Why is the defendant presumed guilty in traffic court? This article says, &quot;When it's your word against the police officer's [regarding a failure to stop at a stop sign], the person with the badge usually wins.&quot; It seems like the officer should have to present at least some kind of evidence that the alleged crime occurred. I could see this being in the form of a video from his or her dash cam. However, if it's his or her word against mine, what prevents him or her from pulling people over to meet some kind of quota?
It seems like the officer should have to present at least some kind of evidence that the alleged crime occurred. Testimony is evidence. Officers can and do abuse this, but courts tend to give them the benefit of the doubt, so they typically attribute greater weight and credibility to a police officer's testimony than to that of a defendant.
Even before the police have any idea who did it, Bob is guilty of whatever wrong he did. However, if you want this to be a legal question and not a moral one, we should assume that you really want to know "Can Bob be convicted of murder, if the evidence proves that he did do it?". Yes, he can. See Morris v. State, 214 S.W.3d 159. The critical question was whether the defendant understood the charges (he did) and whether he could assist in his defense (he could). The desideratum of being able to assist in your own defense only goes so far. On the other hand, maybe no, per Wilson v. US. A government expert witness "testified that appellant had permanent retrograde amnesia and would not be able to aid in his own defense in terms of remembering any of the acts alleged in the indictment". The crucial difference seems to be whether one just has loss of memory, vs. loss of memory connected with some other mental disorder. [Addendum] Per Dusky v. United States 362 U.S. 402, competence to stand trial depends on whether the accused has sufficient present ability to consult with his lawyer with a reasonable degree of rational understanding -- and whether he has a rational as well as factual understanding of the proceedings against him. I am not aware of any exceptions e.g. whether this is not the case with strict liability crimes like statutory rape, and since it is generally held that "competency" is a requirement mandated by the due process clause, I don't think there could be an exception.
england-and-wales NO Unlike some other jurisdictions, there is no requirement for an officer to have &quot;probable cause1&quot; or suspect an offence as the police can stop a vehicle for any reason under section 163 Road Traffic Act 1988: (1) A person driving a mechanically propelled vehicle on a road must stop the vehicle on being required to do so by a constable in uniform or a traffic officer. (2) A person riding a cycle on a road must stop the cycle on being required to do so by a constable in uniform or a traffic officer. (3) If a person fails to comply with this section he is guilty of an offence. There is no associated power to search the vehicle or its occupants but under section 164 and section 165 the driver must produce inter alia their licence, name, date of birth, address, insurance details and other relevant documents as the case may be. Note that although vehicle stops can be random, police officers are subject to the public sector equality duty under section 149 Equality Act 2010 and not permitted to stop a vehicle solely based on the occupants' protected characteristics. 1The term &quot;probable cause&quot; is not used in the UK, but roughly equates to somewhere around reasonable suspicion / reasonable belief
If you consent, the evidence can almost certainly be used against you. Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429 (1991) (&quot;Even when officers have no basis for suspecting a particular individual, they may generally ask questions of that individual, ask to examine the individual's identification, and request consent to search.&quot;) If you refuse consent, it is not clear whether the evidence can be used against you, as we don't know why the officer is asking to frisk you. A stop-and-frisk must be supported by a reasonable and articulable suspicion that you have just committed or are about to commit a crime, and that you are at that moment armed and dangerous. If they reasonably suspect you have just committed a crime but do not reasonably suspect you are armed and dangerous, the police may stop you, but they may not search you. That point is worth emphasizing because several other answers are incorrectly assuming otherwise. For one example, in Thomas v. Dillard, 818 F.3d 864 (9th Cir. 2016), the police responded to a report of domestic violence. Based on their reasonable and articulable suspicion that the suspect had committed that crime, the police stopped and frisked him. Because they had could reasonably explain why they thought he had committed a crime, but could not reasonably explain why they thought he was armed and dangerous, the court said the stop was legal, but the frisk was not: Whereas the purpose of a Terry stop is to further the interests of crime prevention and detection, a Terry frisk is justified by the concern