Not that I am planning on doing this, but if someone commits a crime and is caught without physical ID, can she avoid getting a criminal record by refusing to identify herself?
For example, say someone with no criminal history commits some minor infraction for which the penalty is very light (a fine or a month or two in jail). For whatever reason, the offender doesn’t want a criminal record. Can she simply refuse to identify herself to police and the courts, go through the judicial system as a Jane Doe, pay her fine or serve her time in prison, and then upon release disappear for a while and eventually resume her old identity? Or would the judge find her in contempt of court for not giving her name and threaten to keep her in prison until she identified herself?
This has apparently happened a lot, judging by the cases where the deception has been discovered later and reported on the news. I can recall a couple of cases on the news here locally in the past year or so. Even more often they present themselves as someone else, often a friend or relative that has no criminal past. Fingerprint and DNA checks take time and cost money. They’re not normally used unless there’s suspicion of a serious crime involved.
I had an aquantance who’s brother pulled that quite often. He was a few years older, but they looked remarkably alike. He would often carry his brother’s ID in case he got stopped by the police. He frequently had outstanding warrants for his arrest and, by pretending to be his brother, would avoid apprehension. He was into drug dealing and had many traffic violations. Neither of them were real smart, but the older brother was a fast talker and a convincing liar.
Or if after " Jane Doe" does her month or two in jail, she applies for a job or a license which requires a criminal record check. In which case they take her fingerprints.
Given that those fingerprints won’t neccesarily qualify her as a felon, would they wind up in the FBI database, having only been used to enter a query?
I realize that SOMEONE will have those fingerprints on file, but if you don’t get arrested in the same town, even fingerprints on file at a local PD can sometimes be as good as non-existent.
I mean, I’m sure if they’re looking bin Laden those private files will get hit, but if it’s a two-bit hood hitting a 7-11 in Upper Backwoods, GA, I’m thinking they’re not getting searched.
In practice, here’s how it goes down: you are arrested for something petty (driving with a suspended license, or unlawful littering), something that might ordinarily not result in even a one day jail sentence. But you refuse to identify yourself. At the initial appearance, the bailiff makes the judge aware of that fact (and the judge will likely already be aware, since they will have some sort of police report or booking sheet in front of him/her). The judge then proclaims that Mr./Mrs. Doe can rot in jail forever until they identify themselves to the satisfaction of the court. And they do.
Fingerprint records taken at booking are not regularly searched or cross-referenced, at least at the local level. I am assuming that the copy that goes to the FBI for filing do get classified as a regular practice, but I’m not certain. Automation has certainly helped in this regard.
I seriously doubt that anyone would “rot in jail” for refusing to ID themselves. First off you have to be charrged w/ a crime in a prescribed amount of time, tried in a timely manner, and sentenced, if you’re found guilty, according to the severity of your crime. Even if a judge could order you held in contempt, most jails across this country are overcrowded and early release is common. If your only crime is failing to ID yourself I doubt you’d be held more than a few days, or weeks at most.
The FBI maintains prints on criminals that have been in the federal system and those of people who have applied for, or been employed by the federal gov’t., directly or indirectly. I do not think that prints of local offenders go into FBI files, but I could be wrong on that.
All prints go into AFIS. Most departments have electronic fingerprinting. The prints get into AFIS imediately. If there is a descrepancy between the name and prints that are already on file then we hear back within a half hour usually.
A.R. you are wrong. John Doe will be held in contempt by the judge. No trial necessary. Not sure what the upper limit would be but he can hold Mr Doe for quite awhile. That is in addition to the original charge.
If someone never has had an ID one is automatically generated for them. In New Jersey your Driver’s License number means something. Each number corresponds to something such as your date of birth, eye color etc. When charged you will be assigned an ID number even if you never physically had an ID before. This will follow you around even if you leave your life of crime behind.
IANAL, but I did read that the Supreme Court has ruled that suspects can be compelled to give their identity. Cite.
But a little common sense here – if getting away with minor crimes were simply a matter of not giving one’s name to the police, don’t you think everyone would be doing it already?
I doubt there’s a definitive answer to this, but I was thinking of someone arrested in a protest situation, a likely scenario where someone might refuse to ID themselves on some, probably, misguided idea of principle. In a group arrest I suspect that all would be released. Often they’re held for a few hours and the charges are dropped, or a judge gives each a minimal fine. Pay your fine and you’re free. Could a judge hold them in contempt? Probably, but I again refer to the overcrowding of our jails as well as judicial systems. From a practical point of view, I think it’s unlikely.
