Why, was it an arrestable offense?
Yeah, I question the reality of some of the people giving advice in this thread based on that video.
One thing the cops will be looking for during an investigation is people acting odd. And absolutely refusing to cooperate with the police is a bit odd. Especially if you aren’t a suspect. So truthfully answering their routine questions is usually the best response.
Now if they bring you down to the station for questioning as a suspect or person of interest, then it’s best to just shut the fuck up and call your lawyer.
As for an alibi, that’s usually used to exclude you as a suspect. As in:
“I was in this other bar all night where no one was murdered…with these 4 friends…and the bartender who knows me…and here’s a bunch of receipts…and cell phone records…and a time and location stamped photo of me with some girls I met…and security video footage of me sitting at the bar not murdering people.”
"Ok. Your story checks out…for now…just don’t leave town."
I think you should ask your wife what her opinion of that video is. And ask her how she would act if she was the one being questioned.
Like your wife, I’ve conducted actual interrogations. I know what makes me suspicious that a person is lying and what makes me tend to believe a person is telling the truth. I didn’t let my opinions decide the outcome of an investigation but they did influence what directions I went in to look for further evidence.
(bolding mine)
They can’t? :dubious:
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’ve always thought that the authorities can hold you for 72 hours for… well, for what ever reason they care to give.
In some cases, the cops have even thought about helping you out with the regard to odd behavior.
From the Homicide: A Year on the Killing Streets link I posted upthread regarding interrogations and Miranda:
"[Detective] Terry McLarney once mused the best way to unsettle a suspect would be to post in all three interrogation rooms a written list of those behaviors that indicate deception:
Uncooperative
Too cooperative
Talks too much
Talks too little
Gets his story straight
Fucks his story up
Blinks too muck, avoids eye contact
Doesn’t blink. Stares"
Specific to after you’ve been arrested and sorta of tongue-in-cheek on the detective’s part, I know, but the homicide detectives in Baltimore probably deal with moronic suspects every day. The chapter was used in The Miranda Debate: Law, Justice, and Policing (linked to above) and it’s pretty interesting commentary about detectives and dealing with Miranda.
One thing to also keep in mind. If you get arrested, and they book you in, that never goes away. 30 Minutes later your lawyer shows up with your alibi, does not matter, that arrest record never goes away. You got arrested. Were you guilty of anything, no, but you were arrested.
How many questionnaires a person fills out or places that do a bit of a background check, do you think your application checkers will go to the trouble to find out what, why & when?
Have a traffic stop, they run your info. That arrest will pop. They do not usually check further unless that, just for current W&W’s but what do you think this does to present situation you are in?
No, as an example, just one, see County of Riverside v. McLaughlin, US SC.
I have asked her and she agrees with the video. She also is teaching our kids that when police question you about something - DON’T SAY ANYTHING!
I’m really at a loss to understand a couple of points being raised.
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“The cops will let you go if you say the right words.”
Nope. Oh sure they may physically release you but the reality is that the cop knows you’re guilty and you will continue to be investigated just to be arrested later on. Now it may or may not be factually correct that you did the crime but you are there because the LEO has good reason to believe you are the perp. The reason for the interrogation is to get you to confess or caught in a lie. If you have an alibi then all that means to them is that you are really good about manufacturing a false alibi. I’d honestly like to hear from Loach how many suspects he’s questioned/interrogated that come up with an alibi during the interview and that he has released. -
“It’s suspicious to use your rights.”
How can any American really believe that an innocent person wouldn’t use their rights to not talk? Think about it. They have all of the advantages. They can intimidate you and lie to you and ultimately it’s your word against theirs. Why would anyone want to talk to people in such authority when an honest misspoken work could land you in jail and ultimately prison. The right to remain silent and right to an attorney is not only for guilty people. It’s for people smart enough to realize they’re in an oh shit moment and need to do the correct thing. -
“I should be helping the police.”
