Justice Rehnquist
announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion, in which The Chief Justice, Justice White, and Justice O’Connor joined.
After a bench trial in an Oregon trial court, respondent James Edward Bradshaw was convicted of the offenses of first-degree manslaughter, driving while under the influence of intoxicants, and driving while his license was revoked. The Oregon Court of Appeals reversed his conviction, holding that an inquiry he made of a police officer at the time he was in custody did not “initiate” a conversation with the officer, and that therefore statements by the respondent growing out of that conversation should have been excluded from evidence under Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U. S. 477 (1981). We granted certiorari to review this determination. 459 U. S. 966 (1982).
In September 1980, Oregon police were investigating the death of one Lowell Reynolds in Tillamook County. Reynolds’ body had been found in his wrecked pickup truck, in which he appeared to have been a passenger at the time the vehicle left the roadway, struck a tree and an embankment, and finally came to rest on its side in a shallow creek. Reynolds had died from traumatic injury, coupled with asphyxia by drowning. During the investigation of Reynolds’ death, respondent was asked to accompany a police officer to the Rockaway Police Station for questioning.
Once at the station, respondent was advised of his rights as required by Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U. S. 436 (1966). Respondent then repeated to the police his earlier account of the events of the evening of Reynolds’ death, admitting that he had provided Reynolds and others with liquor for a party at Reynolds’ house, but denying involvement in the traffic accident that apparently killed Reynolds. Respondent suggested that Reynolds might have met with foul play at the hands of the assailant whom respondent alleged had struck him at the party.
At this point, respondent was placed under arrest for furnishing liquor to Reynolds, a minor, and again advised of his Miranda rights. A police officer then told respondent the officer’s theory of how the traffic accident that killed Reynolds occurred; a theory which placed respondent behind the wheel of the vehicle. Respondent again denied his involvement, and said “I do want an attorney before it goes very much further.” App. 72. The officer immediately terminated the conversation.
Sometime later respondent was transferred from the Rock-away Police Station to the Tillamook County Jail, a distance of some 10 or 15 miles. Either just before, or during, his trip from Rockaway to Tillamook, respondent inquired of a police officer, “Well, what is going to happen to me now?” The officer answered by saying: “You do not have to talk to me. You have requested an attorney and I don’t want you talking to me unless you so desire because anything you say — because—since you have requested an attorney, you know, it has to be at your own free will.” Id., at 16. See 54 Ore. App. 949, 951, 636 P. 2d 1011, 1011-1012 (1981). Respondent said he understood. There followed a discussion between respondent and the officer concerning where respondent was being taken and the offense with which he would be charged. The officer suggested that respondent might help himself by taking a polygraph examination. Respondent agreed to take such an examination, saying that he was willing to do whatever he could to clear up the matter.
The next day, following another reading to respondent of his Miranda rights, and respondent’s signing a written waiver of those rights, the polygraph was administered. At its conclusion, the examiner told respondent that he did not believe respondent was telling the truth. Respondent then recanted his earlier story, admitting that he had been at the wheel of the vehicle in which Reynolds was killed, that he had consumed a considerable amount of alcohol, and that he had passed out at the wheel before the vehicle left the roadway and came to rest in the creek.
Respondent was charged with first-degree manslaughter, driving while under the influence of intoxicants, and driving while his license was revoked. His motion to suppress the statements described above was denied, and he was found guilty after a bench trial. The Oregon Court of Appeals, relying on our decision in Edwards v. Arizona, supra, reversed, concluding that the statements had been obtained in violation of respondent’s Fifth Amendment rights. 54 Ore. App. 949, 636 P. 2d 1011 (1981). We now conclude that the Oregon Court of Appeals misapplied our decision in Edwards.
In Edwards the defendant had voluntarily submitted to questioning but later stated that he wished an attorney before the discussions continued. The following day detectives accosted the defendant in the county jail, and when he refused to speak with them he was told that “he had” to talk. We held that subsequent incriminating statements made without his attorney present violated the rights secured to the defendant by the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. In our opinion, we stated:
“[Although we have held that after initially being advised of his Miranda rights, the accused may himself validly waive his rights and respond to interrogation, see North Carolina v. Butler, [441 U. S. 369, 372-376 (1979)], the Court has strongly indicated that additional safeguards are necessary when the accused asks for counsel; and we now hold that when an accused has invoked his right to have counsel present during custodial interrogation, a valid waiver of that right cannot be established by showing only that he responded to further police-initiated custodial interrogation even if he has been advised of his rights. We further hold that an accused, such as [the defendant], having expressed his desire to deal with the police only through counsel, is not subject to further interrogation by the authorities until counsel has been made available to him, unless the accused himself initiates further communication, exchanges, or conversations with the police.” 451 U. S., at 484-485 (footnote omitted) (emphasis added).
