What Is The Proper Protocol When Arrested?

I was falsely arrested, had the charges dropped, my record expunged, and successfully sued the city for false arrest, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution.

I knew from the moment of my arrest the charge was bogus and I would be vindicated but I never thought about pulling a John Rambo on the cop...

when in douby shock the shit out of them when they pose no threat to you? To use a firearm there has to be a threat of immediate physical violence, but I guess that tasers can be used on a whim.

There were six freaking cops and they still had to zap him?

The taser is a copout more times than not

But if you resist an arrest for something you did not do you will still be charged with resisting arrest...It's a Catch 22...

We still have a justice system to address these issues...Cities lose false arrest cases all the time....

And ask them to apply it generously to the appropriate orifice of which they intend to violate.

No one ever spent time in jail for something they didn't say.

no one has ever been rounded up without cause or reason?

care to try again?

And I don't mean behind some bullshit play-time protest charge. I mean when your ass gets the cuffs tossed on and are facing real time in a real jail. Sit down, shut up, get a fucking lawyer.

Cops need to be held accountable for excessive force. Cops are supposed to be trained on how to handle people and should know better than to apply force when it is not needed. How was this guy a THREAT to them?

And there are courts that address police misconduct...

My point is that foolish and dangerous to resist arrest...

it is a very simple 'use of force issue'.

If a cop asks you to desist from picking your nose ,comply... If he arrests you for it sue his ass...

I will NOT comply just because some asshole with a gun and badge thinks they're the law of the land.

What if a cop tells me to shoot my kid because he's possessed by demons. I should just comply... right??

Some of us don't jump just because some jackbooted thug tells us to. It's called "knowing your rights".

If you are arrested:

1. Do not resist arrest, even if you believe you are innocent. You will be arrested anyway, and then you'll have the additional charge of Resisting Arrest. Also, the police are more likely to hurt people who resist arrest.


http://www.hootlaw.com/when_arrested.html

between a legitimate arrest and a false arrest. I also broke a cop's nose, jaw, left eye socket & arm after he tackled me from behind for no other reason than the fact that I was "in the wrong place at the wrong time". You know what happened to me? Not a damned thing, since 7 witnesses came forward and defended me.

No, I won't be giving up my freedom of speech, freedom to travel within my Country without fear of being harrassed nor my freedom of assembly just because some jackbooted thug doesn't like what I say or where I am.

"Those who would give up freedom for security deserve neither". <~~ wise words, if ever I saw any....

They were trying not to hurt him. You don't think that they couldn't have wrenched his arm behind his back, inflicted some serious pain, possibly dislocated something or broken something, and got him out of the hall. Of course the could have. They didn't though. They tried to get him to stop putting up a fight and used the least harmful, in the long run, way to get him to calm the fuck down. Perhaps they should have gone for torn ligaments instead? Maybe they should have gone all Beowulf on him and ripped his arm off. The tazer seemed to work. He was being a jackass.

...for anti-war clerics who dare to try to watch the last fading traces of democracy -- in this case, the Rev. Lennox Yearwood, a 36 year old Pentecostal minister and leader of something called the Hip Hop Caucus, who was trying to exercise his right to attend a public hearing conducted by his elected representatives. As Democracy Now's website puts it:


"The Rev. Lennox Yearwood, president of the Hip Hop Caucus, was tackled by six Capitol police officers after he tried to enter the Petraeus hearing on Monday. Rev. Yearwood was injured in the incident taken to hospital. He was later charged him with felony assault of a police officer."


WaPo reports say he never lifted his hands in either an aggressive or defensive posture, that he suffered a severely sprained ankle, and that there were eight cops rather than six. And of course, the felony assault charge proves it was all his fault anyway. No trial necessary; we'll just lynch him on TeeVee newsotainment.

But to the bigger picture: this episode just further asserts the new Constitutional reality that a participatory democratic republic is no longer necessary or even desirable in the land of the free, and that those wishing to watch these kinds of procedures need to stay home and watch C-SPAN.

But then, put yourselves in the cops' shoes...

Damn! If we'd only brought the taser along we wouldn't have had to put out so much effort and our uniforms wouldn't have gotten all sweaty and dirty and wrinkled. Think of the cleaning bill... Assault is the least they should charge him with. Maybe assault with a deadly weapon (we'll register his fists as lethal weapons as soon as the computer frees up). Maybe attempted murder with those deadly fists. That's the least the bastard should face for fucking up our uniforms. Nail the son of a bitch. Bobby Lee even got a cut on his little finger while he was wrestling the prick to the floor...


wp

Those instructors at the academies are blushing bright red. Good cops know how to do TAKE DOWNS, toute suit! ;)

he wasn't seriously harmed. Glad he wasn't. But he was resisting arrest, and he was acting like an asshole. I can't get up in arms about the cops doing what they did in this case.

