Must shoppers show receipts if they don&#39;t want to? Scenario Alice, a manager at Big Mart, observes Bob leaving Big Mart with three large flat panel plasma screen television sets. Alice asks Bob to produce his receipt. Bob refuses. Alice calls a police officer, Charlotte, to the scene and informs Charlotte that Alice saw Bob leaving the store with store merchandise but did not see Bob pay for it and Bob refused to produce his receipt when questioned. Charlotte asks Bob to produce his receipt for the items. Bob refuses Charlotte's request. Charlotte asks Bob if he paid for the merchandise. Bob responds by stating he is not legally required to produce his receipt nor answer any of Charlotte's questions. Questions: Is Bob under any legal obligation to show his receipt to either Alice or Charlotte? Can Charlotte legally detain Bob? What, if any, additional facts or evidence must come into play in order for Charlotte to arrest Bob? In the absence of an arrest, can Charlotte forcibly handcuff Bob and force him into her police car to take him to the police office for questioning? How does police procedure and the law work in this case?
No If she has probable cause, yes. The question is whether "a reasonable amount of suspicion, supported by circumstances sufficiently strong to justify a prudent and cautious person's belief that certain facts [Bob is a thief] are probably true"? Its likely that the answer to this question is yes. None No Charlotte listens to Alice, Charlotte asks Bob questions which Bob may or may not answer. Charlotte can ask Bob to produce the receipt, Bob doesn't have to. Charlotte can ask to search Bob, Bob doesn't have to consent. If Bob tries to leave, if Charlotte has reasonable suspicion the Bob has committed a crime (which she could certainly justify) she may detain him temporarily without arrest. If Charlotte has probable cause to believe that Bob has committed a crime (which she could probably justify) then she can arrest him.
Were two black men legally removed from a Philadelphia Starbucks? Maybe - its complicated. The crime of trespass in Pennsylvania relevantly involves: 3503 (b) Defiant trespasser.-- (1) A person commits an offense if, knowing that he is not licensed or privileged to do so, he enters or remains in any place as to which notice against trespass is given by: (i) actual communication to the actor; At face value, the store manager asked them to leave and by refusing to do so they committed the crime. However: (c) Defenses.--It is a defense to prosecution under this section that: (2) the premises were at the time open to members of the public and the actor complied with all lawful conditions imposed on access to or remaining in the premises; or If the condition imposed was &quot;buy something or get out&quot; then that would be a lawful condition and trespass would have been committed. If the condition was &quot;because you're black&quot; then that would be an unlawful condition and trespass would not have been committed. Now, the evil and insidious thing about unlawful discrimination is that there are lots of perfectly lawful masquerades that it can wear. Indeed, except in egregious cases, the unlawful discrimination can only be inferred by a holistic look at a large number of interactions to see where any particular one falls on the scale. That said, this particular case feels like racial discrimination. With respect to Starbucks, if they could show evidence that it routinely asks people of all ethnicities who did not make a purchase to leave then this would not be racial discrimination - just bad business practice. However, given the particular business model of providing a place to rest along with an opportunity to buy sub-standard coffee it seems unlikely that this was the case (I'm Australian so I completely fail to understand why Americans insist on drinking bad coffee). With respect to the police, this is a little less clear. It is not their job to determine how a court (or DA) might decide a case: its their job to determine if they have probable cause to believe a crime is or has been committed. They have a store manager who has asked people to leave and people who are refusing to do so - probable cause for trespass. That said, police have discretion as to how to handle the situation: they could talk to the manager, they could ask the patrons to leave or they could arrest them. They can use their discretion however they like: unless it is based on unlawful discrimination. Which brings us back to the beginning.
In the United States, you can always choose to (try to) flee police. If the police subsequently assert that they tried to detain you, then they can choose to charge you with a number of crimes (which vary by jurisdiction). The assertion that you did not (or could not) in fact hear or perceive a lawful order to stop is a defense that you could raise in response to such charges. It is up to the triers of fact to determine whether, given the specifics of the case, they accept that defense.
It is legal, at least in the US, for a store (or other entity) to refuse to sell any item to any individual for any non-prohibited reason (prohibited reasons are typically things like race or religion). More over, in various US jurisdictions, it is prohibited to "furnish" alcohol to a "minor" (for example, under California's ABC law), which can be interpreted as prohibiting to an adult if they reasonably suspect that adult will pass the alcohol onto the "minor". This is to prevent "straw" sales. Additionally, larger chains generally prefer to have harmonized policies across branches, and where practical, across state lines, so will have policies that can accomodate multiple alcohol control regimes.
