Slashdot Mirror
U.S. Supreme Court: Public Anonymity No Right
Anonymous Arrestee writes "Today the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that anybody can be compelled at any time to identify themselves, if a police officer asks. People who refuse to identify themselves, even if they are not suspected of a crime, will be arrested. Sound Orwellian? The Supreme Court also said people who are suspected of another crime might not be subject to arrest for not revealing their name. On this latter point, someone will have to bring a separate case. And the SCOTUS is at liberty not to hear any case it doesn't like. The case is Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevada [pdf]. Previous Slashdot story here."
Actually, the flaming in usenet and elsewhere demonstrates
how badly people behave if they think they are anonymous.
"Your papers, please?"
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
"And the SCOTUS is at liberty not to hear any case it doesn't like."
How does that make sense at all?
I think this law seems pretty shitty, but that line seemed a bit like flamebait to me.
"Sound Orwellian?"
Yes it does to me, but the commentary in the news article isn't necessary. Let me come to my own opinion, thanks.
PS - there is also a ruling on Intel v. AMD from today (see the SCOTUS website) but I wasn't able to sort through the legalese.
Looks like US is bringing its laws finally inline with what the rest of the world has!!
And for those people who think that fourth amendment is still alive, best of luck!!
so, how come we aren't seeing the mass migration of all you intelligent americans to canada yet?
even the most right-winged uber-conservatives from the states that i know love canada.
"Just another way of reducing your liberties and telling you that can fuck with you anyway they want"
From a link:
In upholding his conviction and the mandatory identity-disclosure law, the majority justices also said the law only requires that a suspect disclose his or her name, rather than requiring production of a driver's license or other document.
This bodes well -- it would seem to put the kibosh on any effort to turn this into a "must produce your National ID card on demand" ruling.
A name is a name (Jack Brown), and gives the officer something to call you besides "Hey You", but as long as we're not required to produce some sort of definitive, unique-identity-signifying number of the beast, I'm not too worried.
Hire a Linux system administrator, systems engineer,
... one-way to Canada.
--- We are not in the 8th dimension. We are over New Jersey.
People who refuse to identify themselves, even if they are not suspected of a crime, will be arrested. Sound Orwellian?
"What's your name?"
"Rutherford."
"Rutherford is an unperson."
"Ogilvy."
"Ogilvy's a dead war hero."
"Uh--"
"To Miniluv with you!"
The Supreme Court also said people who are suspected of another crime might not be subject to arrest for not revealing their name.
"You are under suspicion for extreeeme bestiality."
"Uh, no."
"What's your name?"
"Forget it."
"To Miniluv with you!"
The coolest voice ever.
... the US is the same as France...
Here they come here come the bastards Bury your head deep in the sand Anonyminity is a virtue in this day and age Amazing hand dexterity Flagrant misuse of security Better run, run, run, run, run Run Run Run Run, here they come.
No.
Years from now your computer will make you use retina scan. Without that you can't login and your pet robot will beat the shit out of you.
Those who think U.S. is becoming more free is absolutely on crack. We are prisoners to our own PC, spyware, viruses, martha steward pajamas.
Doesn't this fly in the face of the cherished "right to remain silent"? I mean, how can you identify yourself without speaking?
I don't really know what to say about this, other then that it's a desturbing step backwards. I can see corrupt police arresting someone for identifying themselves "incorrectly" (i.e. if the cop dosn't belive them).
Very dissapointed in SCOTUS.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
No, that is just not correct. The court held that police, based on reasonable suspicion that a person is involved in criminal activity can compel him to identify themself.
This ruling doesn't change the fact that police just can't ask to for your name for no reason at all. At least get the facts right in your own damn summary before going off on "your rights".
SIG:Slashdot: indymedia for nerds.
Police Officer here. Reveal your name. Don't worry, you are not under arrest, but you are required to give me your full name by the U.S. Supreme Court ruling.
The s-cotus said what?
ah, you're not driving? doesn't matter - papers please.
The fact that some people behave badly when (they believe) they can do so anonymously does not imply that there aren't perfectly valid reasons for wanting to be anonymous. So there.
sure, they can arrest you, but what are you charged with?
Here's a link to Dudley Hiibel's side of the story: http://papersplease.org/hiibel/.
Thanks for fighting for my rights, Mr. Hiibel!
"What's your name?"
"Rutherford."
"Rutherford is an unperson."
"Ogilvy."
"Ogilvy's a dead war hero."
"Uh--"
"ROOM 101!"
Unfortunatly, the unknowing average citizen believes that since they have nothing to hide, they shouldn't have a problem giving a policeman their identification. This in turns allow the powers that be to further ask for other information, such as, "What are you doing around here", and "Where are you going?" These in of themselves are rather harmless questions, but if we aren't careful, we can recreate Nazi Germany rather quickly. The ability to move about anonymously and not have to be on the defensive about who and where we are are inherent rights, and I can't see legal justification for making the innocent prove who they are and the guilty (or in this case, suspected of another crime) get away with not having to identify themselves. We are supposed to a people that believe in 'innocent until proven guilty', and not 'give in to everything the government wants' because its supposedly 'for our own good'.
War isn't about who's right. It's about who's left.
Do not act suspicious enough to be asked to identify yourself. It's disheartening but accepted policy that anonymity isn't much of an option when the authorities get involved. The more information you obstruct, the more irate they'd get...and the more inconvenienced you will be in the end.
