I can’t help but think there is going to be a gotcha in there somewhere. Bottom line, police officers can be compelled to speak and if the assert their 5th amendment rights it could be grounds for termination. However since such statements are forced they are not supposed to be used in a criminal investigation. See Garrity v New Jersey (NJ case but it went to the supremes so it covers the US). http://www.policechiefmagazine.org/magazine/index.cfm?fuseaction=display&issue_id=122012&category_ID=3
If that article does not answer your question please clarify.
This is the one Mrs Cad uses at work. Very effective.
There’s no gotcha other than would you feel comfortable answering all of IA’s question if you do not know if they suspect you of something having to do with Wilson. And I did take some liberties in assuming you could take the fifth when dealing with IA.
So the question stands, are you going to answer the questions or not (assume you have a choice)? More interesting is why you think there’s a gotcha.
MIT made the documents available to the MIT community - not quite what I’d call “tech-illiterate”. The purpose though, was to find the document you wanted, download and use it, not just download the thousands of documents. So the taking all the candy analogy is pretty accurate.
MIT also offered free guest wifi access to anyone physically on campus. So Swartz, instead of downloading the documents at Harvard where he worked, but where the download would be tied to his account, headed to MIT and signed up for guest wifi, and started running the scripts to get the documents. At this point, I’d agree he probably hadn’t committed a crime, even though he was batch downloading the documents.
MIT IT noticed this however, and disabled his wifi account. I think he tried a few more times with different laptops, but they kept blocking him. Then, he went into a server closet (which may or may not have been locked - accounts differ) and set up a laptop on a hard connection to continue downloading the docs. That where the crime occurred - if the candy bowl that was previously outside your house and said “Help Yourself” was now inside the house, it would be a crime for you to walk in the front door uninvited and take all the candy.
Regarding accusations of molestation/sexual assault of minors, significant strides have been made over the last several decades in interviewing minors as young as 1 years old without giving leading questions. Local police jurisdictions and Child Protective Services are invested in finding out whether accusations of molestation have merit and CPS agencies do not have the resources to hound or harass people based on wild baseless accusations of misconduct.
I found this thread the same day I read this two-day-old Popehat legal blog entry. I’m sharing it because I think it’s relevant. If you want an excerpt before clicking, the first sentence should do nicely:
One of the most consistent messages I offer here is about interactions with law enforcement, and can be expressed in two words — shut up — although “oh you dumb son of a bitch will you for the love of God shut up” might capture the flavor better.
I’ve always wondered what are legitimate reasons for an officer to search my car? Could he just claim “The guy seemed like he was nervous.” Or “It looked like he was hiding something.” ?
If they ask me, “Do you mind if I take a look in your trunk?” And I say, “Yes, I would mind, you do not have permission.” And then they say, “If you had nothing to hide, why wouldn’t you let me take a look?” And then can they claim I started looking nervous and he felt justified in searching the vehicle? Is it just his word against mine?
Has everyone here seen the video from Regents University? It has a professor who gives the “Never Talk to the Police (without counsel present)” and a rebuttal from a cop.
First of all, you should always be able to determine who it is at your door when someone knocks or rings your door bell without having them know that you can see them. You should have some kind of peep hole or camera that lets you see them but does not let them see you.
If you see a police person at your door, why would you open it? What good could it do you? What harm could it do you?
I would suggest that it could rarely do you any good and will almost always either cause some harm to come to you or it will be a mistake.
It’s very important to understand that there is no law that says when the police knock on your door, you must answer. I certainly would never answer a knock from the police.
Just think back in your life to the number of times the police have knocked at your door and ask yourself how many times were you happy that you answered that knock and how many times were you unhappy. Finally ask yourself how many times was it just a mistake or irrelevant. Then add up the numbers and ask yourself whether it is a good idea to answer a knock from the police.
If they have a warrant to enter your premises, they will enter. If not, they will go away. Just think how often the police go to the wrong door by mistake and arrest the occupants on some kind of warrant and wind up shooting the occpants if there is any hesitation to comply with the police.
All in all, I don’t care if you are Ward and June Cleaver. It is a mistake to answer a knock at your door from the police. If they need to contact you, they have many other ways to contact you.
It’s also worth knowing exactly what is meant by “identifying yourself”. In most juristictions, you have to tell the police your name, address and birth date. Those three things are all that you are required to tell them. Nothing more.
But you need to temper that with some common sense. If someone was shot a few doors away from you and the police want to ask you about that shooting, it makes no sense to then tell them that you know your rights and all you have to tell them is your name, address and birth date. It makes no sense to take that approach when you know what is going on and you know they have a good reason to ask you some questions.
It’s only smart to co-operate with the police under those kinds of circumstances. But 90 percent of the time, I think you want to hold the line and the only thing you should be telling them is your name, address and date of birth.