Respondent’s question in the present case, “Well, what is going to happen to me now?”, admittedly was asked prior to respondent’s being “subjected] to further interrogation by the authorities.” Id., at 484. The Oregon Court of Appeals stated that it did not “construe defendant’s question about what was going to happen to him to have been a waiver of his right to counsel, invoked only minutes before. . ..” 54 Ore. App., at 953, 636 P. 2d, at 1013. The Court of Appeals, after quoting relevant language from Edwards, concluded that “under the reasoning enunciated in Edwards, defendant did not make a valid waiver of his Fifth Amendment rights, and his statements were inadmissible.” Ibid.
We think the Oregon Court of Appeals misapprehended the test laid down in Edwards. We did not there hold that the “initiation” of a conversation by a defendant such as respondent would amount to a waiver of a previously invoked right to counsel; we held that after the right to counsel had been asserted by an accused, further interrogation of the accused should not take place “unless the accused himself initiates further communication, exchanges, or conversations with the police.” 451 U. S., at 485. This was in effect a prophylactic rule, designed to protect an accused in police custody from being badgered by police officers in the manner in which the defendant in Edwards was. We recently restated the requirement in Wyrick v. Fields, 459 U. S. 42, 46 (1982) (per curiam), to be that before a suspect in custody can be subjected to further interrogation after he requests an attorney there must be a showing that the “suspect himself initiates dialogue with the authorities.”
But even if a conversation taking place after the accused has “expressed his desire to deal with the police only through counsel,” is initiated by the accused, where reinterrogation follows, the burden remains upon the prosecution to show that subsequent events indicated a waiver of the Fifth Amendment right to have counsel present during the interrogation. This is made clear in the following footnote to our Edwards opinion:
“If, as frequently would occur in the course of a meeting initiated by the accused, the conversation is not wholly one-sided, it is likely that the officers will say or do something that clearly would be ‘interrogation.’ In that event, the question would be whether a valid waiver of the right to counsel and the right to silence had occurred, that is, whether the purported waiver was knowing and intelligent and found to be so under the totality of the circumstances, including the necessary fact that the accused, not the police, reopened the dialogue with the authorities.” 451 U. S., at 486, n. 9 (emphasis added).
This rule was reaffirmed earlier this Term in Wyrick v. Fields, supra.
Thus, the Oregon Court of Appeals was wrong in thinking that an “initiation” of a conversation or discussion by an accused not only satisfied the Edwards rule, but ex proprio vigore sufficed to show a waiver of the previously asserted right to counsel. The inquiries are separate, and clarity of application is not gained by melding them together.
There can be no doubt in this case that in asking, “Well, what is going to happen to me now?”, respondent “initiated” further conversation in the ordinary dictionary sense of that word. While we doubt that it would be desirable to build a superstructure of legal refinements around the word “initiate” in this context, there are undoubtedly situations where a bare inquiry by either a defendant or by a police officer should not be held to “initiate” any conversation or dialogue. There are some inquiries, such as a request for a drink of water or a request to use a telephone, that are so routine that they cannot be fairly said to represent a desire on the part of an accused to open up a more generalized discussion relating directly or indirectly to the investigation. Such inquiries or statements, by either an accused or a police officer, relating to routine incidents of the custodial relationship, will not generally “initiate” a conversation in the sense in which that word was used in Edwards.
Although ambiguous, the respondent’s question in this case as to what was going to happen to him evinced a willingness and a desire for a generalized discussion about the investigation; it was not merely a necessary inquiry arising out of the incidents of the custodial relationship. It could reasonably have been interpreted by the officer as relating generally to the investigation. That the police officer so understood it is apparent from the fact that he immediately reminded the accused that “[y]ou do not have to talk to me,” and only after the accused told him that he “understood” did they have a generalized conversation. 54 Ore. App., at 951, 636 P. 2d, at 1011-1012. On these facts we believe that there was not a violation of the Edwards rule.
Since there was no violation of the Edwards rule in this case, the next inquiry was “whether a valid waiver of the right to counsel and the right to silence had occurred, that is, whether the purported waiver was knowing and intelligent and found to be so under the totality of the circumstances, including the necessary fact that the accused, not the police, reopened the dialogue with the authorities.” Edwards v. Arizona, 451 U. S., at 486, n. 9. As we have said many times before, this determination depends upon “‘the particular facts and circumstances surrounding [the] case, including the background, experience, and conduct of the accused.’” North Carolina v. Butler, 441 U. S. 369, 374-375 (1979) (quoting Johnson v. Zerbst, 304 U. S. 458, 464 (1938)). See also Edwards v. Arizona, supra, at 482-483.
The state trial court made this inquiry and, in the words of the Oregon Court of Appeals, “found that the police made no threats, promises or inducements to talk, that defendant was properly advised of his rights and understood them and that within a short time after requesting an attorney he changed his mind without any impropriety on the part of the police. The court held that the statements made to the polygraph examiner were voluntary and the result of a knowing waiver of his right to remain silent.” 54 Ore. App., at 952, 636 P. 2d, at 1012.
We have no reason to dispute these conclusions, based as they are upon the trial court’s firsthand observation of the witnesses to the events involved. The judgment of the Oregon Court of Appeals is therefore reversed, and the cause is remanded for further proceedings.
It is so ordered.
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