I also doubt that everyone charged w/ some misdemeanor, like shoplifting, DWI, or public drunkenness, has their prints sent to the FBI. Fingerprint ID may look sexy on TV, but it’s not nearly as efficient as you might believe.
I’ve done it many times. It’s pretty efficient especially now that we have moved into the digital age. One recent example, a woman was arrested for shoplifting. She gave a name but had no ID. She was fingerprinted using our digital fingerprinting machine. The prints were automatically sent to AFIS. 25 minutes later we received a hit confirmation on the prints. The woman’s real name came back along with the dozen or so other aliases she has been arrested under. Seemed very efficient to me. I don’t work on TV.
If you piss off a judge enough he is not going to care if the jail is overcrowded. One rule I like to live by, don’t piss off a judge.
Fingerprinting has some mundane but important uses other than catching serial killers, like identifying people being charged with enhanced crimes due to prior felonies or misdemeanors, what they call “biometric identification.” For example, in Texas a third DWI is a felony. If you got a DWI five years ago in Houston, three years ago in Dallas, and one week ago in Muleshoe, you aren’t going to be able to convincingly deny your two prior DWI’s to the judge in Muleshoe, because the Muleshoe DA is going to pull your fingerprints off of AFIS or and prove them up through the local PD fingerprinting expert. Your fingerprints on all three arrests will likely be made available to the FBI’s IAFIS also, in case you forget to tell the federal agency you’re applying for a job with somewhere down the road that you have a few D-Wobblety-I’s in Texas.
Refusal to ID situations are like Loach says: you aren’t going to be able to bond out on the misdemeanor failure to ID you’ve been arrested for and avoid the murder warrant out for you in a different county by refusing to ID yourself, or giving an assumed name. They’ll run your prints and find out about the warrant.
“Compelled to give their identity” just means that they don’t have a legal right to refuse. But it’s not like the courts can imprison you indefinitely for failing to give a name, nor can they beat it out of you (unless they say they think you’re a terrorist). I agree with the second point, though, and I think that fingerprints are probably the reason.
In my state, everyone actually taken into custody for a crime gets fingerprinted. Those prints are sent to a state agency, which keeps the criminal history records (also known as a rap sheet). They are then compared to the records already on file, so if someone has an outstanding warrant or is on parole or probation, the proper notifications are made.
Certain offenses ( such as not paying the subway fare) can be handled by either an arrrest or a summons. The summons will only be issued if ID such as a driver’s license is presented. If the person refuses to give a name, or can’t provide ID, they go through the system and get fingerprinted.
Under certain circumstances, the record may be either sealed, or access might be limited law to enforcement. If there is a conviction of either a felony or a misdemeanor, the record will remain.
-The FBI may or may not keep records of someone with only a shoplifting conviction on their record. But many jurisdictions will check the prints of someone arrested for shoplifting against the FBI database. It’s not at all uncommon for someone with a warrant from NY to be located through a minor arrest in NJ.
If " Jane Doe" gets arrested and serves a month or two in the same state where she wishes to resume her life, she’d better stay away from jobs, licenses and certain volunteer positions which require fingerprint checks. Most, if not all, states have a statewide database which keeps records of both misdemeanors and convictions.
True, if you’re talking about " dust a room which may have the fingerprints of a hundred people, find a nice clear one of the perp who conveniently has a criminal record , and get the results in fifteen minutes". It’s plenty efficient in more realistic circumstances, such as finding out if the guy arrested for shoplifting tonight has a record before court tomorrow morning, or not having the person who applied for a job as a bank teller start until the background check comes back.
Did you read the cite? The plaintiff was arrested and convicted for refusing to identify himself. Which seems to be proof positive that refusing to identify yourself is far from a “get out of jail free” card; it can be a “go straight to jail” card.
Cite? AFAIK courts regularly imprison witnesses indefinitely for refusing to testify, so it doesn’t seem much of a stretch to imprison a defendant for refusing to testify to his name.
While I didn’t read the entire cite, I did skim it, and I believe I saw a reference that said the 5th amendment was a legitimate reason for refusing to ID yourself to a LE officer. It also said that the officer must have reasonable cause to ask for your ID.
While I’d like to believe that LE agencies were as thorough and efficient as they pretend to be, recent experiences tell a different story. We, too often, hear about serial criminals that have been in custody, only to be released w/o connecting them to their past crimes and outstanding warrants.