Marrisha Robinson and her infant daughter were sitting in their Mitsubishi in a Los Angeles strip mall parking lot on February 12, 2014, waiting while her fiancé, Adrian Dawson, was shopping in one of the stores. The defendant, Christopher Grimes, double-parked his Mercedes behind the Mitsubishi, apparently leaving it out of gear and without setting the emergency brake. The Mercedes rolled into the Mitsubishi’s rear bumper and did some minor damage. Grimes told Robinson not to worry; that he would “take care of it.” As he was talking to Robinson, Dawson came running out of the store, “sucker punch(ing)” Grimes in the face two or three times while yelling “My baby’s in the car!” Telling Dawson that he did not want to fight, Grimes left the scene in his Mercedes. Less than two minutes later, as Robinson and Dawson were driving away, they noticed Grimes’ Mercedes behind them. Thinking that Grimes was seeking to recontact them so they could exchange insurance information, Dawson slowed down. The Mercedes, however, suddenly pulled alongside them and the driver fired four gunshots into the Mitsubishi. Dawson, in the Mitsubishi’s front passenger seat, was struck by one or more of the shots and died shortly thereafter. Grimes, as the obvious suspect, was arrested two days later. Robinson identified Grimes in a photographic lineup as the man with whom they had had the parking lot confrontation, but she could not attest to whether he was the one who later shot Dawson.  

Evidence collected during the execution of a search warrant on Grimes’ Mercedes and home included 9mm ammunition and bullet casings. Dawson died from shots fired from a 9mm firearm. Text messages on Grimes’ cellphone also indicated he was the shooter. The detectives, however, felt they needed more evidence to prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt.  

Immediately upon his arrest, before any interrogation had begun, Grimes asked to have his lawyer present. Later, after detectives read defendant his Miranda rights, he unequivocally invoked his right to counsel a second time. Rather than immediately terminating the questioning, however, the detectives continued to talk to him, telling him that although he did not have to say anything, they wanted him to know that they were conducting a “very serious investigation” in which he had been implicated. He was further told that the investigation was about a murder and that he was going to be arrested for the crime.  

When he asked, “Why would I be arrested for murder?” one of the detectives asked him if he wanted to wait for an attorney, or to talk with them at that time. Choosing to talk, Grimes admitted that he had been in an altercation in the strip mall parking lot, but denied being the shooter. Grimes was subsequently booked into jail. Still not satisfied that they had enough evidence to prove that he was the shooter, the detectives put an undercover informant posing as a fellow inmate into Grimes’ jail cell. The informant pumped Grimes for information about the shooting. Although Grimes continued to deny that he had shot Dawson, he did make incriminating statements about facts that only the shooter would have known: which window through which the shots were fired, and that the shooting took place two minutes after the strip mall incident. 

Grimes was charged with murder in state court and the trial court allowed into evidence all of the statements made to the detectives and to the jailhouse informant, despite his prior invocation of his right to an attorney. Grimes was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to 40 years to life.  

The California Second District Court of Appeals (Div. 7) affirmed the conviction in an unpublished decision (see People v. Grimes (2020) Cal. App. Unpub. LEXIS 1135.). In its affirmation, the appellate court ruled that while his statements to the detectives should have been suppressed because they came after he invoked his right to the assistance of counsel, admitting them into evidence was harmless error given other evidence of guilt.  

The appellate court also ruled, however, that the statements Grimes made to the jailhouse informant were properly admitted into evidence. The appellate court ruled that Grimes’ jailhouse statements were admissible because law enforcement is not required to give Miranda warnings to a suspect before placing them in a jail cell with an undercover informant, citing as its authority the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Illinois v. Perkins (1990) 496 U.S. 292.   

Grimes then filed a federal 28 U.S.C. § 2254 habeas corpus petition, again arguing that subjecting him to the questioning by a jailhouse informant after he had invoked his right to counsel violated the U.S. Supreme Court’s prohibition on post-invocation questioning, as ruled in Edwards v. Arizona (1981) 451 U.S. 477. The federal district court denied his petition. The defendant appealed.