I know Loach (and others) are going to fight me on this but hear me out. Most interrogations/questionings are done to make the cops life easier. If they are talking to you about a shooting and you say “I didn’t mean to shoot him.” then they get to go back to the station, do the paperwork for your arrest and move on to the next case. It also means they don’t have to go get a search warrant for your house, question you “downtown”, process more evidence, find eyewitnesses, etc. If I’m a suspect (again, in the context of this thread I am discussing being questioned/interrogated as a suspect) then “helping” the police isn’t really helping you because nothing you say can help your case and only hurt it (see number 1). Having establish that talking to the police in that situation offers no upside and only consequences if I fuck up. (Sorry, I meant I was there last Tuesday. What day was it? Monday or Tuesday?) and here is the best part - there are no consequences if I invoke the 5th Amendment. Oh and when being questioned by the police, it’s all about me and not them because I’m the one going to jail if I say the wrong thing. So why should I help the police when there’s no benefit for me and only consequences? They certainly are not (according to the video they cannot but I’m not sure how accurate that is) going to help me. -
“But if every criminal refused to talk …”
Don’t fucking care. Be honest - you went out on a date, had consensual sex and are now accused of rape, are you really concerned about whether or not the guy that robbed the 7-11 last week invoked his 5th Amendment rights? Do you think your refusal to talk to the police is going to lead to the next murder spree. This is such a slippery slope and even if it weren’t - even if every criminal in the US learned from your example and refused to talk to the police then so fucking what? We are in the US where we have those rights and quite honestly, anyone who suggests that invoking those rights is bad because you know crime and all that … well it sounds a little too Patriot Act and TSA crotch grab for me.
Have to factor in the probabilities there. The scenario is premised on you in fact having a rock-solid alibi. The ‘leathal injection’ possibility is only open if the cops ignore this evidence and in fact actively-and successfully-attempt to fabricate evidence against you, and the prosecutors, the judges, and juries all believe it despite the fact that your alibi is rock-solid.
While crooked cops of course exist, it is hard to imagine most random cops going through all that trouble, and doing it successfully, so that you end up executed. The probability of that outcome is vanishingly small.
A bit of free advice to any Americans visiting the UK: if you ever get stopped by the police over here, don’t adopt this paranoid “say nothing” stance because it could very well bite you in the backside. 
Well, the airplane ticket is a bust - the company can verify that you had reserved the seat, it can even verify that your boarding pass was checked in, but it can’t say without a doubt you were on the plane. As for the people in Brussels, two couldn’t be reached, three declined to testify because they don’t want to get pulled into your shit, and the last one had a brainfart and was adamant he saw you on Friday, not Wednesday. A week later his memories come back and he says he *did *see you on Wednesday after all.
How does that look to a juror ? How fucked do you feel right now ?
So of course you don’t tell the cops to fuck off. You ask them if you’re under arrest, and if you are you’d like to see a lawyer please, as is your right, thanks. And if you’re not under arrest, then thank you for your time officers. Keep that passenger manifest and those Belgian friends under your hat until trial, when they can be used to save your ass from a wrongful prosecution (or strategically withheld if it turns out to be more advantageous to you).
It is. However, the probability of dutiful, serious and honest cops becoming convinced you’re the guy and using all the ammo they can muster at you, no matter how incidental or circumstantial, is not so far fetched.
And it can happen over the slightest thing - many cops are convinced they can tell when someone is lying, out of sheer instinct and experience. This has scientifically been determined to be bullshit. But there’s no white coat in the interrogation room to tell them they’re wrong, so they’re still convinced and hound dogs don’t give up a scent very easily. Prisons are full of innocent people whom the investigators responsible would swear upon their own nuts are guilty.
So in other words if jtgain is a young black man in the South.
I’m willing to bet very few of those innocent folks had a truly “rock-solid alibi”.
The cops could hound-dog you if you lawyer up, just as if you don’t. The only difference is whether you talking to them is likely to inolve you making mistakes that later, in court, are likely to damage your defence, leading to you being convicted where you would otherwise have walked.
To my mind, that possibility has to be weighed against the possibility that hiring a lawyer and doing everything through him or her would cause you expense and inconvenience - including the inconvenience of making the cops more interested in you than they otherwise would have been. All this predicated on you having a truly solid alibi and a realistic hope that the cops will focus elsewhere.
Again, this is situational. The hope of course is that the cops are looking at a number of suspects and will not focus on you, if you can show them that they are barking up the wrong tree - for example, you were provably out of the country when the alleged assault took place. If they have good reasons to focus on you anyway, I suspect that getting a lawyer would be mandatory; not if you are just one of hundreds of potentual suspects.
If the justice system itself is prejudiced against you (and I don’t pretend to know what the situation is in the US), it could well be that having a lawyer will not help.
Bloodsucking jokes aside, and positing I’m not hiring Saul Goodman, I’d expect my attorney to be able to evaluate those risks better than I am and to tell me whether or not given present circumstances my soliciting him is worth his valuable time, my inconvenience and unnecessarily increased scrutiny on the part of The Man. And to advise me correctly no matter what the sum of that equation turns out to be.
I’m a broke-ass game translator, the hell do I know about the grinding wheels of Justice ? I’ll trust the guy with the degree and the briefcase. Or just the briefcase, but it has to be real leather.
Nope. Not even close.
Untrue. Even convictions can latter be expunged.