for the safety of the officer and others in proximity. Accordingly, whereas a Terry stop is justified by reasonable suspicion that criminal activity may be afoot, a frisk of a person for weapons requires reasonable suspicion that a suspect is armed and presently dangerous to the officer or to others. A lawful frisk does not always flow from a justified stop. Rather, each element, the stop and the frisk, must be analyzed separately; the reasonableness of each must be independently determined. Even then, the search is basically limited to a minimally intrusive patdown to ensure you don't have any weapons on you, and the officer is generally not permitted to actually search inside pockets or the like, though the search may escalate based on what the officer is able to feel during the patdown. Minnesota v. Dickerson, 508 U.S. 366, 375–76 (1993) (&quot;If a police officer lawfully pats down a suspect's outer clothing and feels an object whose contour or mass makes its identity immediately apparent, ... its warrantless seizure would be justified by the same practical considerations that inhere in the plain-view context.&quot;) The refusal to respond generally operates as a refusal to consent. The police are therefore free to conduct whatever search they could have conducted without your consent. If they have a reasonable, articulable suspicion that you're carrying a gun, they can probably frisk you to see if that's the case. If they have a warrant to search your pockets, they can search your pockets. If they don't have any of that, they need to keep their hands to themselves.
In Massachusetts where I live, here are the general guidelines: In re G.L. c. 268, § 32B(b). A person can be charged with resisting arrest only when the officer is acting under the color of his official position (meaning he is on duty and acting according to those duties). The Commonwealth must also prove that the defendant knew that the person seeking to make the arrest was a “police officer.” The Commonwealth may do so by proving that the officer was in uniform or, if not in uniform, identified himself (herself) by exhibiting his (her) credentials as a police officer while attempting to make the arrest. Such credentials would include such things as a badge, insignia, identification card, police radio, or other police equipment such as a clearly identified police vehicle. Thus, in Massachusetts according to usual legal interpretation: (1) The officer must be on duty and acting in an official capacity. (2) The officer must be provably known to be a police officer by some means to the person charged. Resisting arrest must be ancillary to some other charge. You cannot just be charged with "resisting arrest" unless you are actually being arrested on some other charge (or interfering with someone else being arrested). So, as far as a search is concerned, even if the resisting arrest charge were thrown out, the real question would be why was the person being arrested in the first place? That would determine the admitability of the evidence.
In the circumstance you describe, you can refuse a breathalyzer test (&quot;opt to not take it&quot;), and doing so would not constitute probable cause for an arrest (the results of the test can be probable cause). That is when you are on the roadside. This is Washington's &quot;implied consent&quot; law. One of the first things that the law says is that the test is &quot;subject to the provisions of RCW 46.61.506&quot;, which includes the requirement that the test be performed according to methods approved by the state toxicologist and by an individual possessing a valid permit issued by the state toxicologist for this purpose. The state toxicologist is directed to approve satisfactory techniques or methods, to supervise the examination of individuals to ascertain their qualifications and competence to conduct such analyses, and to issue permits which shall be subject to termination or revocation at the discretion of the state toxicologist. There are other requirements regarding 15 minute prior observation. The legally required test is done in the police station by a specially trained technician, on an approved machine (the portable machine is not approved). The implied consent law also says that this test is &quot;required&quot; if arrested for any offense where, at the time of the arrest, the arresting officer has reasonable grounds to believe the person had been driving or was in actual physical control of a motor vehicle while under the influence of intoxicating liquor You are not required to take the Portable Breath Test, which is optional (when you have been stopped) – it's the post-arrest &quot;evidentiary&quot; test that is obligatory, using the approved procedure. Note that failing the optional test gives probable cause for an arrest, however there can be other grounds such as failing the line-walking test. If the officer just tells you that the roadside test is mandatory, that is a defense which can be used at trial ('cuz the optional test is not mandatory). Whether or not the portable test is admissible in court depends on the state: in Kentucky it is statutorily not admissible, likewise in