This story is about a woman who drove down the road breast-feeding her baby and talking on the phone. A concerned yenta phoned police, who it says tracked her down using her license plate number. I guess that could mean they found her in traffic, but it sounds to me like they looked her address up and went to her house. The woman’s statements make it sound like she didn’t deny what she did, and now she’s facing up to 180 days in jail.
What if she had denied it? Can you really be arrested and charged with a misdemeanor that some random person saw you committing earlier that day (or week, or year)?
Police in Ohio say a woman has been charged with child endangerment after another motorist reported she was both breast-feeding the youngster and talking on a phone while driving.
The story is not very detailed. It sounds like they may have tracked her down at home. If they asked for a statement there, that’s evidence. If all this is true, the cops probably would have to charge her, and let her have her day in court.
Again, the story is not very detailed.
I don’t know. I’d assume they’d try to gather evidence just like any other crime. Witness had a time, maybe a traffic camera caught a picture or something.
You can be arrested if there is probable cause. That is, an articulable set of facts that would cause a reasonable person to believe a crime has probably been committed and that the accused committed it.
In this case, if the accuser can be re-contacted, or maybe followed the defendant, and gives plausible details, and they’re corroborated to some extent (e.g. there is an infant, the mother’s clothes are in disarray, there’s a cell phone in view, the mother’s explanation is an admission or is a denial that makes no sense, etc), than probable cause for arrest would exist – in this case, presumably for Endangerment (in Arizona, A.R.S. 13-1201.A).
Conviction would rely on a judge finding the facts constitute the crime beyond a reasonable doubt.
If she’s in her home, they need an arrest warrant to get her.
A misdemeanor not involving the breach of the peace that did not occur in front of a police officer also requires a warrant to make an arrest.
The word of some yenta isn’t really enough for that. She’s not a reliable source of information as such things are measured.
However, the cops can ask you whatever they want when they knock on your door. And if you’re dumb enough to think that driving, talking, and breastfeeding is perfectly normal, you’d probably tell them of your own free will and end up arrested.
If she had tried to deny it the investigating police officer probably would have said they have an eye-witness who is willing to sign a statement describing the crime and that he would be back in an hour or two with an arrest warrant, but if she wanted to fess up she could save them a lot of work and they would put in a good word about her cooperation to the DA. Keep in mind the charge here wasn’t about breastfeeding it was endangering a child. I’m pretty sure an eye-witness statement would be sufficient evidence to obtain an arrest warrant.
If I recall correctly, I remember reading that the police approached her the next day at the school where she was dropping off her child. They asked her about it and she readily admitted it.
However your question is, what if she had denied it, could they have charged her anyway? My completely non-expert opinion is no, that they would have just given her a warning. But luckily for the police, not only did she admit it, but she went on TV saying she does it all the time and she sees nothing wrong with it.
People like this should not be contributing to the gene pool…
On edit:
Really? So anyone could just take down the license plate of a jerk who cuts them off in traffic and call police saying that they saw a kid not in a safety seat in the car, and the person would be arrested, just on one person’s allegation? I don’t think that rises to the level of reasonable doubt…
Have you ever heard the stories of people’s children being taken away by CPS just because of uncorroborated hearsay evidence of a neighbor or friend? Even at the hint of child endangerment, e.g. an eye-witness statement, they have the ability to act to protect the child. This case is slightly different but the principle stands. Here is one quick example I find just from a google on “probable cause for arrest eyewitness testimony” The first item that comes up is a decision from the US 6th circuit court of appeals, when ruling that the hearsay evidence of a 3 year old child was not probable cause:
"An eye witness’s statement that he or she saw a crime committed or was the victim of a crime is generally sufficient to establish probable cause. We are not aware, however, of any situation in which the uncorroborated hearsay statement of a child as young as three, standing alone, has been considered sufficient to establish probable cause. "
So in short, yes, providing a false report to the police is possibly all it takes to get someone who cuts you off in traffic arrested unless you are 3 years old or have other issues that make your statement suspect. Keep in mind being arrested and being convicted are two entirely different things and making false police reports is in itself a pretty serious crime, a felony depending on the circumstances.
ETA: I looked at the smoking gun to see if they had the official report posted. I didn’t find it. The story was very weak but with the information given I would say there would not be enough to charge if she didn’t open her mouth.
Being arrested and having your child taken away by CPS are two totalling different things. CPS or whatever your state calls it, generally have a lot of leeway and do not have to have probable cause. In the interest of the child they will take it away because a delay may mean keeping the child in danger. It is not the same at all as having probable cause for an arrest.
That’s why I wrote: “This case is slightly different but the principle stands.”
The principle being that an eye witness report identifying the suspect of an alleged crime is generally considered sufficient probable cause for a police officer to investigate and possibly sufficient to make an arrest on it’s own merit, even if that report is uncorroborated hearsay. Obviously the investigating officer will ask the accused for their side of the story, look for any evidence that supports or disproves the allegations, and ultimately make their own determination if there is probable cause. But an appeals court will likely rule that eyewitness report was in and of itself probable cause.
