Why is the Miranda warning typically given during an arrest? I'll admit that this question stems more from indirect experiences through popular culture and not real-life experience (fortunately), but I think there's still some real-life backing to it. The "Miranda rights", as established in Miranda v. Arizona, must be read to a subject prior to interrogation so he or she is aware of the possible consequences of statements/confessions/etc. However, typical depictions of arrests - at least in popular media - show suspects being "read their rights" during their arrest, despite the fact that they are not undergoing, nor immediately about to undergo, any form of interrogation. Why is the Miranda warning typically depicted as being given during an arrest, and not immediately before an interrogation? Is there a law that states that this is necessary?
An interrogation isn't necessarily a sit-down-in-a-room thing. Miranda v. Arizona clarifies what they mean by "interrogation" for the purposes of that opinion: By custodial interrogation, we mean questioning initiated by law enforcement officers after a person has been taken into custody or otherwise deprived of his freedom of action in any significant way. If any post-arrest questioning might happen, it is prudent to inform the defendant of their rights. Miranda also reminds us that: Any statement given freely and voluntarily without any compelling influences is, of course, admissible in evidence. The fundamental import of the privilege while an individual is in custody is not whether he is allowed to talk to the police without the benefit of warnings and counsel, but whether he can be interrogated. [...] Volunteered statements of any kind are not barred by the Fifth Amendment, and their admissibility is not affected by our holding today. The police are not required to give a Miranda warning in order to make use of statements that the defendant volunteers while in custody. But, police generally can't predict when they might ask the defendant a question (or otherwise make the defendant feel compelled to answer).
Brief detentions and reasonable suspicion You can be briefly detained by police if they have reasonable suspicion that you committed a crime. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968) What reasonable suspicion "means" can only be fully understood by reference to subsequent case law (which I will expand this answer to do), but as a basis, the court said in Terry that: the police officer must be able to point to specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion This standard has been reiterated as recently as in Heien v. North Carolina 574 U. S. ____ (2014), where they say "All parties agree that to justify this type of seizure [a traffic stop, in the case of Heien], officers need only reasonable suspicion — that is, a particularized and objective basis for suspecting the particular person stopped of breaking the law" (internal quotation marks omitted). The reasonable suspicion standard was also used recently in Navarette v. California 572 U. S. ____ (2014). They reiterated that reasonable suspicion is dependent upon both the content of information possessed by police and its degree of reliability, quoting Alabama v. White, 496 U. S. 325, 330 (1990). A mere "hunch" does not create reasonable suspicion, but the level of suspicion required by the reasonable suspicion standard is "obviously less than is necessary for probable cause". Arrests and probable cause To be arrested, police require probable cause. Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160 (1949) In more detail, probable cause exists (from Brinegar v. U.S.): where the facts and circumstances within the officers' knowledge, and of which they have reasonably trustworthy information, are sufficient in themselves to warrant a belief by a man of reasonable caution that a crime is being committed Also: The rule of probable cause is a practical, nontechnical conception affording the best compromise that has been found for accommodating these often opposing interests. Requiring more would unduly hamper law enforcement. To allow less would be to leave law-abiding citizens at the mercy of the officers' whim or caprice. As in the case of reasonable suspicion, the probable cause analysis is case-by-case and fact-intensive, so to understand the contours of probable cause will require reference to much subsequent case law. In Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89 (1964) the question before the court was entirely "whether or not the record in the case before us can support a finding of probable cause for the petitioner's arrest". In that case, it turned out that the information they had received about the arrestee was not sufficient for probable cause, but regardless, the test the court applied was whether the police had probable cause for the arrest. Notes While I am confident in the correctness of this answer, what each of these standards means will take hours of work to flesh out, which I plan to do. The courts have repeatedly reiterated and referred to these decisions/standards, but the analysis is very fact-intensive and is done case-by-case. Also, I realize the presentation is a little scattershot, as I'm first just looking to include relevant cases and statements the court has made about these standards, but I'll re-make it into a coherent story every once in a while.
...in this case the officer has "definite cause." Why is probable used? "Probable cause" is a standard for when a property search can be conducted or a warrant issued. According to the Wikipedia article you linked to, Ballentine's Law Dictionary defines probable cause as a reasonable amount of suspicion, supported by circumstances sufficiently strong to justify a prudent and cautious person's belief that certain facts are probably true We do not talk about "definite cause" because there is no such legal standard. Having "definite cause" as you suggest here simply means you have a very strong case to satisfy the legal standard of probable cause. Referring to the above definition, the officer whose drug-sniffing dog alerts at a traffic stop certainly has a "reasonable amount of suspicion." The officer may actually have an incredibly high amount of suspicion, but that's irrelevant to the probable cause standard. It is merely sufficient that the officer's level of suspicion is "reasonable" and backed by suitable evidentiary circumstances. It just seems like any way you try to interpret the word "probable" it doesn't make sense, you either have cause to search/arrest/etc. or you don't where is the probability? The probable cause standard is "probable" because it does not impose exacting requirements on law enforcement. (Note that the U.S. Constitution uses "probable" slightly differently from its modern meaning; see another answer.) It need not be blatantly obvious that a crime is being committed but likely that a crime is being committed. Of course, the exact standard of how likely is likely enough to satisfy the standard of probable cause (and what evidence constitutes a particular threshold of likelihood) is a test for the court to determine.
