During a traffic stop, the officer asks permission to search my vehicle. I decline. Now what?

[x-ray_vision]

@Doug_K

Pointing out that Wikipedia acknowledges being an unreliable source is a response to this:

I am declaring you wrong based on a Wikipedia article that actually uses prescriptive defenitions- legal ones.

I know. My point that you have gone after Wikipedia as a whole, instead of solely the facts given with sources in the article remains.

Me saying “I am declaring you wrong” was in response to you claiming someone else was wrong because “look what this dictionary says.” I don’t usually go around declaring there is one way to define a word, but me doing so in this case was based on your fiat declaration that firefighters and police aren’t civilians because of a dictionary definition.

The content of the link has not changed since…

Read the part where I don’t care. I care about the prescriptive definitions in that entry!

The link to the DoD directive reads “US DoD definition of the term Civilian, refers to civilian law enforcement agencies”. The document linked includes definitions for “Civilian Agency” and “Civilian Law Enforcement Official”, but not for “Civilian”, although their definitions imply that they are using the term in the “specialist in Roman or modern civil law” sense.

Wow, are you stretching! A “Civilian Law Enforcement Official” is…a civilian.

I’ve already read the section on Geneva Convention protocols

I bet you have. It’s why you skipped to a link on the bottom of the wiki article to tackle instead of the content you were aware I was referring to which isn’t so easy to.

and I also checked those references. Article 50 is defining who is covered by article 51, but it doesn’t dictate the use of the term outside the Geneva Conventions.

This is great! Your rebuttal to the a official definition of a word in the Geneva Conventions, a legal Act binding in close to two hundred countries, is that it has no authority to define the word OUTSIDE of the Geneva Conventions? Love it!

And your official definition is where? You skipped this question:

BTW, two of your three dictionary definitions don’t include firefighters- are one or two of them technically wrong?

A poster referred to police officers not in the military as being civilians and you flatly called him “wrong” and based it on one dictionary definition. That definition included firefighters, yet when you cited two more dictionaries, firefighters weren’t part of the definition.

Are volunteer firefighters civilians, or just paid firefighters? What about full-time paramedics? EMTs? Mall cops?

That definition you based him “wrong” on also said that one not on active duty in the armed services is a civilian. That’s news to me! Commissioned and enlisted members of the Reserve and National Guard are members of the military and as such aren’t “civilians.”

The VA specifically calls members of the Merchant Marine civilians here:

Those who serve in the Merchant Marine are called Mariners (not Marines). They are civilians who are only considered military personnel during times of war; Mariners are given Veteran status if they served in a war.

Active Duty vs. Reserve or National Guard

Notice they don’t say that about National Guard or Reservists. I wonder why that is?

[Doug_K]

@x-ray_vision

I know. My point that you have gone after Wikipedia as a whole, instead of solely the facts given with sources in the article remains.

Me saying “I am declaring you wrong” was in response to you claiming someone else was wrong because “look what this dictionary says.” I don’t usually go around declaring there is one way to define a word, but me doing so in this case was based on your fiat declaration that firefighters and police aren’t civilians because of a dictionary definition.

Read the part where I don’t care. I care about the prescriptive definitions in that entry!

Not just “this dictionary”. Multiple dictionaries, including Oxford University Press, publishers of the world’s most authoritative English dictionary, and Merriam Webster, the one cited in the article.

Wow, are you stretching! A “Civilian Law Enforcement Official” is…a civilian.

No, a “Civilian Law Enforcement Official” is …

An officer or employee of a civilian agency with responsibility for enforcement of the laws within the jurisdiction of that agency.

And a “Civilian Agency” is

3.1. Civilian Agency. An agency of one of the following jurisdictions:

3.1.1. The United States (other than the Department of Defense, but including the U.S. Coast Guard). This includes U.S. agencies in international areas dealing with U.S. flag vessels or aircraft in violation of U.S. law.

3.1.2. A State (or political subdivision of it) of the United States.

3.1.3. Commonwealth, Territory, or Possession (or political subdivision of it) of the United States.

If that defines civilian, then I’m not a civilian.

This is great! Your rebuttal to the a official definition of a word in the Geneva Conventions, a legal Act binding in close to two hundred countries, is that it has no authority to define the word OUTSIDE of the Geneva Conventions? Love it!

That’s not what I said. I said that it defines the term for the purpose of clarifying who Article 51 protects. And it does.