I don’t disagree with your main point. I disagree with you using child protective services in your example. They are not law enforcement. They don’t need probable cause. They have the leeway to err on the side of caution, take the children out of the house, and then decide if it was warranted. It is comparing apples and lug nuts.
Are you saying that children should be held in the driver’s lap (without a seat belt), so the driver can look away from the road to comfort them? :eek:
The question I was replying to was from someone incredulous that a person could simply pick up a phone and cause someone to be arrested with a false accusation. Along with the disclaimer that this was a different type of case, I cited a well known and oft covered example of the same possibility applied to another agency; e.g. a simple phone call to CPS can cause a child to be pulled from their home and a simple phone call to the police can cause a person to be arrested for suspicion of a crime. That is as far as the analogy was intended to be taken.
In my first post in this thread I cited the US circuit court of appeals ruling that uncorroborated hearsay does constitute probable cause for arrest so I won’t bother repeating it all - just scroll up and read or do the google search I recommended and read up on it yourself. A simple phone call can get you arrested if the subject of the phone call is an eyewitness identifying you as the suspect of a crime they allegedly witnessed.
As for the CPS analogy it does hold if you read it the way it was intended. If someone asked you in disbelief “are you trying to tell me, that a person could just call and have a pizza delivered to someone elses’ house as a joke?” and I answered “not only that, haven’t you ever heard of those cases where someone called the phone company and had someone elses’ phone disconnected as a joke?” that is more along the lines I meant. I am aware that the phone company is not the same as a pizza parlor. I am aware that police are bound to probable cause and CPS is not, that wasn’t the point. The reference to CPS was simply another example of a method by which a false accusation could be leveled against an innocent person causing them great inconvenience and despair at the hands of a government agency. The analogy ends there, and so does my continued participation in this hair-splitting because it is hijacking the thread from its original scope.
Sure. I once sat through part of a trial involving a bus driver who was accused of striking a child on his bus. The sole witness for the prosecution was the guy driving in a car behind the bus. Incidentally, the bus driver claimed that the witness misinterpreted what he’d seen: He was driving a bus full of hearing impaired children. He needed to get the child’s attention, so he touched the child. The bus driver had the worst lawyer possible (I’ve encountered the guy before; he’s an idiot) and still managed to get acquitted.
I suspect it is, but not the way you think. My wife and I managed to raise 4 children to maturity, strapping them from an early age (starting with in bassinettes, then graduating to special child seats when they were old enough to sit up). The main effect that it had on their behaviour was that, when they got old enough to communicate their wishes, they made it clear that they preferred to use seat belts rather than drive around unrestrained.
And if a young child is upset in the car and needs comforting, then you should stop the car and comfort it.
Yes, as long as the crime falls within the statute of limitations. However they will probably not arrest you if you are not an imbecile and don’t admit to commiting said crime because it would just be the other person’s word against yours. Since she apparently admited to it, you now have a witness AND the suspect’s confession.
What she should have said was “I don’t know what you are talking about”. As far as the cop knows, maybe some woman just called in her plates because she was pissed off about the other woman taking a parking spot or something.
And by the way, the woman should be charged with several counts of stupidity:
-Talking on a cell phone while driving
-Breast feeding a small child while driving
-Admiting to doing so to the police
I found when I was younger, the best way to deal with the police was to be polite, brief, vaugebut specific, not admit to anyone doing anything that could be construed as a crime and don’t lie if you can help it. Here’s an example. When I was about 20, some friends of mine and me are driving to a party. We have an open case of beer in the car and the other guys are drinking (I, as the driver, elected not to drink). As luck would have it, we get pulled over. So the boys immediately stuff the case of beer under the seat and hide their open cans. The cop comes up to the window and the conversation goes something like this:
Cop: “Evening boys. Have you been drinking tonight?”
Me: “No sir. I haven’t had anything to drink.” (TRUE)
Cop: “Do you have any alchohol in the car?”
Me: “I didn’t bring any alchohol in the car.” (TECHNICALLY TRUE)
Cop: “Did any of your friends bring any alchohol in the car?”
Me: “Not that I’m aware of” (ok, a lie, but the alternative is to admit that I, as the underage driver, knowingly allowed minors to bring alchohol in my car.)
Cop: “Are you sure?” (Possibly seeing if I would crack or something)
Me: “Officer, as far as I know, there should not be alchohol in this car.”
At which point he seemed satisfied and moved on to the other carload of friends in front of us. I sort of left out the part of the story where he asked us where we were going and I sort of clumsily explained that we were going to our friends house but I didn’t really know where and that I was following the car in front of us and he was following a third car which didn’t pull over.
Now, I think the reason the cop more or less let us go was a) the driver in the other car admited to having booze, but he was 21 and it wasn’t opened. and b) the driver of the third car had parked just out of sight around the corner and then for some reason decided to come crashing through a hedge on foot yelling “IS THERE A PROBLEM HERE OFFICERS?” scaring the crap out of everyone and almost getting himself shot. While not illegal, certainly idiotic.
Anyhow, the point is just keep you mouth shut when dealing with the police.