Self-defence has nothing to do with whether you are performing an arrest (lawful or otherwise) Self-defence is a plea that you used reasonable force to protect yourself, others and in some jurisdictions, property, from immediate harm. There is, as you say, a “whole spectrum” of both the perception of the threat and the force used that go into determining if the actions of the defendant amounted to self-defence or not. That’s why it’s up to the jury to decide on a case by case basis. A person who has the power of arrest (law enforcement officers and citizens who actually witness a crime) is authorised to use reasonable force to effect that arrest. Of course, effecting an arrest may cause a situation to escalate to the point where self-defence becomes an issue.
"Police" that one would generally encounter in the US are local or state agencies, and the ordinary crimes you mentioned are matters of state law, so they would be reported to local or state police. (There are federal law enforcement agencies, but they only deal with specialized areas of federal law, and you wouldn't ordinarily encounter them in daily life.) On the other hand, immigration is a matter of federal law. The responsibilities of local or state police are governed by state law, and the federal government cannot compel state officers to enforce federal law. A specific state's law could potentially require state and local police to ask about people's immigration status and/or ask the federal government to check on the status of someone they suspect might be illegal. I believe a few red states have enacted, or are considering, such laws, though they usually deal with people stopped by police rather than people filing a report. Some of these laws have been challenged in court, and I am not sure which exact parts of which laws are still being implemented for each of those states. Most states do not have such laws.
Your attorney can help you answer those questions, if necessary. Generally, you cannot know for certain. Mass. criminal procedure rule 6 covers arrest warrants – the Superior court can issue an arrest warrant. That warrant must be "signed" by the issuing official, will have the name or other reasonable means of identifying the subject, and the offense charged. An electronic signature is a signature. If the arresting officer does not have the warrant at the time of arrest, the arrest may proceed anyhow, and if he has the warrant, he shall on request show it to the defendant as soon as possible. If the officer does not have the warrant on him, he shall inform the defendant that a warrant has been issued. There is no practical way to look at a warrant and determine that is is a real warrant as opposed to a fake document created by thugs. There is no statute under which a person can resist arrest until they are satisfied that the arrest is by a legitimate officer and that the document was properly issued by the court. If there was no proper warrant, the arrest will probably be found unlawful and you will be set free until a proper warrant is issued. It would be unlawful for thugs to take you (impersonating an officer is a crime), and that is as far as the law goes. Ch. 267 of Massachusetts General Laws lays out the law regarding warrants, and those laws focus on the conditions for legally issuing a warrant, not for convincing a person that a warrant, search or arrest is legitimate. You may certainly attempt to confirm that the warrant and officer are real, but you cannot resist the search or arrest if you are not satisfied.
If the conditions at s.17 and s.24 PACE 1984, and PACE Code G are satisfied for the offence of rape then there is no requirement for a warrant. Once the suspect is in police custody he may be further arrested for suspected harrassment if any of the necessity criteria are met - this will depend on the particular circumstances of the case. An either way offence is, for these purposes, regarded as an indictable offence. A constable does not need to physically see an offence being committed, but he must have (a) reasonable grounds to suspect an offence has been committed (b) reasonable grounds to believe an arrest is necessary (c) the requesit belief to satisfy s.17 PACE 1984. All this will come from conducting a proportionate investigation in to the allegations.
The government must have reasonable suspicion to stop you and ask you questions. The government must have probable cause to arrest you. The government cannot question you if you have invoked your 5th Amendment rights The government must release you if you post bail which is set by a magistrate in some cases but can be posted without conferring with a magistrate for many minor offenses for which the amount is set in advance. Also, you can only be constitutionally held for a certain period of time without appearing before a court for an initial appearance at which you are charged and typically you have an attorney assigned for you if you cannot afford one. Generally speaking a lawyer for a defendant will either post bail on behalf of the client, or will seek to invoke the client's 5th Amendment right to silence and 6th Amendment right to counsel (including the right of a lawyer to visit his client in jail) making further detention much less useful, while challenging law enforcement to articulate probable cause for the arrest with the implication that a civil lawsuit and suppression of evidence and loss of credibility with the local judge could follow if they fail to do so. If the client is not brought before a court by the constitutional deadline (unusual, but not unheard of), the lawyer can bring this to the attention of the court and have the court demand that his client be brought before the court. Of course, strictly speaking the defense lawyer can't force the police to do anything. Instead, the defense lawyer persuades the police to do something based upon what a court is likely to do, or has already done, as a result of their conduct so far. Also, of course, it isn't always possible for a lawyer to get his client out of jail. If the police do have probable cause and the offense is not one for which bail is set in advance, it is not possible for the client to be released until bail is set by a judicial officer such as a magistrate and bail (if granted at all) is posted, which may be beyond the client's means in the case of a serious offense, particularly if the client is considered by the magistrate to be a flight risk. On TV and books, the person that the police have arrested is usually someone that the police had no probable cause to arrest but suspect of a crime anyway, and the police usually fold when called on the fact that they lack probable cause by the lawyer. Less commonly, on TV and in books, the lawyer facilitates the payment of bail on behalf of his client.