Police No Longer Need to Explain an Arrest

I'm not sure about the credibility of this as I copied it from Rense
I did some search, but didn't find more news about that, so here it goes:

Police officers don't have to give a reason at the time they arrest someone, the U.S. Supreme Court said in a ruling that shields officers from false-arrest lawsuits.
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The justices, voting 8-0, threw out a suit against Washington state police officers who stopped a motorist and then told him he was being arrested for tape-recording their conversation. Although the recording was legal, the high court said the arrest was valid because the man could have been arrested instead for impersonating a police officer.
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In an opinion for the court, Justice Antonin Scalia said the officers didn't have to provide a reason for arresting the man at all, as long as they had probable cause to do so.
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"While it is assuredly good police practice to inform a person of the reason for his arrest at the time he is taken into custody, we have never held that to be constitutionally required," Scalia wrote.
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The decision was one of five issued by the court today in Washington. In a second unanimous ruling, the court said the Florida Supreme Court was wrong to set aside a death penalty verdict on the grounds that the defense lawyer didn't obtain explicit client authorization to concede guilt and focus on the penalty phase of the trial.

Is that true???
If it means that police can arrest you now without the reason, that sounds like police state to me. Any comments???

[edit on 15-12-2004 by jazzgul]

I would not be surprised. What was it, last June, the part in the Miranda warning "you have the right to remain silent" got tossed out.

They have to have Probable Cause for arrest.

Probable cause is where known facts and circumstances, of a reasonably trustworthy nature, are sufficient to justify a man of reasonable caution or prudence in the belief that a crime has been or is being committed. (reasonable man definition; common textbook definition; comes from Draper v. U.S. 1959)
Probable cause is what would lead a person of reasonable caution to believe that something connected with a crime is on the premises of a person or on persons themselves. (sometimes called the nexus definition; nexus is the connection between PC, the person's participation, and elements of criminal activity; determining nexus is the job of a judicial official, and it's almost always required in cases of search warrants, not arrest warrants)
Probable cause is the sum total of layers of information and synthesis of what police have heard, know, or observe as trained officers. (comes from Smith v. U.S. 1949 establishing the experienced police officer standard)

.
What it means is the police can arrest you for NO REASON AT ALL,
and then figure out any bogus reason later on that will supposedly justify it.

When the Supreme court upholds a police state, the national government is worthless to law abiding citizens.Seattle Times
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Tell me someting I dont I know.!

It will allways be the same.

Shame!

What can you say but thankyou all who voted 4 more years...

Like I said its a shame!

So can we as a people move on, I would like to think so.

Dear God NOOO!!! The NWO is starting to take over

Welcome to the civilized world! Like most of Europe now the US enjoys an all-powerful police force...

Habeus Corpus, isn't that the right to have an explanation for arrest?
The only other time i remember the Habeus Corpus being yanked, was in the civil war, when Abe Licoln used it as a tactic.
I doubt they'd do it for no reason, unless bush was up to something.

Originally posted by CountFranklin
Habeus Corpus, isn't that the right to have an explanation for arrest?

Habeus corpsus has not been revoked. THey are saying that the police don't have to have a reason at the moment of arrest for arresting you, but they still have to give one to hold you.

Any confirmation on this outside of rense?

the seatle times link
In a pair of victories for law enforcement, the Supreme Court yesterday made it harder to sue police for wrongly shooting a fleeing suspect or for arresting a motorist on charges that later fall apart, so long as officers had a second, valid reason for the detention.

So this right off the bat is something different than rense is claiming. Is it any wonder to the fans of rense as to why lots of people don't consider it a good news source? Its pretty ironic that renser fans can go on about how the mainstream media isn't real news, when rense puts out sensationalism over actual news, and, heck, probably just lifted the whole thing from another news source anyway.

On Feb. 21, 1999, Officer Rochelle Brosseau of Puyallup shot Kenneth Haugen as he fled in his Jeep to avoid being arrested on drug charges and for questioning in a burglary in Puyallup. Haugen pleaded guilty to fleeing police but filed suit claiming a civil-rights violation.

If these are the kind of criminals that the NWO are after then,well, i guess they're not really the NWO afterall eh?

During the traffic stop, Alford told the officers he had case law showing the taping was legal, but police arrested him anyway � partly for the separate reason, which they did not tell him, that he appeared to be impersonating a police officer.

The 9th Circuit said the arrest was improper, ruling that the separate charges were not sufficiently "closely related" to the initial offense for which he was arrested

Honestly, is this the great horror that people are worried about? They arrested the guy for taping and because they thought it seemed like he was impersonating a police officer. The court found that the taping wasn't somethign he could be arrested for but that the impersonation was. Why should he be able to sue the state for unlawful arrest?

Under Washington state law, officers are not required to state the reasons for an arrest

So they didn't even have to state why they were taking him in in the first place.

Originally posted by Kakugo[Like most of Europe now the US enjoys an all-powerful police force

From that what I know in many European countries you have to have given good reason for arrest. Which countries are you talking about?

Originally posted by Nygdan
[Any confirmation on this outside of rense?

yes I found the same article at bloomberg

For the rest - hope you are right Nydgan - but this whole situation smells fishy to me

Hahahaha I pity you americans.

Come to australia where we are free

Police have NEVER had to inform you at the time of your arrest the reason for the arrest, in fact, they have 48 hours in which to hold you before they have to submit formal charges for your arrest, otherwise you are to be released. They do, however, have to inform you of your miranda rights. Now, as one poster erroneaously stated, you DO have the right to remain silent under the 5th Ammendement protection to not incriminate yourself.

Whereas it is a general courtesy for the police to inform you of the charges at the time of arrest, there is no law or statute that requires it. The Supreme Court's decision is simply an affirmation of the existing laws as they have been for over 200 years.

Thanks kozmo - it cleared everything to me - it is good to hear some expert opinion

BTW you have very scary avatar - do you really stand for it? And who is going to use nukes

Originally posted by jazzgul
Thanks

kozmo - it cleared everything to me - it is good to hear some expert opinion

BTW you have very scary avatar - do you really stand for it? And who is going to use nukes

Um, regarding the avatar... No, I don't advocate nuking the Middle East, not at all. It's simply more of a political statement to get people to think and obviously it works... you questioned who would be using the nukes. You tell me... Iran, Pakistan, the US, China, N Korea, Isreal... exactly WHO will be using them? There has been more war in the middle east than any other place on the planet and now they are becoming armed with nuclear weapons. Scary!

I'm not really into offending anyone and I guess my political statement is a bit misleading. I tried to change the avatar and shall see if it worked when I post this message.

Regarding your avatar ( BTW you should start another thread about it ) I hope NOBODY will use it - in that way I'm hopeless idealist - I believe people can come finally to their senses before is to late. If somebody will use nukes in the middle East it won't stop there and than ... Bye, bye Dorothy...

I'm starting it now. I'm very interested in what other posters think about this issue.

And they can also have mega problems if they stick you for heck of it. I myself have seen what a small town can do to a corrupt cop, it was so bad he lost everything he had, even his wife and kids. Poor guy is now a street drunk living in Arizona somewhere from what I have heard.