Posted on 08/19/2011 6:11:36 AM PDT by marktwain
Over here, you don't get a criminal record merely for being arrested.
Any arrest, especially one involving violence and injury/death, would REQUIRE one to retain an attorney, with costs easily approaching five figures, regardless of adjudication.
Over here, you can use a free duty solicitor that won't cost you anything. Lastly, any arrest would mean a trip to jail and a hefty bond to get released. Depending on the locale, the short stay in jail could be hazardous to one's health.
If you are arrested in Britain, you can be detained for up to 48 hours (worst case scenario, if you are suspected of terrorism). If you haven't been charged, you will be detained in a single police cell. Suspects that haven't been charged can be released on police bail, which does not involve the payment of a bond. You actually have to be charged with something before they can remand you in custody until your trial and force you to share cell space with other criminals in the meantime, and you are only remanded in custody until trial if you are deemed a danger to the public or a serious flight risk.
I can only assume that arrests in England are considered much differently, otherwise you wouldn't dismiss them and their negative ramifications so blithely.
Yes it is, from the looks of things being arrested in America is a punitive measure in itself, inflicted on people who haven't even been charged with anything...
Yes it is, from the looks of things being arrested in America is a punitive measure in itself, inflicted on people who haven't even been charged with anything...
The United States is a big heterogeneous country. In some places, being arrested can be a very serious punishment. I think that is a nasty flaw in our criminal justice system, but it is getting better, and will likely become much better as surveilence technology continues to decrease in price.
I have been teaching concealed carry weapons courses in Arizona for 15 years. I tell my students that if they become involved in a deadly force situation, expect to be held for a day or two by the police while they sort things out. It doesn't happen all the time, but it is fairly common. Much depends on how clear-cut the circumstances are.
We had a person in Arizona who killed someone who was attacking him. It seemed pretty clear-cut to me, but it took a couple of appeals and three years before he was exonerated and freed. He was initially convicted and spent three years in jail.
He was a retired school teacher who had never been in trouble with the law. His attacker was someone with a violent history and mental problems who was living out of his car.
If you wish to read about the case:
That case just highlights the importance of allowing evidence that can put a justifiable homicide in context. I’m sure the prosecution would have allowed evidence that theorised a defenden’t motive, so it would only have been fair for the defence to do the same. But it also highlights what can go wrong legally if you are better armed than an assailant who comes off worse...
I second Zeppo’s response the Scottsman.
Scottsman’s excitability and also his penchant for the use of invective and personalizing factual disputes overpowers his reason.
I use it as an example to show that you should not give a statement to the police until you have spoken with an attorney.
I don't want to high jack this thread, but it was a very unusual case in Arizona jurisprudence. It is highly unusual to have the state legislature have to pass legislation four different times in order to correct what was perceived to be an injustice.
It might be worth noting that our current director of Homeland Security, former U.S. Attorney General for Arizona, appointed by President Bill Clinton, former Arizona Governor, Janet Napolitano, vetoed the legislation that would have given Harold Fish another trial. She did it twice, for what I thought were extremely questionable reasons.
A flaw in the Arizona law about self defense was corrected because of that case.
This is a core concept in teaching about justification for the use of force in the United States.
1—The BBC is a media organisation. For an academic to use it as the authority on a particular point is frankly ridiculous. For you and I to use it would be bad enough.
The BBC is a media organisation, it is not the creator of laws nor is it the organisation who dispenses guidelines and rules.
2—Toy guns are not banned, and the assertion is so ridiculous I almost considered not actually dealing with it. As to replicas, Ms Malcolm stated in her article that they were banned. Again, an astonishingly appalling piece of research by an academic.
In her retort to me via Powerline, you will notice she shifts her argument, because she knows that I was right. That replicas were and are not banned, only those not subject to recent laws regarding the colour and style.
3—Ms Malcolm used her author as the focal point of her point, I used the actual Hansard link from 1946 to make my (correct) point. My use of the 1971 book was merely an addendum, what I said was that the 1946 proof is found in books as far as back as 1971 and before, to show just how wrong she got her ‘1964’ point.
My reference to the 1971 book was neither here nor there, I didnt need it to make my salient point. Malcolm used and needed Williams to make hers.
3—My ancedote is very relevant.
I am British. She is not.
I live here. She does not.
I have been a victim of British crime. She has not.
I have experience of the actual (Scottish and English) legal systems, having been both a victim and a particpant (court clerk in both Scotland and England AND a civilian worker for the police in Glasgow and the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority, a job which entailed dealing with the courts, the police and the victim and their families).
So I KNOW that this academic is telling the biggest nonsense. She is either a very poor academic or she is lying and distorting facts to make a spurious argument.
