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STATE OF MICHIGAN
COURT OF APPEALS


PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, Plaintiff-Appellee, v DION H. RIGGEN, Defendant-Appellant.

UNPUBLISHED December 17, 1996

No. 176754 LC No. 93-129398 FH

PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN, Plaintiff-Appellee, No. 178528 LC No. 93-129397 FH MARK D. JACKSON, Defendant-Appellant. _________________________________________ Before: O'Connell, P.J., and Smolenski and T.G. Power,* JJ. PER CURIAM. In these consolidated cases, defendants appeal as of right their bench-trial convictions of breaking and entering business property with intent to commit larceny, MCL 750.110; MSA 38.305, and burning real property, MCL 750.73; MSA 28.268.1 In Docket No. 176754, defendant Riggen also pleaded guilty to habitual offender, third offense, and was sentenced to five to twenty years' imprisonment. In Docket No. 178528, defendant Jackson also pleaded guilty to habitual offender, third offense, and was sentenced to 30 months to 240 months' imprisonment. We affirm the convictions and sentences of each defendant.

* Circuit judge, sitting on the Court of Appeals by assignment. -1

I Defendants and codefendant Eddie Hough were riding in a rented Ryder van when they were stopped by a Birmingham police officer at approximately 3:00 a.m. The officer testified that she ran their license plate through her mobile computer terminal, as she often did while working her shift, and discovered that the Southfield police reported the van as being a "failure to return." After the police dispatcher confirmed the van's status and reported that the Southfield police had requested impoundment of the van, officers began to inventory the van's contents. In the passenger compartment, they discovered blank checks from a Pontiac business, a coin box of the type used in stores, three pairs of gloves, and what they believed to be marijuana. The rear of the van contained computers, boxes of beepers, and clothing. A call to the Pontiac police confirmed that the business named on the blank checks had been burglarized and set on fire on the same evening. Two Pontiac officers went to Birmingham to arrest the three men and to impound the van. The next day, a Pontiac detective attempted to interview all three men. Both Riggen and Jackson refused to speak with him. Hough was the last to be interviewed and, after being read his Miranda rights, made two oral statements to the detective, the second recorded on a tape recorder. Both statements inculpated all three defendants in the burglary and arson, although Hough minimized his own role. At the preliminary examination, Hough denied the truth of his custodial statement and said he had been coerced by the detective. He claimed that, while alone in the van, he had found the stolen merchandise abandoned in the road and retrieved it with the idea of selling it. Hough's custodial statement was admitted as substantive evidence in the prosecution's case against all three defendants. His preliminary examination testimony was admitted in defendants' cases-in-chief. II Both defendants Riggen and Jackson now contend that the trial court erred in admitting Hough's custodial statement as substantive evidence against them. For Hough's custodial statement to be admissible as substantive evidence against Riggen and Jackson, it "must be admissible under the Michigan Rules of Evidence, and admission of the statement cannot be violative of [Riggen and Jackson's] rights under the Confrontation Clause." US Const, Am VI; Const 1963, art 1,

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