There is no general law making it illegal to lie about debts, or anything else. It is illegal to lie to a law enforcement officer in the course of an investigation. (And of course it is illegal to lie in court testimony or when otherwise under oath.) But it is in no way unlawful to decline to answer, unless a proper court order has been obtained, or other lawful means of compelling an answer. I would expect any law office to respond to such a question with something like "Am I/we being investigated? If so, send the appropriate notice and our lawyer will consider what we should tell you. If not, tell us what information you want, and we will consider and provide a written response in due course." If a taxpayer has been found to be delinquent in paying taxes, in some cases a court order may be obtained seizing assets, including unpaid debts. But no IRS agent can make such a claim on the spot, and indeed for a client to make such a payment without such a court order, or the order of an IRS tribunal (or the creditor's written consent) would itself be unlawful and would subject the lawyer to a suit by the PI (Private Investigator). When the lawyer pays a service provider, a 1099 must be filed with the IRS. If the PI is a corporation, a different form is used, but a record of payment is still required. As failure to timely file such a form is a violation of the tax code, an accusation of paying without filing would permit the lawyer to decline to answer under the Fifth amendment. If the lawyer did pay and did file a 1099 or other documentation, the IRS would know what had been payed, and would not need to confront the PI. Also, as the comment by Hilmar points out, a PI would be likely to use the cash accounting method, and so would own no tax on work performed but unpaid (as yet). So unless the IRS agent thinks the PI was paid "off-the books" and is intentionally failing to report the payment, there would be no point to such a question. And if that were he case, the lawyer would be very likely to decline to answer. I find the story quite implausible.
You are allowed to ask the police whatever questions you like. There is an upper limit that you can't refuse to obey a lawful order on the premise that you want to ask a bunch of questions, but they don't seem to have ordered you to do anything, so you can ask away. They have no obligation to tell you anything or to be truthful, except for certain questions like "am I free to go" when you want to leave and are testing whether you are under arrest. Even then they don't have to answer your questions right away. The police can therefore ignore you, especially if you are asking curiosity questions. It might be that they are restricted from giving information in certain circumstances (pertaining to the privacy of others). If there is an issue of legitimate concern (e.g. Little Billy has been beating up on cats again) and you feel that you need to know this, then you can request the police record on the matter. Certain information will probably be redacted under state law, but you could get a report that states that some [redacted] juvenile was beating up on animals. The Florida records law is one of the first in he nation, dating back to 1909. You can read this, to see if you think the circumstances match one of the exemptions, though all you have to do is make the request and be told that the record is exempt, then you will have some idea what was going on.
There is no hard and fast rule to determine what constitutes proof beyond a reasonable doubt. In the first instance, the judge (or jury, when there is a jury trial) decides this on a case by case basis. If the officer testifies that the matters recorded in the ticket are true because it was the officer's practice to always record accurately what happened in a ticket, this would ordinarily not be grounds for reversal of a conviction on the ground of insufficient evidence, unless other evidence somehow put the officer's testimony in serious doubt (e.g. a social media post clearly putting the officer in another location at the time that the ticket was allegedly issued). Normally, the only kind of evidence that would not result in a ticket being upheld on appeal would be the failure of the officer to testify at all.
The 4th amendment protection against unreasonable searches is irrelevant, since it only relates to governmental searches. There may be &quot;shopkeeper privilege&quot; laws in your state that enable a detention. Ordinarily, you cannot be arrested by a person – that would be assault and false arrest. However, a state can enact an exception, such as Washington's RCW 4.24.220, which says In any civil action brought by reason of any person having been detained on or in the immediate vicinity of the premises of a mercantile establishment for the purpose of investigation or questioning as to the ownership of any merchandise, it shall be a defense of such action that the person was detained in a reasonable manner and for not more than a reasonable time to permit such investigation or questioning by a peace officer or by the owner of the mercantile establishment, his or her authorized employee or agent, and that such peace officer, owner, employee, or agent had reasonable grounds to believe that the person so detained was committing or attempting to commit larceny or shoplifting on such premises of such merchandise. As used in this section, &quot;reasonable grounds&quot; shall include, but not be limited to, knowledge that a person has concealed possession of unpurchased merchandise of a mercantile establishment, and a &quot;reasonable time&quot; shall mean the time necessary to permit the person detained to make a statement or to refuse to make a statement, and the time necessary to examine employees and records of the mercantile establishment relative to the ownership of the merchandise. Speaking of Walmart, here is a petition regarding a lawsuit against Walmart over such an event, where a shopper failed to stop to respond to exit security, resulting in her being physically stopped. A lawsuit (assault, unlawful imprisonment, outrage) ensued. The bottom line was that the shopkeeper's privilege is a valid defense against a lawsuit to the effect that a shopper does not want to comply with a request to prove that they are not stealing goods.