4—It is very relevant regarding her use of an author/expert dead for 14 years and not published for over 30. Because she is using his outdated expertise to cement her point on a issue where that expertise is outdated BECAUSE of the law changes that have happened 1997-2011 (Labour and Tory govts). Again, she is either woefully out of date or she is deliberately distorting the argument.
5—No, I am not excitable.
I AM angry. Very angry that an academic, of all people, is peddling such nonsense about Britain and the British legal systems.
Wouldnt you be angry if the tables were reversed?. Or is it ok for Americans to get angry at pompous Limeys and Eurotrash, but when we get annoyed, we are just over-excitable?.
And you miss an obvious point about me:
ALL the other British Freepers who have posted in the Malcolm threads have backed me 100% and stated also that what Joyce Lee Malcolm says is utter rubbish.
So dismiss me, but you might want to think that when all the British people on this site say something is a lie, it just might be a lie......
You have to understand that as he was taking part in a Parliamentary debate in his capacity as Home Sec, therefore he was not giving a personal opinion. When he or any senior minister makes such a statement, they are stating govt policy on an issue.
I understand the use of ‘I’ might confuse, but he was speaking as the Home Secretary, not as ‘I’, the individual.
As Home Secretary, then, he was able to make major policy decisions such as this without debate in Parliament or the passing of legislation?
It appears to me that was the case.
Britain isn't the only place the bureaucracy is more the master than the servant. We have experienced it in the United States as well. Might I mention the EPA.
Well, in the US, you can't be arrested without probable cause that you've committed a crime. They can't just lock you while they figure out if you've done something wrong, even if only for 48 hours.
If they don't have reasonable suspicion that one HAS committed a crime, supported by evidence, you cannot be arrested.
So while arrests are more punitive here, they are not used to "figure things out."
Of course, if subsequent investigation produces probable cause, they will swear out an arrest warrant and come and get you.
Forgot to add, once arrested, you must be charged within 48 hours or released.
Maybe outside the home or auto, but in Georgia, there would have to demonstrable evidence that the force was used in something other than self-defense for there to be an arrest.
I have always considered probable cause had to be articulable, not just "we don't know what happened, sit in this cell while we figure it out."
Maybe outside the home or auto, but in Georgia, there would have to demonstrable evidence that the force was used in something other than self-defense for there to be an arrest.
I have always considered probable cause had to be articulable, not just "we don't know what happened, sit in this cell while we figure it out."
If someone was threatened, shot or killed, and there are conflicting stories about what happened, there is often probable cause. Our two statements are not in conflict.
When a Freeper relates an incident from his direct personal experience to illustrate the misepresentation by an apparently reputable academic of easily verfiable fact, only to have that experience dismissed or even disbelieved, then a little 'excitability' and 'invective' are surely in order? In the circumstances, his response strikes me as a model of decorum.
I've come late to this thread, but would like to add my endorsement (along with that of the other British Freepers the Scotman has mentioned) of everything he has said.
The US Justice system seems to have a rather dubious policy of making being arrested part of the punishment by throwing you in with other criminals and then forcing you to declare the fact that you were arrested to future employers etc even if you haven't been convicted or accepted a caution for anything. That is a bit screwed up if you ask me...
Obviously, Americans are more comfortable with the concept of justifiable homicide than Britons.
The US Justice system seems to have a rather dubious policy of making being arrested part of the punishment by throwing you in with other criminals and then forcing you to declare the fact that you were arrested to future employers etc even if you haven't been convicted or accepted a caution for anything. That is a bit screwed up if you ask me...
On the other hand, the idea that you can be detained without any articulable evidence that a crime has been committed seems screwed up to me. We have the 4th Amendment which protects us from arbitrary arrest.
Arrests are viewed more seriously here because in order to BE arrested, there has to be a serious indication that you've actually broken the law.
On the question of the distinction between arrest and charge, it’s worth noting that the British practice in this area has changed since the quite recent (1986) introduction of the Crown Prosecution Service, a body independent from the police which is responsible for bringing prosecutions in all but the most minor offences. Before that time prosecutions were brought by the police themselves, who were both the investigating and the prosecuting authority. I mention this bit of history because, as I remember it, the U.S. prosecuting model was consiously used in devising the role of the CPS. One of the consequences is that an arrest has less significance than it did formerly.
Interesting. Thanks for that info.