A poster referred to police officers not in the military as being civilians and you flatly called him “wrong” and based it on one dictionary definition. That definition included firefighters, yet when you cited two more dictionaries, firefighters weren’t part of the definition.

Not quite. The poster said “of course most police are civilians themselves.” There’s no “of course” about it. The first definition I posted was the same definition referenced (but not quoted) in the article.

And whether or not firefighters are included has nothing to do with whether it’s proper for police officers to speak of civilians.

If you don’t care about any cites that disagree with you, there doesn’t seem to be any point in continuing this.

[pkbites]

@Cheesesteak

It’s better for you, I fail to see how it’s better for me.

Would you rather a field kit show a negative for the suspicious vegetable matter I found or would you rather be taken into custody on it and have to go through the rigamarole of waiting for our backed up crime lab to determine what it is?

It is better for you. I certainly don’t want to hook you up for something that isn’t illegal.

And no I can’t just arrest you for having unknown substances. I have to articulate quite a bit before that. And no, if it turns out to be nothing you’re not going to become a millionaire.

I’ve kicked loose a lot of people thanks to field kits. And I’ve been doing this a long time.

[x-ray_vision]

@Doug_K

Not just “this dictionary”. Multiple dictionaries, including Oxford University Press, publishers of the world’s most authoritative English dictionary.

Most authoritative? Yet they didn’t declare firefighters as not being civilians? How do you explain that?

You took one definition, in a dictionary, and declared that a poster’s use of civilian was incorrect and specifically mentioned that firefighters aren’t civilians based on that one definition. Why not just go to the most authoritative English dictionary first?

If that defines civilian, then I’m not a civilian.

It defines a civilian agency:

3.2. Civilian Law Enforcement Official. An officer

or employee of a civilian agency with responsibility

for enforcement of the laws within the jurisdiction

The officers within it are civilians as they are not military members. That’s the word used for non-military members, including police forces outside of the military- civilian. I find it hard to believe that you are claiming members of agencies specifically called “civilian” agencies are non-civilians in earnest.

That’s not what I said. I said that it defines the term for the purpose of clarifying who Article 51 protects. And it does.

Of course it is what you said! I quoted you and repeated it:

*You: but it doesn’t dictate the use of the term outside the Geneva Conventions.

Me: Your rebuttal to the a official definition of a word in the Geneva Conventions, a legal Act binding in close to two hundred countries, is that it has no authority to define the word OUTSIDE of the Geneva Conventions? Love it!*

Does your source “dictate” use of the term? Everywhere? In all militaries? In all civilian populations? In the Geneva Conventions? It was a laughable complaint!

Not quite. The poster said “of course most police are civilians themselves.” There’s no “of course” about it. The first definition I posted was the same definition referenced (but not quoted) in the article.

Not quite? Oh, what I claimed happened is exactly what happened.

And you flatly called him “wrong” and flatly stated that police and firefighters are not civilians.

Had you said something like “I wouldn’t say ‘of course’; there are other ways to define who is and isn’t a civilian, such as…” we wouldn’t be having this conversation.
What you did was flatly declare him wrong based on a dictionary definition and said based on it that firefighters are not civilians. What I did do was ask you a question twice, and you are attempting to bypass by

And whether or not firefighters are included has nothing to do with whether it’s proper for police officers to speak of civilians.

I have no idea what you’re talking about. I never claimed it was improper for police officers to refer to others as civilians. Likewise, I don’t make any such judgments when my comedian friends say “civilians” are going to be attending.

What I did do was ask you a question twice, and you are attempting to bypass by making the above straw man argument. I’ll ask a third time:

BTW, two of your three dictionary definitions don’t include firefighters- are one or two of them technically wrong?

And if the first definition you supplied carried any weight defining who is and isn’t a civilian, note that it said that one not on active duty in the armed services is a civilian. That’s news to me! Commissioned and enlisted members of the Reserve and National Guard are members of the military and as such aren’t “civilians.”

The VA specifically calls members of the Merchant Marine civilians here:

Those who serve in the Merchant Marine are called Mariners (not Marines). They are civilians who are only considered military personnel during times of war; Mariners are given Veteran status if they served in a war.

https://www.va.gov/vetsinworkplace/d...vereserve.html

Notice they don’t say that about National Guard or Reservists. I wonder why that is?

If you don’t care about any cites that disagree with you, there doesn’t seem to be any point in continuing this.

