Another freedom taken away: "Resisting Arrest" - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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Crime and prevention thereof. Loopholes, grey areas and the letter of the law.
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#15277074
The charge of "resisting arrest" is a funny thing. One may imagine that it was devised so that murderers, rapists or robbers who tried to escape from the clutches of the law are punished additionally for resisting against police officers.

In practice, the effects of this charge disturbingly fall on undeserving victims. Strangely, people can be charged with nothing else but resisting arrest -- meaning that their only crime was resisting arrest. This makes little sense. In essence, there was no reason to arrest them, but since they resisted their wrongful arrest, they are now criminals.

The California Penal code (§148 ) defines Resisting/Delaying/Obstructing an Officer or Emergency Medical Technician as follows:

"Every person who willfully resists, delays or obstructs any public officer, peace officer, or an emergency medical technician 'in the discharge or attempt to discharge any duty of his or her office or employment'."

This law is somewhat vague, and assumes that officers "in the discharge or attempt to discharge" their duty are always doing the right thing. Herein lies the problem. In fact, sometimes officers do harass people for absolutely no reason, and when people rightfully resist, the officers use the "resisting arrest" charge as a subjugation or punishment for resisting their authority.

An interesting case is that of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol Officer who stopped an ambulance transporting a patient because the ambulance driver did not yield for the officer. The officer pulled the ambulance over, and when the paramedic tried to explain the emergency situation, the officer went into a rage and assaulted the paramedic. The officer was
given 5 days suspension without pay.

In California, this officer ironically would have fit the definition of "resisting arrest" because he was delaying a medical technician in the course of his duties. Strangely enough, in California, the medical technician would have also been "resisting arrest" because he was delaying or obstructing an officer from the performance of those duties. This completely absurd result only highlights one of the many problems with this law and its underlying assumption that a certain class of people (emergency personnel, police, firefighters) are always doing the right thing.

It is unfortunate that Oklahoma highway patrol did not seem to have too much a problem with their officer assaulting paramedics -- a 5 day suspension seems like a very light punishment. Most people who assault someone in the course of the job are probably fired.

However, it is fortunate in Oklahoma that the state still recognizes the right to resist unlawful arrest. Years ago, almost every state recognized this right. Today, only a minority do. Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, Mississippi, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Wyoming recognize the right of an individual to fight off unlawful arrest.

California, in erasing such an important individual liberty, is now seeing the effects of this foolish law. One recent study of the San Jose Police Department found that more than a dozen San Jose officers were repeatedly using force in resisting arrest cases.

In the course of one year, Officer John Marfia committed many acts of aggression against civilians. He knocked Camille Monet Fisher to the floor, ground her face into the asphalt, and caused a miscarriage. Marfia later struck Carlos Duran in the chest, knocked him down, and pinned his head to the ground. In the same year, Marfia pulled Hai Tran the ground, and punched a bystander who Marfia alleged was trying to intervene. All three of these people were booked only on charges of "resisting arrest".

All three of these people prevailed in the charges against them, but Marfia saw no discipline. Instead, he was promoted. People who filed complaints to the departments Internal Affairs division were ignored (is that any surprise? What do you think an "internal" investigation is?).

Another Officer Ordaz has been implicated in several excessive force cases in connection with resisting arrest charges also. Ordaz alleged that Bennett Walden charged at him with a clenched fist, and that Ordaz had to knock him down and strike him repeatedly with a baton as a result. Walden produced two witnesses that supported his version of the story, that the attack was unprovoked.

The study found that one Officer Marin had used a taser three times in the first two months she was given a taser. A few months after that, she shocked a teenager with a taser.

The study, and sometimes the justice system, has found all these officers to have used excessive force and wrongfully arrested innocent citizens. However, while the citizens had to pay for lawyers, go through the legal system, and suffer physical injuries, these officers have met little if any discipline.

Those who do not have the resources to hire a good lawyer undoubtedly receive a far worse outcome. Resisting arrest is a law that defaults to assuming that the citizen is a criminal, since anyone can be arrested for anything, whether lawful or not. It allows police officers to arrest people for absolutely no justification. The determination of right and wrong lies completely with the police. The law justifies and perpetuates arbitrary arrests, since police who do so suffer no punishment.

The result is that the citizen is actually guilty until proven innocent, not the other way around as our legal system purports to operate.
In other words, our politicians have made laws that allow anyone to be arrested without doing anything illegal, and those who do not comply and go along with it will be punished.


