# McNeil v. Wisconsin > Supreme Court of the United States · June 13, 1991 · 501 U.S. 171 URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9432330 ## Case - **Full name:** McNEIL v. WISCONSIN - **Court:** Supreme Court of the United States - **Decided:** June 13, 1991 - **Citations:** 501 U.S. 171; 111 S. Ct. 2204; 115 L. Ed. 2d 158; 1991 U.S. LEXIS 3483 - **Precedential status:** Published - **Opinion:** Concurrence by Kennedy - **Judges:** Scalia, Kennedy, Stevens - **Cited by:** 1,585 later opinions in the Frix Law Library ## Citator (automated) - **Yellow flag:** Reported abrogated by Texas v. Cobb, 532 U.S. 162 (2001) — not on the Supreme Court's list. - Negative treatments: 1 - Distinguished by: 1 - Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9432330 ## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction) - explaining that “[t]he purpose of the Sixth Amendment counsel guarantee — and hence the purpose of invoking it — is to ‘protec[t] the unaided layman at critical confrontations’ with his ‘expert adversary,’ the government, after ‘the adverse positions of government and defendan… - stating that the Fifth Amendment right to counsel "is in one respect narrower than the interest protected by the Sixth Amendment guarantee (because it relates only to custodial interrogation) and in another respect broader (because it relates to interrogation regarding any sus… - holding that where police initiate an encounter in the absence of counsel after the suspect invoked his right to counsel, assuming there has been no break in custody, the suspect’s statements are presumed involuntary and are inadmissible as substantive evidence at trial, even … - stating that the Sixth Amendment right to counsel is “offense-specific” and does not attach for a particular offense “until a prosecution is commenced, that is, at or after the initiation of adversary judicial criminal proceedings — whether by way of formal charge, preliminary… - holding that after a defendant's valid Miranda waiver, despite the attachment of his Sixth Amendment right to counsel as to another offense, the police are free to question that defendant, without counsel present, about crimes for which he has not yet been formally charged ## Opinion text *183 Justice Kennedy, concurring. I join the opinion of the Court in all respects. Its sensible recognition that invocation of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel is specific to the offense in question should apply as well to requests for counsel under the Fifth Amendment. See Arizona v. Roberson, 486 U. S. 675, 688 (1988) (Kennedy, J., dissenting). For those in custody, Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U. S. 477 (1981), and its progeny go far to protect an individual who desires the assistance of counsel during interrogation. Limiting the extraordinary protections of Edwards to a particular investigation would not increase the risk of confessions induced by official efforts to wear down the will of a suspect. Having adopted an offense-specific rule for invocation of the Sixth Amendment right to counsel, the Court should devote some attention to bringing its Fifth and Sixth Amendment jurisprudence into a logical alignment, and should give uniform, fair, and workable guidelines for the criminal justice system. Even if petitioner had invoked his Fifth Amendment right with respect to the West Allis armed robbery, I do not believe the authorities should have been prohibited from ques-' tioning him in connection with the Caledonia offenses. --- Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9432330. Public record. Not legal advice.