He was fucked up on drugs.

kicked out of him. Just because someone's a drug addict and jerks a little after you've beaten the snot out of him, doesn't give you the right to continue. Whoa! I'm feeling surreal! :crazy:

And would have been able to make a way better case come judgement day.

Don't believe it? Watch COPS sometime.
Half the people arrested on that show would have got away if they had kept their mouth shut.

I waived my Miranda Rights... You might think it was foolish but I knew I was factually innocent...

Anyone who says anything to a cop in an "arrest" situation
without their lawyer being present is putting themselves
in legal jeopardy.

Once you've identified yourself to the cops and given
your date-of-birth, the *ONLY* additional thing you
should ever say is "I want my lawyer here and I will
not speak with you until my lawyer is here with me."

Repeat as many times as necessary.

Tesha

http://www.buzzflash.com/interviews/03/02/14_McDougal.html

be cooperative and get a lawyer as fast as you can.

if you're going to do it, you have to know what you're doing or you're going to get hurt. You can negotiate with the police, they just don't want any surprises.

I would like to see the brutality that is always exhibited against "our" side visited on the anti-choice freaks and their kind. But that never happens.

If you cannot avoid them, you are screwed (sometimes literally).

that is exactly what is going on in that picture. Medea Benjamin negotiated with the police to be able to engage in their protest without anybody getting arrested. People were catching planes and nobody wanted to go to jail that day.

Otherwise, you're SCREWN!!!1

They should immediately be quiet and try to stay calm. Do not resist. Do not attempt to argue with the police officer(s), including telling them your rights, or how to do their job.

When asked, identify yourself. Do not participate in any other conversation. Request an attorney.

Do not panic. Even if the police officer says things about what terrible things you face, do not respond. If a friendly cop asks what you think about the Yankees this year, do not respond.

Get a lawyer before anything else.

The court system will be where your side gets presented.

I did everything you said but I did waive my Miranda Rights because I knew I was factually innocent... I had ampicillin...The cop said it was qualudes...Total fricken idiot...It wasn't pleasant at all...Luckily it was in Daytona Beach Shores so I was taken to a holding cell there and bailed out before being taken to the main facility where I would have been thrown in with the general population...

...explaining what to do when arrested. Reacting to numerous news accounts of cops bashing protestors' skulls, the ACLU printed up a wallet-sized card that explained what to do when confronted with an arrest. I believe some of the pointers were:

1) Do not resist arrest
2) Follow the cop's instructions
3) Go peacefully; everything will be worked out at the police station

Of course, this does not cover what you do when confronted by an asshole/sadistic cop, but it should be helpful a majority of the time...

http://www.acluhawaii.org/downloads/policecard.pdf

It's only directly applicable to arrests in Hawaii,
but it will give you the general idea. They have a
separate card for teens, whose rights and responsibilities
vary somewhat.

Tesha

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gCCjFbFXn8

:rofl:

Thanks!

Obey the law
Use Common Sense
Stop Immediately
Turn that shit off!
Be Polite
Shut the fuck up
Get a white friend

and

Don't ride with a mad woman!

All excellent points and illustrated like only Chris can! :rofl:

"I didn't do nothin" over and over.

Yes, I would bet 5 bucks that is not the way to go

And it was a 3rd degree felony...

Even if it's over a traffic ticket. I got pulled over in February on a (supposedly) suspended license. It turned out that the state I used to live in (IL) suspended my privileges in 2006 because I didn't take an emissions test. Two major flaws here: I moved out of IL in 2003, and I sold the car in question in 2004, so neither the car or I are even licensed in that state anymore, and hadn't been for quite some time. Thanks to the Sedgwick County (KS) Sheriff (the authority who pulled me over), the next 6 months were a major headache. Without my experienced traffic court lawyer, it would have been a full-flown migraine. It was lowered to a driving without possession of a driver's license, then dismissed altogether. Thanks to experienced legal help, and the $500 I paid him to represent me, I avoided having a major infraction (and several points) on my driving record. Well worth it.

faith in the system is remarkable. glad it worked out for you, but many are not as fortunate and cannot afford to throw $500 down the toilet.

We settled for $3,500.00 in 1980 money... But I would have preferred it never happened...Even though I didn't do anything wrong it was still embarrassing and scary....

A lot of kids have NO idea how to act if they come in contact with police in any official capacity. ALWAYS explain to to your kids that they have to give police their names and addresses along with any driver's license and insurance information they can legally request in your state. Also make sure your kids understand that arguing with the police is a BAD idea and that they need to call YOU (their parent) before they say ANYTHING to the police other than giving their name and address and saying politely that they want to have their parents present if they are to speak with the police any further.