Interesting comment, Pot.

[echoreply]

@Shodan

TV isn’t real, and false convictions are man bites dog cases. Besides - I am upper-middle class, boringly conventional, and I didn’t do it.

38% of exonerations for minors involve false confessions, and 11% in adults. The majority of convictions for which there was later exoneration (usually due to DNA evidence) involved false witness testimony, but the number of false and coerced confessions is non-trivial.

[Doug_K]

This is the only thing I’m going to respond to now, because it illustrates how pointless this has become:

@x-ray_vision

Of course it is what you said! I quoted you and repeated it:

*You: but it doesn’t dictate the use of the term outside the Geneva Conventions.

Me: Your rebuttal to the a official definition of a word in the Geneva Conventions, a legal Act binding in close to two hundred countries, is that it has no authority to define the word OUTSIDE of the Geneva Conventions? Love it!*

No, you did not repeat it. You quoted me, but then you said that I said “it has no authority to define the word OUTSIDE of the Geneva Convention.” I did not say that. Not in what you quoted, not anywhere else.

[x-ray_vision]

@Doug_K

This is the only thing I’m going to respond to now, because it illustrates how pointless this has become:

I made many good points and asked very relevant questions. Ignoring them is your choice.

No, you did not repeat it. You quoted me, but then you said that I said “it has no authority to define the word OUTSIDE of the Geneva Convention.” I did not say that. Not in what you quoted, not anywhere else.

I see no meaningful distinction between “it doesn’t dictate the use of the term outside the Geneva Conventions” and “it has no authority to define the word outside of the Geneva Conventions.”

It’s common courtesy to tell someone what the distinction is between two things when someone claims they don’t see any during a debate rather than just repeating “didn’t say that, neener, neener, neener.”

[Magiver]

@Drum_God

True story: Last week, I was stopped for speeding. I pulled over very soon after the lights went on. I was alone in my own car. The car is properly licensed and registered. I also have a valid driver’s license and proof of financial responsibility. I was wearing my seatbelt and had no contraband in the vehicle. I stopped the car in an empty parking lot adjacent to the road. I placed the transmission in park, set the parking brake, and turned on the interior cabin light (it was night). I placed my hands in my lap and waited for the officer to approach. When he arrived, I lowered the driver’s window so that we could speak. He shined his light at me and asked me to lower the rear window. The window is tinted, but complies with the law. I lowered the window as requested and he shined his light in the back seat. The rest of the encounter went as expected and the officer gave me a printed warning (no fine) to better control my speed.

I think you have the right idea when getting pulled over. I do the same thing you do but I take the keys out and throw them on the dash and I drop the rear window. I also put my hands on the steering wheel with fingers open. I have a CCW license and want the officer to feel comfortable.

I’ve run into a couple of rogue cops before. I humor them within their scope of power and I’m on my way. I would refuse a car search on principal but I’d be nice about it and give that as my reason.

[MarvinKitFox]

@bob_2

Is this really how cops behave in America? It sounds more like a third-world country.

NoNo.
In a third-world country the cop pulls you over, and asks “how thick is your wallet?”

Literal, direct, verbatim quote from when I was stopped.

[Shodan]

@echoreply

38% of exonerations for minors involve false confessions, and 11% in adults. The majority of convictions for which there was later exoneration (usually due to DNA evidence) involved false witness testimony, but the number of false and coerced confessions is non-trivial.

WADR, that’s 11% of false convictions, not 11% of interrogations. Maybe it is non-trivial, depending on your definition (and we have had more quibbling about definitions in this thread than I care for) but it is not the case that the police automatically force or trick a confession out of whoever they think is the most likely suspect. And, again, I didn’t do it, and I want the police to catch whoever did do it. Maybe I have, even without knowing it, some significant information that will assist the police in finding whoever did it.

It hardly counts as a cite, but we watch Homicide Hunter, where Lt. Joe Kenda talks about the hundreds of murder cases he has worked on, and he is really good at getting confessions. But his modus operandi is not just to pick out the first guy he suspects and get him to confess.

Sure, false confessions happen. And no doubt if I were being interrogated for my wife’s murder (which God forbid) there would come a point where I said “I’ve told you everything I know, four times. Now I need to go care for my family - call me if you want anything more” and they said “You aren’t going anywhere” then I say “Am I free to go?” and any answer other than No means Yes, and Yes means I lawyer up. If I have said something that convinces them that I did it rather than someone else, I will take my chances.

