National Survey of Miranda Warnings, 2005-2006

Miranda warnings given by police to criminal suspects before they are questioned, are heterogeneous in their language, length, and content. Past research has focused mostly on individual Miranda warnings. Lacking in generalizability, those studies have had limited applicability to both public policy and professional practice. This data collection contains the results of a large-scale survey that examined Miranda warnings from across the United States and documented differences in their length and content. The first wave of the survey involved systematically contacting sheriff and public defender offices across the United States. These data were augmented with additional warnings from other Miranda investigators. The first wave generated 532 unique Miranda warnings. The second wave surveyed prosecutors (i.e., district attorneys and state attorneys) across the United States using similar procedures. This survey focused on 28 states with low response rates (i.e., less than or equal to 20 percent of counties) in the first wave. This survey also included responses to the wave one survey that were received from public defenders months after the deadline for the first wave. The second wave generated an additional 358 unique Miranda warnings that were written in English and intended for general use.