I knew an attorney that used to go out to schools and do talks with the high school age kids about what rights they have and how to act in any situation where they were in contact with the police, and it made excellent sense to me that he'd do that. He now does Federal legal work and I dunno if he still does that--I probably need to have my 10 year old talk to one of the criminal guys I know just so she knows her rights and how to act...


Regards!


Laura

eom

But in my contacts with the police, I did what they said and answered their questions truthfully. Of course, I had done nothing except speed or run a stop sign, so I had nothing to worry aabout.

But if you know you're on the wrong side of the law, dumb up, shut up, and lawyer up. And don't try to get physical with the police, Rodney King. You'll always lose.

then the use of a taser is appropriate, if NOT, as seems to be the case, then the use of the taser was inappropriate excessive use of force. Would they have killed him with a gun if the taser wasn't there, I don't think so.

I'm just saying even if you are innocent and resist arrest you will still be charged with resisting arrest...

however, people on this site seem to have no concept of "proportional use of force" and are defending the use of the so called less lethal taser in practically all situations, when in reality, they should only be used in place of firearms as a less lethal alternative.

I'm just recommending the best course of action when you're arrested...

Somebody up thread suggested otherwise...

When I was arrested I was on the beach... I was 21 years old and in the best shape of my life...I worked out five time a week, stood 6'1 tall, 195 pounds and not an ounce of fat...I was taking ampicillin for an ear infection...The cop said it was qualudes...

Was I supposed to say," Motherfucker, that's penicillin... I'm not putting no damn handcuffs on"...I would have got a beating, right there on Daytona Beach Shores and though I would have been exonerated on the controlled substance charge I still would have a "resisting arrest" charge on my record...

I let the legal process play out , was exonerated , and successfully sued the city...

charge, especially if the arrest itself was bad in the first place. I had a car where the trunk was broken, the lock on the trunk fell out, there was only a hole, and the trunk would close and lock, but was stuck "up" for lack of a better word, so it looked a little open. The bar attached to the body of the car was bent, but the trunk latched just fine, you just needed a flathead screwdriver to unlock and open it. How it got this way was stupidity, my buddies and drove to my girlfriend's house, to pick her up, and we hopped out of the car while it was running, ran to the front door, she came out, we walked back to the car, and were locked out. So we forced the trunk open, it took all three of us, and my skinny friend climbed into the trunk, folded down the backseat and unlocked the car.

I was young and stupid, what can I say. :)

Anyways, a few weeks later, I got pulled over, not for the trunk, the car is black, it was at night, and you couldn't see the trunk's edges or anything that well. He pulled me over for the "random" stops for drug searches. We pulled into a gas station, and he walks up to my car, asks me to get out, and then asks to search it. Not being that stupid, I said go ahead, you are wasting your time. After he was done, he then walked to the back of the car, noticed the trunk, and asked, sarcastically, "Do you have a body in there?"

He then asked me to pop the trunk, I told him that he needed a flathead screwdriver, other than that, good luck. I was just slightly irritated, I've been pulled over about a dozen times that year, I was almost 20 at the time, and haven't been issued so much as a ticket yet. The car I was driving was a black 4 door Corsica, not exactly a "hot item" for being pulled over, more a family car, but cheap, hence why I owned it. I didn't hide my feelings at being pulled over, but I didn't scream or anything, I was "caustic" in my responses to his inane questioning. He just gave up and left, I was just pissed. I figured if I was black, I probably would have been left dead in a ditch somewhere.

I figured the cop was just looking to score, cops in my area have a reputation for confiscating drugs for personal use.

eom

which, I agree, would probably end up bad for you. I've never been arrested personally, I've been pulled over plenty of times, even took a ride in the back of a police car, though that was only a ride, stuff like that, but never arrested. Also, I guess it would depend also on HOW you physically were arrested that matters as well, for example, passive resistance, like taught in the non-violence protest movements since the 1960s, is rather tame. Basically its, when you are arrested, don't cooperate, in other words, don't walk to the police car, force the cop to drag you, but at the same time, don't actively resist, that just the excuse the cops need to beat the crap out of you.

Then ask for an attorney. The cops are not your friends, nor do they want to be. They are there to get you off of the street if they perceive that you have broken the law. The judge is the only one who wants to hear what you have to say, and the courtroom is where your interests have the best chance of being protected.

:wow: :P

Otherwise you're likely to get tasered or shot or bit or clubbed for your trouble.

:rofl::rofl::rofl:

What do you recommend? Physically struggling with the cops while screaming your head off? Slugging the cop? Try to run away?
Depending on the circumstances, an alternative is to go limp and let the cops carry you out. But that's not what the guy in Florida did, so I'm wondering if anyone thought his approach was the right one.

Cops take down people armed with guns.. you and your protest sign will not win. So, unless you want a major beat down, just do what you're told and deal with the rest of it later on.

:-)