As for an arrest coming up on a traffic stop, that is also not true. Criminal histories can only be run under certain circumstances. Not everyone has access. As a detective I do have access. Patrol officers don’t. If you don’t follow the proper protocols the access to that database can be pulled for the entire department. Its controlled at the Federal level and there are audits. Improper use of criminal databases is a crime. Why would I want to get in trouble just to see if you were ever arrested during a motor vehicle stop?
- You still seem to think that every police interaction is an interrogation with a suspect. It is not.
There have been plenty of people who I have interviewed who have convinced me that they were not involved. It happens all the time. I don’t waste my time going after people that are not guilty. Plenty of time is wasted trying to get people who are not guilty but have knowledge of a crime to cooperate.
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An honest misspoken word is not going to land you in jail. That is ridiculous. Even a full confession is often not enough. We always work under the assumption that a confession might get thrown out. We have to make sure that the burden of proof is met. You sound like you really don’t understand the burden of proof.
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If you are a criminal there probably isn’t a benefit to talking to the police. Other than we really do try (but never promise) to get you a good deal if you cooperate. But I’m assuming that you are not a criminal. If you have information that can lead to a crime that happened in your neighborhood being solved then it is to your benefit. Just like I’m sure you would appreciate if your neighbors helped you if you were the victim.
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Again, you seem to think we are only talking about criminals talking. We are not. Not when you say things like, “She also is teaching our kids that when police question you about something - DON’T SAY ANYTHING!” Unless you are telling me your children are criminals. Chances are if they ever have interaction with the police it will not be as suspects.
Wait, Saint Cad, let me get this straight: Your wife is a cop, and she’s taught your children that they should never, under any circumstances, ever talk to a cop? Things must be awfully quiet around your dining room table.
Mrs. Cad: So, honey, how was your day at school today?
Saint Kid: I want a lawyer.
The scenario I’m thinking of has officer friendly knock at your door and say something like “there has been a very serious crime [let’s say in this scenario you are White, middle-aged and male and it’s a rape] in your neighbouhood, and we are asking all men fitting a rough description of “White, age 30-50” some questions. The crime took place on Tuesday at 3 AM. Can you tell me your whereabouts at that time sir?”
Now, in this scenario, you happen to have just come back from a family vacation in France and weren’t even in the country on Tuesday. Proving you were in France would be trivially easy.
Do you:
(a) Tell the police you were in France on Tuesday, knowing it is true and hoping they would thank you for your time [after checking it is true] and knock on the next guy’s door and waste no further time on you?
(b) Tell the police that you need to consult your lawyer on what to say to them?
I’m just not seeing how (b) is the clearly better answer.
So you ignore the multiple times that I have said in this thread (and even that post) that the assumption is that I am being questioned as a suspect. Obviously I’m not talking about you going door-to-door showing me a picture asking, “Has you seen this guy hanging around?”
And I notice in your response the assumption that at the point of interrogation (sorry if I use “interview” in the wrong context. It’s the term Mrs. Cad uses so maybe we are both equivocating) you have the guilty person. Suppose I call you because Mrs. Cad is shot dead. You know murder is most commonly done by spouses and there’s something a little off about me. Maybe I’m a little to matter-of-fact about it so you “invite” me to discuss it downtown. Are you honestly going to tell me that if I say I was at the grocery store or show you a movie stub bought a30 minutes before the shooting that at that point you’ll say that you were mistaken, release me and cross me off your list of suspects?
I asked a question and I’ll ask it again. You have probably interrogated a lot of suspects you “knew” were guilty. How many said something during that interrogation that in of itself convinced you that you were wrong? Not interviews trying to sort out what happened but honest-to-goodness trying to get the suspect to confess interrogations.
Now let’s turn it around. How many people have you been interviewing just to gather information and they say something that gets them arrested or at least investigated further.
But that’s the point. I don’t know what trouble my mouth is going to get me into. What if I say I’m not surprised he’s dead or I’m glad he’s dead. And that’s just the immediate oopsies. What if you’re on the stand and the DA says, “Det. Loach, can you tell us about the defendant’s whereabouts on the day of the shooting?” “Well, he seemed very unsure if he was in the neighborhood on the Monday or the Tuesday of that week.”
But even you admitted in a thread a while back that I started that you have no real power to make a deal. If I’m at the point I need to make a deal, it would have to be my attorney and the DA’s office right?
So what’s the problem with teaching our kids:
- Identify yourself. The cops can get a hold of you later if they need to.
- Keep quiet. Call your mom or dad. Don’t talk until we get there.
She’s not a cop but she does the interrogations (she calls them interviews so Loach and I may be using the same word to mean different things) at her work when an employee is accused of (major) workplace violations. Like the firing kind of violation.