous bench, was "particularly revolting and atrocious." Yet the conviction of Handyman Harlis Miller, serving a life sentence for the murder of Westport Matron Isabel Sillan, was reversed because it had been obtained with the aid of inadmissible evidence.

It was just the sort of decision to feed the growing public outcry against courts coddling criminals, and the New York Daily News was quick to complain about "judicial concern for accused criminals outweighing judicial concern for the rights and safety of decent people." In fact, the most serious cause for concern rested with the police.

After Mrs. Sillan was strangled and her 14-year-old daughter, Gail, was raped, the handyman fled to Soperton, Ga., where he was captured. With Miller safely in jail, a Connecticut county detective and a Westport police sergeant went to Soperton and examined the suspect's car without taking the time or trouble to ask his permission or obtain a search warrant. When the car was brought back to Connecticut, it was examined again--still without a warrant. The upholstery was crawling with samples of Gail Sillan's blood and hair. Despite defense objections, that evidence was admitted at Miller's trial.

"Not every search without warrant is illegal," noted Judge Comley. "For example, a search which is an incident to a lawful arrest is proper." But the search of Miller's car was "remote from the arrest both in time and space." The U.S. citizen's immunity from such illegal search is a cornerstone of the Constitution, and the court was guarding against any erosion of that immunity.

Reversal of his conviction does not mean that Miller will go free. Even though the police ruined any chance of his using evidence from the suspect's car, the state prosecutor is already pressing for a second trial, hoping for a second conviction.

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