So I report to the police (let’s say same jurisdiction) my neighbor is drinking in public and let’s go so far as to say he’s been arrested for that before. Police roll up and there is no alcohol in sight. They have probable cause to arrest him?
Is he a career alcoholic? Resisting sobriety? Do the police have reason to believe that he is a carbon-based life form? Drinking Mad Dog 20/20 or a nice Chianti?
They have reasonable suspicion to detain him, which is not the same thing. If he gets agitated and the police think it would be safer to handcuff him, they can do that too.
If this is some repeat drunk that they have arrested thirty times before for various offenses including assault and larceny, then it becomes more believable that the scenario (where he gets agitated and needs to be restrained in the interests of safety) would work out that way.
If it turns out that he is morbidly obese, and has asthma and heart disease and high blood pressure and so on, he might die in the course of being restrained even if nobody uses a chokehold on him.
Regards,
Shodan
So what escalated Garner’s detention into an arrest? Being agitated because the cops were harassing him?
About all I see is a guy waving his hands in front of him in a “fending off” sort of gesture. I’m told he pulled back his arm to deliver the Iron Fist of Death#10, but its hard to be sure. Hard for me, some guys don’t seem to have any problem…
I’m guessing you were just quipping, but, no, giving things away is different from selling them. If I give you a cig, you don’t have to pay sales tax. If I just give you one, once, I don’t need a vending license. Lots of other differences.
(Good thing there are such differences, or anyone who “gives” someone else sexual gratification is guilty of prostitution!)
(And, obviously, you can’t get around the law by pretending you’re just “giving” things, but taking some other form of compensation. “I’ll ‘give’ you this cigarette, and you drop 45 cents into the hat in front of that busker there, who is totally unknown to me and with whom I have absolutely no prior arrangement.” Um…no.)