This post is an adaptation of a free opinion article, Resisting Arrest Charge is Turning Our Country into a Police State, copblock.org , Georgia Sand, June 16, 2010
Last edited by Puffer Fish on 16 Jun 2023 19:36, edited 4 times in total.
#15277075
related story: Woman convicted of felony for not complying with police, leaving after eviction notice (posted in Liberalism section, 3 March 2023)

In that story the two women did not even really actively do anything to resist arrest, yet one of the women was convicted of two felony counts for resisting arrest.
The only things they did is not open the front door, not immediately go outside of their house, waiting several hours, and then they left their home from the back door, and when approached by an officer just stood for several minutes. Until they were attacked by police.
The home invasion by police was all supposedly based on some calls from neighbors reporting hearing gunshots in the vicinity.
Seems like they were sent to prison for not following police orders, which were barked at them from a distant megaphone from outside the home they were in.
#15277076
All of this seems kind of reminiscent of Julian Assange's one-year sentence for jumping bail, by a UK judge, when in fact he had originally turned himself in to police, the whole reason for arrest was being accused of a crime in a different country that would probably NOT have been prosecuted as a crime in the UK given the specific circumstances, and indeed the original charges (which came from Sweden) had ended up being dropped before he was rearrested, probably due to being so weak and later turned out to be flimsy and pretty groundless (see Assange Accusations in Sweden 21 Apr 2023 ).
And he was punished with this sentence despite the fact that he had already effectively suffered "punishment" by spending 7 years holed up in a room in an embassy (fearing eventual extradition to the US, despite no official charges yet) which practically amounted to solitary confinement. So it was not as if there was even any need or justifiably valid reason for him to be punished for jumping bail.
(Of course the reality is this was likely just used as a legal excuse to punish him for something else, coming under political pressure from the US; or just to be able to conveniently hold him longer so the UK authorities would have more time to consider the extradition request coming from the US, even though the US could have chose to officially begin the request much earlier but intentionally chose to wait, to maximise their legal leverage)

(A very long complicated story with numerous different types of injustices and very unfair problematic legal issues)

When someone has turned themself in, it seems ridiculous to punish them with one year in prison for skipping bail, after the original charges for which they were charged with have been dropped. Or if it becomes apparent that they were not guilty of those original charges.

Or for one country to punish the defendant for skipping bail over a crime in another country that, given the specific circumstances, would not have been considered a crime in the first country. All the more so given that skipping bail was not considered itself a crime in the country that was originally criminally charging him.

(The standard way of dealing with someone who skips bail is to just revoke their bail money, try to recapture them, and then keep them in prison until the completion of the trial. But, in my opinion, it becomes absurd, pointless and unfair to do this when it later becomes obvious that there is not going to be any trial)
#15278558
Godstud wrote:Resisting arrest is not a right, and never has been.

No one doubts that resisting arrest is a right if the persons attempting to carry out the arrest are not police officers, or if they turn out (after the fact) not to be real police officers. (Could you imagine the government sending someone to prison because they tried to fight off a kidnapper who was disguised as a police officer, and the victim was not sure their attacker was not a police officer?)
Or if someone attempts to arrest the police officer. (No one would claim the police officer has no right to resist)
#15278592
Calling for the abolishment of police only shows that you're ignorant and hate the reality of how our society would decay without people enforcing the rules of it. Anarchists are idiots.
#15278598
Pants-of-dog wrote:There seem to be no intelligent criticisms of the position of police abolition.
Society falls apart when no one is around to enforce the rules. I said as much but you ignore things that you don't like.
#15278609
Pants-of-dog wrote:This seems like a myth.
Like your argument?

Pants-of-dog wrote:In my own experience, society fell apart when the police took over.
Oh, so we're basing this on your idiotic anecdotal evidence, and "your truth". Ah. That explains the delusion.

There is no good argument for abolishing police, and that's why no one with an iota of intelligence can see this as a legitimate or valid option.
#15278611
The thousands of people killed by cops in NA each year are a few thousand good reasons to abolish police.

Another good reason is that cops tend to be abusers, and there is evidence suggesting that they are also commonly rapists. 14 year olds seem to be the favourite age group of these predators.
#15278621
1,201 people were killed by police in 2022. Out of that, most were people who had to be killed to stop them from killing others. Your claim of thousands, is a falsehood.

No one is arguing that police reform doesn't need to take place, but abolishing the police is foolish hyperbole.

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