Regards,
Shodan

[Turble]

@pkbites

…

I’ve kicked loose a lot of people thanks to field kits. And I’ve been doing this a long time.

Please don’t think I am jerking you around here; this is not personal and not an attack. I have some questions about which I am very curious and I think some of us will find interesting.

Can we assume you have also taken people to jail for false positives? Do you have any feelings about that?

Can you estimate how many or what percentage?

How many of those had consented to a search you wouldn’t have done unless they consented?

How often do you request to search a car when you don’t really feel you have RAS?

[Inigo_Montoya]

@Shodan

Sorry - I don’t believe this. “We don’t care if you are guilty or innocent as long as we can clear the case” - not buying it.

And you won’t buy it until your bewildered ass is warming a prison cot. Your blind trust in the system is empowering.

[Corry_El]

@TSBG

In the meantime, I will observe that being amazed by the number of drunk and high drivers on a cop show is like being amazed at the number of flying people in a superhero movie.

I can accept this without proof if you’re talking about fictional cop shows, as implied by superhero movies which are always fictional. If you’re talking about ‘reality’ cop shows I wonder if that’s actually true.

Seems to me the implication, if applied to the reality shows, is that eg. the original ‘Cops’ and shows like it take all kinds of footage of people stopped (even for a legit reason, illegal turn or something) who turn out obviously otherwise acting legally and responsibly, and/or the cops ask to search, the person agrees, and they don’t find anything. But, since this would not be very interesting TV, they don’t show that large amount of footage, but rather they show the minority of cases where the people are acting hilariously (if it wasn’t dangerous) illegally (taking drugs or drinking, no valid license, no insurance, car is stolen, etc. some or all very common in the cases shown) and/or agree to a search (almost every case on those shows where the cops ask the person agrees) and the cops easily find illegal stuff.

The hypothesis that they don’t show a lot or even a great majority of less interesting cases where the people were completely legit besides whatever small infraction led to the stop…it’s not obviously untrue. But is it actually true?

My strong suspicion would be that the cars (junkers especially) and various types of people (it isn’t any single type race wise as those shows illustrate) they target are ones where they’ve learned, institutional knowledge, there’s a higher likelihood of being able to make a legitimate arrest for something more serious than the initial stop.

And so if I had to guess I’d guess the segments shown on ‘Cops’ etc are not wildly unrepresentative. Probably not a scientific sample either, but I guess not grossly skewed from true reality.

[Brayne_Ded]

@SamuelA

Well, yeah but with more violence. Also you have the highest probability of going to prison in the USA versus any other developed country.

But, on a day to day basis, if your vehicle is in good condition and your papers are in order you won’t be treated badly.

Kinda wonder if the police in the Soviet Union were all that bad on a day to day basis…

From what I have heard, no, they weren’t. These days they try to shake people down for bribes with manufactured claims such as speeding or some other traffic violation. I’m told it’s best to leave the driving to a local in parts of eastern Europe, Russia, Ukraine, Romania, Bulgaria.

[pkbites]

@Turble

Can we assume you have also taken people to jail for false positives?

I have never gotten a lab notice that the evidence tested to be otherwise what the field kit said it was. I have confiscated pills/capsules that tested to be legal substances, but there was no field test for them and the people they were taken from were not in custody. Had they tested positive in the lab they would have been sought out and arrested.

@Turble

How often do you request to search a car when you don’t really feel you have RAS?

I don’t have a number for that. It’s whenever my spidey senses are tingling. Or if my mobile data unit lists a bunch of convictions for serious offenses. But then it’s after they are told they are free to go. They’re no longer being detained and can leave or tell me FO if they wish.

BTW, that’s the way SCOTUS said it can be done. If you don’t like it, bitch at them.

[MikeF]

I’ll let pkbites answer for himself but I’ll chime in here. I spent almost the entirety of my career in narcotics, violent crimes and homicide units. As a very wild guess, I’d say I participated in over 2000 narcotics arrests, probably a lot more. In virtually every case, a field test kit was employed. I never once heard of a false positive field test. I’m sure it can happen but I have no personal experience with that. As such, I never had bad feelings for taking someone to jail after a false positive. I’ve felt bad for other reasons but not that one.

“How many of those consented to a search you wouldn’t have done unless they consented?”- Hopefully, all of them. If you have probable cause to search, you don’t need consent. If you don’t have consent or probable cause (or public safety and other very limited exceptions), you don’t search.

