State v. Keith M. Abbott, 944 N.W.2d 8

In the early morning of Jan. 3, 2011, Keith Abbott told his wife Kristin Miller "may be dead" after an affair; police were called and Abbott was examined by medical staff.
Medical personnel removed two sweatshirts Abbott was wearing and left them on the living-room floor; Abbott was transported to a hospital.
Abbott’s wife, Ermelinda Cruz, consented to an officer taking the sweatshirts from the home; later testing showed Miller’s blood on the sweatshirts and on Abbott’s truck.
At the hospital a staff member gave Officer Kovacs a transparent “patient belongings bag” containing clothing (shoes/socks) removed from Abbott; testing found Miller’s blood on those items.
Abbott was later arrested (Feb. 1), read Miranda warnings, made various ambiguous references to counsel and later an express request for counsel; he entered an Alford plea to second-degree intentional homicide and appealed suppression rulings.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Validity of seizure of sweatshirts	Cruz validly consented; spouse has common authority over shared home property	Cruz lacked authority due to estrangement, sweatshirts were personal effects, and had been removed during medical treatment	Court held Cruz had actual common authority; seizure valid and suppression denied
Validity of seizure of patient belongings bag	Admissible under private-search doctrine (Jacobsen) or plain view exception	Warrantless seizure violated Fourth Amendment; State did not meet burden for exceptions	Court held State failed to prove an exception (bag should have been suppressed) but error was harmless
Admissibility of custodial statements after ambiguous references to counsel	Abbott understood Miranda and implicitly waived; his ambiguous remarks did not invoke right to counsel	Abbott lacked faculties; officers should have treated his ambiguous remarks as invocation of counsel	Court applied Davis: invocation must be unambiguous; earlier statements admissible; only statements after clear request suppressed
Standard for reviewing suppression error after guilty/Alford plea (§971.31(10))	State urged manifest-injustice standard for plea-withdrawal-type review	Defendant contended harmless-error standard applies to §971.31(10) appeals	Court held harmless-error standard governs §971.31(10) appeals and applied it, finding the bag’s evidence harmless because duplicative of untainted evidence

Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218 (consent is an exception to the warrant requirement)
Matlock v. United States, 415 U.S. 164 (third‑party common authority for consent searches)
United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109 (limits on government intrusion after private search)
Davis v. United States, 512 U.S. 452 (request for counsel must be unambiguous)
Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (custodial interrogation warnings and waiver framework)
North Carolina v. Butler, 441 U.S. 369 (implicit waiver of Miranda rights)
State v. Armstrong, 223 Wis. 2d 331 (harmless‑error test governs §971.31(10) suppression appeals)