IF they do NOT answer, then the detention has ended legally, as the order to remain, such as being pulled over, is abrogated.
The crux is though if it is a crooked cop, if you start to leave, s/he will say they told you to stay when you asked when they did not, or say you never asked.
Remember the St. George, MO case with Brent Darrow about a crooked cop.
My comfort level is irrelevant. I have no 5th amendment rights for internal investigations. It’s either speak or get fired. If I was the suspect in something criminal they wouldn’t care as much about the internal stuff since under Garrity any statements I made would be coerced and inadmissible in court. It could ruin the investigation. Instead I would be mirandized and interviewed like any other suspect.
The simple answer is no but it may be slightly different from state to state. Random checkpoints are allowed as long as they don’t detain people for more than a brief time period. Within that brief interaction some articulable suspicion must be reached to take things further (like the odor of an alcoholic beverage). Standard field sobriety tests are not included in implied consent. Implied consent only covers giving breath samples or, depending on your state, blood. In general (I can’t be certain for all 50 states) you do not have to perform sobriety tests. Where I am a little murky about the law is those field breath testers. They are not widely used in my state. When they are used they can only be used as part of probable cause and not as proof of the level of BAC. Only one type of machine has been scientifically tested and authorized by the state to be used to measure BAC and that’s the desktop alcotest machine back in the station. That’s what implied consent covers. But there is a lot of evidence gathering before you get to that point. But I am not sure if those field breath testers are part of implied consent in any state. Just like in NJ the rules governing that are probably in case law and not statute.
Right – and the legal system be damned; it’s not your responsibility, right? It’s not your problem if police can’t solve crimes because nobody gives them any of the information they need.
Well, it’s your right to be that selfish, but I wouldn’t be proud of it.
I’ve never had any negative consequences from speaking to police. At least, I never had any that weren’t due me to begin with, and I would have had them no matter what I’d said.
Protect from what? Termination? No. It puts limits on what they can do with a compelled statement. If you are compelled to make a statement under threat of termination that statement can not be used in court. But refusal to speak means they can follow through with the threat and fire you.
The important point is that it works on getting a confession from a guilty person. If you’re questioning an innocent person it doesn’t work.
The basic principle is that rather than trying to get the person to simply admit they committed the crime in question, you offer them an opportunity to explain why they committed the crime. A guilty person committed the crime and presumably had a reason for doing so. They will often take the opportunity to offer their explanation without realizing this is also an admission of guilt - explaining why you killed somebody necessarily includes admitting you killed them.
An innocent person is relatively immune to this process. They didn’t commit the crime and they didn’t have a reason for committing the crime. So they’re not going to see the need to confess to the crime or explain their reason for doing it. They’ll simply deny both the crime and having a reason.
Sometimes you’ll encounter a criminal who’ll try to outthink the process. He’ll say something like “I’m not saying I killed that guy but if I had killed him here’s why I would have done it…” That’s usually a bad idea - if you committed a crime, you shouldn’t discuss it at all. Offering details or justifications just gives the police more to work with.
What about the West Memphis 3? The cops were convinced the kids did it, ignored other possible suspects, and coerced a retarded kid into making false confessions. I’m not saying the cops were bad or corrupt, even, they probably thought they were serving justice and didn’t even think they were breaking or bending the rules. But SOME cops will stick to their theory no matter what. You never know which kind you’re talking to. And then there are cops who ARE corrupt or lazy or bad. Hell, police kill people for no good reasonand get away with it–not many or most, but some do.
I venture to say that there are no more bad apples on police forces than at, say, Google; but the consequences for the rest of us are much worse.
What would I do if asked questions by the police? I’m not sure exactly, but I am sure that if my wife disappeared or was killed I wouldn’t talk without a lawyer. It’s just too obvious that I’d be a suspect.
Obviously there are bad cops out there. But the point is that refusing to talk won’t protect you from a bad cop. If a bad cop decides you’re guilty and is willing to break the law to make you look guilty, then you’re fucked. The fact that you refused to answer questions isn’t going to save you because there are plenty of other ways a bad cop can falsely incriminate you.
Another “know your rights” video. Long, but worth viewing. It shows a series of staged police encounters that are handled badly by the contact, and then repeats them to demonstrate how they can be handled better. An important takeaway in many of these is that even if you think you have nothing to hide, you might. Maybe you’ve never smoked weed, but your buddy in the back seat tossed his stash under your seat when you got pulled over; consent to a search, and you, the driver, will be arrested unless your buddy is upstanding enough to take responsibility for his stash. Maybe it’s a used car or a rental, and you have no idea what’s under the seat or in the glovebox. House party? Are you sure none of your guests brought in contraband? Not sure? then DON’T LET THE COPS INTO YOUR HOUSE. Step outside to talk to them, and don’t admit to anything.