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Malcolm’s moment (UK)
powerlineblog.com ^ | 18 August, 2011 | Scott Johnson, Joyce Lee Malcolm
Posted on 19 August 2011 14:11:36 GMT+01:00 by marktwain
5 posted on 19 August 2011 17:39:19 GMT+01:00 by the scotsman
I have read the comments by Professor Joyce Malcolm “To Keep and Bear Arms: The Origins of an Anglo-American Right” published 1996, “The soft-on-crime roots of British disorder” Wall Street Journal newspaper of 2011, “The English riots: How British law fosters disorder” http://www.powerlineblog.com blog of 2011
And I have read the comments by “the scotsman” who states that subjects of the crown have not had the right to possess and use firearms for self-defense since at least 1946, and backs this up with the statement “I have experience of the actual (Scottish and English) legal systems, having been both a victim and a particpant (court clerk in both Scotland and England AND a civilian worker for the police in Glasgow and the Criminal Injuries Compensation Authority, a job which entailed dealing with the courts, the police and the victim and their families).”
“the scotsman”, whoever he is, is a liar.
The following are the exact words that hundreds of United Kingdom Home Office Metropolitan Police police officers had to say every single day to police sergeants as firearms were issued to them from the years 1966 to 1996. Maybe they still do in 2011. The Metropolitan Police is the only police force that comes directly under the control of the Home Secretary. The numbers fluctuate over the years, but the Metropolitan Police usually has 20% to 25% of all the affirmed police officers in England and Wales.
CONFIDENTIAL
FOR POLICE EYES ONLY
METROPOLITAN POLICE
GENERAL ORDERS AND REGULATIONS
made by the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis with the
approbation of the Secretary of State for the Home Department.
PRINTED BY HOBBS THE PRINTERS LIMITED, SOUTHAMPTON
1969
GENERAL CONTENTS
PART 1 - ADMINISTRATION
Section 6. SERVICE REGULATIONS, ETC.
SEC. 6 - SERVICE REGULATIONS, ETC.
Firearms for use of police Paras. 19-34
Operational use Paras. 19
SERVICE REGULATIONS, ETC. - SEC. 6
FIREARMS FOR USE OF POLICE
Use
Operational use of firearms.
19. EVERY POLICE OFFICER TO WHOM A WEAPON IS ISSUED MUST BE STRICTLY WARNED THAT IT IS TO BE USED ONLY IN CASES OF ABSOLUTE NECESSITY, e.g., IF HE, OR THE PERSON HE IS PROTECTING, IS ATTACKED BY A PERSON WITH A FIREARM OR OTHER DEADLY WEAPON AND HE CANNOT OTHERWISE REASONABLY PROTECT HIMSELF OR GIVE PROTECTION, WHEN HE (AS WELL AS A PRIVATE PERSON) MAY RESORT TO A FIREARM AS A MEANS OF DEFENCE.
(Reprinted: October, 1977) (Set 10/77) 6/5
I have spoken to a Metropolitan Police public firearms police inspector that served from 1966 to 1996, and he confirms that it was well known that subjects of the crown had the absolute right to possess and use firearms for self-defence and hundreds of Metropolitan Police police officers had to verbally state this every day in order to obtain firearms when on duty, as shown above.
However he says that he, like every other public firearms police inspector, had confidential instructions from both the Metropolitan Police Commissioner’s Office and the United Kingdom Home Office. Both instructions stated that public firearms inspectors were under no circumstances ever to discuss whether or not subjects of the crown had the right to either possess or use firearms for self-defence. Furthermore, if any application to the Commissioner’s Office by a member of the public for a firearms certificate for self-defence was received, then full details of both applicant and circumstances were to be obtained, in addition to a careful interview of the applicant by the pubic firearms inspector, before forwarding the firearms certificate application to the Commissioner’s Office for approval. There every such application would be refused by the Commissioner’s Office.
Both sets of instructions also reminded the public firearms inspector, that any firearms certificate applicant that was refused a firearms certificate for any reason, had the right under the Firearms Act 1937 and Firearms Act 1968 to appeal the refusal to the justices of the peace at the quarter sessions, and when the quarter sessions were replaced by the crown court in the 1970s, to appeal the refusal to a recorder or justice at the crown court. Therefore a public firearms inspector had to obtain as much evidence as possible for the refusal in the case of such an appeal against the Metropolitan Police Commissioner.
The Metropolitan Police public firearms inspector I spoke to, told me that he had never heard of any member of the public making an appeal to a judge upon the refusal of the grant of a firearms certificate for self-defence.
I guess if the England public allow the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and the United Kingdom Home Secretary to break the law, then the Metropolitan Police Commissioner and United Kingdom Home Secretary will break the law.
Firstly, the British people are not subjects of the crown and have not been since 1981 and the British Nationality Act. The British people are citizens.
Secondly, I referred to my personal experience clearly in a general term, about Ms Malcolm’s lack of experience of the British legal systems not specifically on the firearm issue. You have distorted my point.
Thirdly, again you either are not reading my posts correctly or are distorting them. Because my references to 1946 are about CIVILIAN British ownership of firearms, not the police, whose rights to arms are of course different.
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