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Want to remain silent when questioned by the cops? You'd better speak up and say so. If you don't, your silence could be used against you.
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Salinas v. Texas. One of the worst SCOTUS decisions. There a defendant was being asked questions, stopped replying, and they used that in court as a sign of guilt. They rules that since he did not explicitly invoke his rights, that was ok.
Even better than invoking your 5th amendment rights, invoke the 6th. Your right to an attorney. No lawyer will tell you to talk, but if it ever does come up, it looks better to a jury. After all, some people have the attitude that pleading the 5th is only for the guilty, but wanting a lawyer and following their advice has a much lower negative connotation.
And of course, watch this video: https://youtu.be/d-7o9xYp7eE
It's (almost) never in your best interest to talk to the police. "Anything you say can and will be used against you." Invoke the 5th, then remain silent. You should also know your state's laws about identifying yourself. In my state, you must produce your id when pulled over operating a vehicle, but otherwise you're not required to id yourself. You don't have to let them enter your home without a warrant, either.
@wheresyourshoe in situations where the exigency clause is applicable such as a health checkup, you may have to let them into your home as you no longer have the 4th amendment protections against unreasonable/warrantless searches and seizures.
It's obviously circumstantial, but if you're not doing anything wrong they shouldn't have a reason to come in. Some cops will make up reasons, or might think a health check is enough reason. It all depends. They do need to believe someone is in danger inside your home. I've been welfare checked, and they didn't even ask to come in. I talked to them on my front steps.
Yep. You being silent can be written into the report in a way to help their case for probable cause. INAL, but have had my fair share of police encounters, and I've found there is not one size fits all approach, you really have to read the individual officer and game plan your approach on the spot. It's kinda a no win situation especially when cops are trained to escalate the situation.
It's kinda a no win situation especially when cops are trained to escalate the situation.
I'm English, so I don't know what USA police are like much, but surely your nation is not backward as to explicitly train police officers to escalate a situation?
Let me clarify this for you.
Whenever you read anything about police in the USA, mentally replace "police" with "the mafia, but for rich white people."
They are not only allowed to carry weapons, they are encouraged to kill, and they are protected from legal action by what we call "qualified immunity." The court system is thoroughly corrupted at all levels, from small local courts up to the Supreme Court. Police officers are allowed to do whatever they want and change the narrative afterwards, and the court system laps it up, seemingly unaware that police are only human and can totally lie. The police officer who killed George Floyd was involved in multiple murders before that fateful day in 2020, and that was just one guy.
The USA has a higher rate of imprisonment per capita than China does. Our leadership genuinely feels we have to keep millions of people locked up and working for corporations for literal pennies an hour, or else the whole system will start to fall apart.
Backward doesn't even begin to cover it. Barbaric would be closer.
It was more a turn of phrase, me being spiteful, but there's a few factors here, imo.
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Is that they aren't really trained enough. At all.
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It could possibly be by design
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Escalation = more charges or more likely to drum up charges that will stick = more likely to collect money on your possible imprisonment and or fines.
It's profit. The police and criminal justice system are a sham here, and yes we are quite backwards.
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It's the metrics. If they have a vague suspicion during a traffic stop, that there are, for example, drugs in the vehicle, perhaps because there's a Black person in the car, then by escalating, they can use the reaction as "probable cause" to search the vehicle.
Then they may find something that will help them meet their quota.
The entire article is worth reading, but here the most relevant part for your question:
"One teaching method he cited, however, was a chart of different mental states – each assigned its own color – describing levels of preparedness, or the lack of it, to respond to threatening situations. The chart was developed by former U.S. Marine Col. Jeff Cooper, now deceased, “as a means of setting one’s mind into the proper condition when exercising lethal violence,” according to a 2004 written commentary attributed to Cooper.
Kennedy features a fighting practice in an instructional video, showing him and students wrestling and trying to tackle one another. He described the practice as a form of “stress inoculation” that aims to improve officers’ performance under pressure."
https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/usa-police-extremism
Ehh, they are trained to try and find as much shit as possible, they want to pull you out of the car and search it when they pull you over if they even remotely think you have illegal shit.
Most want to put you in cuffs instead of write a ticket or give you a warning.
Keep your car crystal clear in the passenger compartment, be white, kiss their boots, and they might not try to pull you outta the car and waste an hour, depends where your at and who you got.
Also, if you're arrested in Louisiana and tell the cops "Just give me a lawyer, dog," be sure to make clear that there's a comma between "lawyer" and "dog." Otherwise the courts may conclude you haven't invoked your constitutional right to an attorney because you were asking for a canine.
You shouldn't be disrespectful to people who can fuck up your life (well you shouldn't be disrespectful to most people, but especially not when they have power over you). You can assert your rights without being hostile. Just be nice, say: "I invoke my 5th amendment right to silence, and I would like to contact an attorney." No need for "bitch" or "pig" or anything similar. I'm personally not a fan of law enforcement, in fact I resent them, but I aint gonna flip them off when I see them.
Edit: When I say "disrespectful" I meant more like "provocative". Don't try to provoke a hostile reaction. I know it sucks to be nice to cops, but sometimes you just gotta hold in the anger, just to live to fight another day.
I think you may have intended your comment as a top-level one rather than a reply to mine. But in case there's any confusion, there isn't a single thing about my comment above that suggests anyone should be "disrespectful" to police or anyone else.
Nor was disrespect at issue in article I linked. A guy demanded an attorney, as he was permitted to do under the US Constitution; he was denied that right; and a Louisiana Supreme Court justice articulated a frivolous reason for excusing that denial. Even if he had been disrespectful (and there's no indication he was), that should not be acceptable.
Some hypothetical about individual disrespect has no bearing on a systemic abuse like that. Which is why I assume you didn't mean your comment as a reply to mine.
I Plead the fifth! smack smack
I plead the fifth! smack smack
One. Two. Three. Four. Feee-Ifth.