Washington per court ruling. The other tests (often known as Standard Field Sobriety Test) are also optional, so ultimately it reduces to whether they already have probable cause, that is, if &quot;the totality of the facts and circumstances known to the officers at the time of arrest would warrant a reasonably cautious person to believe a crime has been committed&quot;. It is just not clear to me what actual circumstances distinguish mere reasonable suspicion (driving slow) from probable cause, but watery eyes, slurred speech and alcohol smell will make probable cause. I don't know if driving slow and having watery eyes is probable cause – I would think not. Dunno about &quot;smell of alcohol plus driving slow&quot;. In Birchfield v. North Dakota, 579 US ___ we find an example of a traffic stop with ample probable cause for an arrest (smell of alcohol, bloodshot watery eyes, driving into a ditch, failing the alphabet test and massively failing the voluntary breath test). The analogous North Dakota law is largely similar to Washington law, mandating only the &quot;approved&quot; more technical version of the test and not the roadside test. Defendant, in that case, refused the mandatory test. A crucial difference compared to Washington law is that while suspension of driving privileges follows from refusal under Washington law, refusal in North Dakota is itself a misdemeanor per N.D.C.C. § 39-08-01. The issue for SCOTUS is whether a law criminalizing refusal to submit to a breath test (but not a blood test) violates the 4th amendment: it does not.
It's illegal if the intent is to deceive. Under S50(1) of the Police Act 1996: Any person who with intent to deceive impersonates a member of a police force or special constable, or makes any statement or does any act calculated falsely to suggest that he is such a member or constable, shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding six months or to a fine not exceeding level 5 on the standard scale, or to both. Their intent would need to be proven. It will be fact-specific; in some cases far easier to prove than in others. The criminal justice system is overburdened and underfunded so it is no surprise that these trolling videos are given no priority whatsoever. Further complicating the matter is the need to correctly identify the individual to prosecute. Doing so would require a fair amount of police time, time that could perhaps be spent on more urgent priorities given the relative lack of harm these videos are doing compared to more serious crimes. However, in this video (Would You Help a Police Officer Having An Asthma Attack?) an S50(2) offence would seem to have been committed by the actor wearing the police clothing: Any person who, not being a constable, wears any article of police uniform in circumstances where it gives him an appearance so nearly resembling that of a member of a police force as to be calculated to deceive shall be guilty of an offence and liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale. It does appear that both offences are being committed in these various videos, and the only reason people aren't being prosecuted is practical: there are more serious crimes to focus on, and the police would need to identify who exactly committed this crime--given these all happened at least two years ago, it would be challenging to say the least. They also seem to commit the separate crime of wasting police time, for example by approaching cops in the street and falsely confessing to crimes. Under S5(2) of the Criminal Law Act 1967, wasting police time is a criminal offence. Bringing proceedings in court requires the consent of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) since those proceedings could have a chilling effect on the propensity of the public to report genuine matters to the police in the future. It is likely that while &quot;wasteful employment&quot; of police time was caused by these people, so committing the offence, it is likely viewed simply as &quot;part and parcel&quot; of the job and the officer likely didn't spend any time at all investigating the confessions (depending on their nature). Of course, even if the officer did spend time investigating the false confessions, the DPP would need to give their consent so unless the person has a demonstrated history of doing this (that would stand up in court) or the time wasted was of a particularly serious nature (e.g. the man who falsely claimed to be the Yorkshire Ripper), it seems unlikely consent would be granted.
This recently came up in a local PA homeowner association. Legally they own the roads in their development, but they have erected stop signs to make it clear who has the right of way and asked the township police to enforce them. A resident challenged the right of the police to enforce traffic laws on private property, but lost his appeal (albeit at the municipal level). The judge explained that the residents and any visitors had a reasonable expectation that the traffic signs would be obeyed, and that therefore violating them was just as dangerous as violating them on public roads, and that the same law and penalties would therefore be applied.