In New Jersey you must have RAS before asking for consent to search a car. (Oddly, you do not need RAS to ask for consent to search a house. I’m certain that requirement for vehicles resulted from abuses on the highways and byways of the Garden State.) Your RAS will be articulated in your reports and, with the prevalence of video recording by officers and citizens alike, you’d better actually have it if you don’t want to find yourself out of a job (or worse).

I’m sure that I’ve mentioned it before but any search without a warrant is presumed bad in court and the burden is on the officer/prosecution to prove that it met one of the exceptions to the requirement for a warrant.

[pkbites]

@MikeF

In New Jersey you must have RAS before asking for consent to search a car. (Oddly, you do not need RAS to ask for consent to search a house. I’m certain that requirement for vehicles resulted from abuses on the highways and byways of the Garden State.) Your RAS will be articulated in your reports and, with the prevalence of video recording by officers and citizens alike, you’d better actually have it if you don’t want to find yourself out of a job (or worse).

I’m sure that I’ve mentioned it before but any search without a warrant is presumed bad in court and the burden is on the officer/prosecution to prove that it met one of the exceptions to the requirement for a warrant.

I may be wrong but isn’t Loach from Jersey too? I know they have mentioned such rules, as well as different rules regarding Miranda.

I just want to point out to others here that those rules are state specific. They don’t apply to the rest of the country and aren’t dictated from SCOTUS.

[DrDeth]

@Corry_El

I can accept this without proof if you’re talking about fictional cop shows, as implied by superhero movies which are always fictional. If you’re talking about ‘reality’ cop shows I wonder if that’s actually true.

Seems to me the implication, if applied to the reality shows, is that eg. the original ‘Cops’ and shows like it take all kinds of footage of people stopped (even for a legit reason, illegal turn or something) who turn out obviously otherwise acting legally and responsibly, and/or the cops ask to search, the person agrees, and they don’t find anything. But, since this would not be very interesting TV, they don’t show that large amount of footage, but rather they show the minority of cases where the people are acting hilariously (if it wasn’t dangerous) illegally (taking drugs or drinking, no valid license, no insurance, car is stolen, etc. some or all very common in the cases shown) and/or agree to a search (almost every case on those shows where the cops ask the person agrees) and the cops easily find illegal stuff.

The hypothesis that they don’t show a lot or even a great majority of less interesting cases where the people were completely legit besides whatever small infraction led to the stop…it’s not obviously untrue. But is it actually true?
…

And so if I had to guess I’d guess the segments shown on ‘Cops’ etc are not wildly unrepresentative. Probably not a scientific sample either, but I guess not grossly skewed from true reality.

I knew a cop who was on such a show, they filmed like 4 hours of his stops, didnt use any, he was on for like 3 minutes for another cops stop. So, yeah, they shoot a lot they dont use.

[DrCube]

@Cheesesteak

Do you think you get 80% acceptance without the people you ask feeling pressure to acquiesce?

You’re a cop. You have me in a compromised position, a position of extreme uncertainty. Uncertainty that you, the cop, are in absolute control over. You then suggest that this position of uncertainty (of which you are in complete control) will end favorably if I agree to something. If that’s not pressure, I’m happy to use an alternate word to describe it, but it’s why people agree to it.

I have at least two experiences that I can remember where an LEO asked for permission to search, once my car and once my fenced in back yard. In both cases I said “my lawyer has advised me not to permit searches without a warrant” and in both cases the cop said “sure, you have the right to refuse the search, but I have the right to take you down to the station for an open-ended period of time for ‘questioning’, so do you want to do this the easy way or the hard way?”. In both cases I relented and permitted the search.

[DrDeth]

@DrCube

I have at least two experiences that I can remember where an LEO asked for permission to search, once my car and once my fenced in back yard. In both cases I said “my lawyer has advised me not to permit searches without a warrant” and in both cases the cop said “sure, you have the right to refuse the search, but I have the right to take you down to the station for an open-ended period of time for ‘questioning’, so do you want to do this the easy way or the hard way?”. In both cases I relented and permitted the search.

And- actually he didn’t have such a right. At your house, he’d have to have a warrant for your arrest in most cases, which he certainly didn’t have and couldn’t get. In your car? Very doubtful- but he certainly could have made up something to give you a ticket.

When you are in your “castle”, unless they have paper, say no in all cases. Call your lawyer.