We will answer your questions, but when dealing with a potentially armed suspect, niceties will go out the window.

Originally posted by DerepentLEstranger
reply to post by iamsupermanv2

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all this took 2 minutes

exactly

any arguments about my rights would have prolonged the whole thing unnecessarily and from long experience i know they aren't interested and only do so as a psychological tactic

Originally posted by OnceReturned

Originally posted by captaintyinknots
I disagree, and I would challenge it as far as I could. He can ask me to cooperate, but unless he has read me my rights, I dont have to oblige. I am innocent until proven guilty. Just because I look like someone that has been described in a crime is not probable cause, and does not supersede my rights.

He couldn't arrest you without probable cause - and I agree he didn't have that - but, he could briefly detain you and frisk you for weapons based on reasonable suspicion, which he did have.

Courts have ruled (Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968)) that a stop on reasonable suspicion may be appropriate in the following cases: when a person possesses many unusual items which would be useful in a crime like a wire hanger and is looking into car windows at 2am, when a person matches a description of a suspect given by another police officer over department radio, or when a person runs away at the sight of police officers who are at common law right of inquiry (founded suspicion). However, reasonable suspicion may not apply merely because a person refuses to answer questions, declines to allow a voluntary search, or is of a suspected race or ethnicity. At reasonable suspicion, you may be detained by a police officer (court officer on court grounds) for a short period of time and police can use force to detain you. If it is a violent crime (robbery, rape, gun run), the courts have recognized that an officer's safety is paramount and have allowed for a "frisk" of the outermost garment from head to toe and for an officer to stop an individual at gun point if necessary. For a non-violent crime (shoplifting for example) an officer may frisk while at reasonable suspicion if he noticed a bulge in the waistband area, for example, but can frisk in that area only.

Considering that the OP was not under arrest, he could not have resisted. But he had every right to decline the officer's requests. To do so politely is not resisting, and does not give the cop any more rights than they had to begin with.

I don't mean resist in the criminal sense, I mean resist the cops attempts to investigate.

He could have refused to empty his pockets, but would that have really made anything better? It's not like that's the kind of thing we need be doing to really stick it to the man and embrace our rights as Americans. It's just trivial obstinance that introduces a difficulty where none would otherwise exist. Why not comply with an investigation? Can you really make the case that it is ethically or morally preferable to exercise your right to refuse to empty your pockets, rather than facilitate the process by just showing him that you're not the guy they're looking for?

It seems to me like "the right thing to do" would be to help out here. I agree with the objective - catching the armed robber - and going along with it would not involve a substantial negative consequence for me personally; I just have to show this cop what I have in my pockets. It's a trivial act that would aid in a process which I want to succeed (catch the bad guy). The idea that resistance for the sake of resistance is worth it because otherwise our rights will be slowly erroded doesn't seem reasonable. Do you think that the OPs compliance has really sped up our descent into an Orwellian police state? Do you really think that not showing the cop what was in your pockets would delay any larger process at work that is minimizing civil liberties?

It seems like the rights you're appealling to here ought to imply the responsibility to use them in an appropriate way. It's more virtuous to aid in a legitimate pursuit of justice than to interfere with that pursuit just to remind everyone that - technically - you don't have to play along if you really dont want to.

And again people do not understand how the laws work.

You are matching the description of a person who committed armed robbery. Failure to comply could result in being pistol pointed and treated in a hostile manner until they determine you are not a threat.

a potentially armed suspect

Keep up the good work and you'll be as good as MIke Winslow from "The Police Academy" films in no tme.

i give him my legal/given by parents name [ the one with the squeaky clean record]