Millions of custodial suspects waive their rights each year without the benefit of legal counsel. The question posed to psychologists in disputed Miranda waivers is whether this waiver decision was, knowing, intelligent, and voluntary. Mental health professionals must be aware of potential barriers to Miranda comprehension to provide expert opinions regarding a defendant's competency to waive rights. The current study examined how Miranda warning reading level, length, and method of administration affects Miranda comprehension. Recently arrested detainees at Grayson County Jail were administered oral and written Miranda warnings from the Miranda Statements Scale (MSS; Rogers, 2005) to measure their comprehension of the warnings. Surprisingly low levels of Miranda comprehension were found for most warnings. For all warnings at or above 8th grade, a substantial minority (27.1% - 39.6%) of defendants exhibited failed (i.e., < 50% understanding) Miranda comprehension. Regardless of other variables, oral administrations resulted in a substantially larger number of defendants with failed Miranda comprehension. Implications for public policy and clinical practice are discussed.

Dans la perspective de mettre en œuvre les services qui relèvent de leurs compétences, les collectivités territoriales sont, en principe, libres d’emprunter le mode de gestion de leur choix et, en conséquence, d’opter soit pour une gestion directe soit pour une gestion déléguée. Cependant, désireuses de confier la réalisation de certaines missions à un tiers tout en conservant la maîtrise de leur exercice, les collectivités territoriales envisagent, parfois, de recourir à une entité personnalisée dont elles constituent les membres et que nous proposons d’identifier sous les termes d’« organismes satellites ». Dans ce cas de figure, les collectivités territoriales sont inévitablement amenées à nouer des relations avec ces structures satellites afin que ces dernières disposent des moyens de fonctionner et aient des tâches à accomplir. Ces relations, à la fois organiques, matérielles et fonctionnelles traduisent, d’une part, la participation des collectivités territoriales aux organismes satellites et, d’autre part, l’attribution de missions des premières aux seconds. Or, le cadre juridique dans lequel évoluent les collectivités territoriales tend à s’opposer à l’établissement de ces relations et à compromettre l’apparente faculté pour les collectivités territoriales de recourir à un mode de gestion mixte de leurs services. / In order to apply the services that come under their competences, regional authorities are, in principle, free to take the method of administration of their choice and, consequently, to opt either for a direct administration or a delegated one. However, having the desire to entrust the realization of some projects to a third party while keeping the control, regional authorities sometimes plan to use a legal entity in which they are members and that we suggest to be identified under the words “satellite organization”. In this case, regional authorities have to build relationships with the satellite organizations so as they have tools to work and to get projects. These organic, material and functional relationships show, on the one hand, the participation of regional authorities in the satellite organization and, on the other hand, the awarding of projects to the satellite organization. But the legal framework around regional authorities seems to be opposed to the setting up of these relationships and compromising the apparent faculty for the regional authorities to use a method of mixed administration of their services.