The lesson here is to be clean enough or not be suspicious enough to get into such predicaments.
I work at a place where people occasionally use stolen ID numbers to gain computer access. People tend to betray themselves with their actions when they're guilty of something, and it's often easy enough to find out who isn't logged on legitimately just by making eye contact. It's a matter of being mindful of your non-verbal communication.
I think it's very kind of the Supremes to provide such a simple way out of this otherwise intrusive situation. If a police officer asks you for your name, simply inform him or her that, as you are wanted for another crime, you would prefer not to give your name. See how easy that is? I love this country!
When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a skull.
I thought that part of the point here was that the laws were only validated by the court for circumstances where a person *is* under reasonable suspicion of being involved in a crime, which is a lower standard than that required for a search (probable cause).
Now I am surprised! Here in the land Down Under, we have always been compelled to identify ourselves to police. Name and address, but there's no ID card requirement.
There is also a charge for giving police a false name.
Try this for a start.
Or Google
When they came for the communists, I said "He's next door. Take him away. Goddam commies."
I doubt there's anyone in America that could not be charged and convicted of a real legal offense that exists on the books somewhere in America in a given week. This isn't some nebulous concept of sin - I'm speaking of real laws that exist.
Still - the thought of being arrested for just walking around without a wallet, or not wanting to tell a strange officer your name is going further into the "oh, come on" realm.
I can imagine many ways to spin this both ways. Drunk people can be charged for even more crimes now if they get caught ashamed and unwilling to name themselves. So can plain embarassed or even crazy people.
Still - the judges had to decide based on the issues handed to them. I'd have preferred greater freedom here, but as a matter of law, they may be correct that this isn't a constitutional requirement. Always strange how legal decisions get made.
Ryan Fenton
Orwell missed by 20 years..
The system had the verbosity of HTML combined with all the readability of compiled assembly viewed as bitmap images
I'm anonymous you insensitive clod!
To have the right not to tell them your name you have to get arrested?
Am I the only one that things this is hilariosly messed up logic?
"There is no teacher but the enemy."-Mazer Rackham
"Your papers, please?"
Sallah (laughing): Papers? Of course!
(to Marcus)
Sallah: Run.
Marcus Brody: Yes.
Sallah: Papers. Got it here! Just finished reading it myself!
(to Marcus)
Sallah: Run.
Marcus Brody: Yes?
Sallah: "Egyptian Mail," morning edition!
[to Marcus]
Sallah: Run.
Marcus Brody: Did you say, uh...
(Sallah punches German Dude)
Sallah: RUN!
The coolest voice ever.
If all I have to give is my name, then I'm not particularly concerned. Just make up a name that doesn't sound too suspiciously bland (like John Smith) I think my new police officer name just became Bryan Wendy.
Of course, I will continue to list my address as
1060 West Addison
Chicago, Illinois
60613
And my social...
078-05-1120
You have the right to remain silent....not!!!
gotta register one of these days....rct
Due to homeland security if any officer suspects that you may not be who you claim, they can AND DO require fingerprinting on the spot.
Seriously.
Hasn't this always been the case? The Supreme Court gets inundated with requests and they can only hear so many cases per year. So they choose the ones that pertain to the Constitution the most and decide which ones have the greatest impact and then hear those cases.
What's changed?
Blessed be he who reads this post, Cursed be he who tells my boss.
ruling to end the FL recount.
It was a 5-4 ruling with
Rehnquist, Kennedy, O'Connor, Thomas, and Scalia in favor and Stevens, Breyer, Souter, and Ginsburg opposed.
I think that the majority of /.er's just regard this ruling as another step twoard the manifest destiny of the world... You have to wear your IR because it's embedded in your arm, and unless you're very clever there's no way to avoid telling the feds who you are (after all, the bill of rights doesn't pertain to RFID tags).
Next step FED ID's
Who the fuck goes anonymous anyway?
The reason the Supreme Court only hears cases it wishes is twofold.
1) As the original poster suggested, it allows them to only decide cases they feel are "ripe"
and more importantly:
2) The Supreme Court receives over *8000* requests for cert each year. They can only hand 80-120 cases or so. Needless to say they have to be able to filter some of the "junk" out.
"There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws."
- Ayn Rand, "Atlas Shrugged"
Also, a number of Philip K. Dick's books addressed the power of the drug war to instantly criminalize somebody, a power which oculd be used selectively against dissenters and political troublemakers. This is another example of a law which can be used selectively - the police choose who to ask, thus biasing the pool of possible arrestees. Demanding identification under duress - from people you know will be unwilling to provide it - has the benefit that it's all above board, and the ensuing arrests are in the interests of "security".
"One's identity is, by definition, unique; yet it is, in another sense, a universal characteristic," writes Justice Anthony Kennedy for the majority. "Answering a request to disclose a name is likely to be so insignificant in the scheme of things as to be incriminating only in unusual circumstances."
Incriminating, no, but it could be intimidating. This is, IMO, dangerously close to saying "if you're innocent, you should have nothing to hide".
Freedom: "I won't!"
Well that's it folks, I guess I have to retire this account
SCROTUM?
Yes, my only tool is a hammer. And you're starting to look like a nail.
Post anonymously!!
;^)
But my legal name is {477ef70b-a53c-4658-9586-9d4e8541f02f}, you insensitive clod!
People who refuse to identify themselves, even if they are not suspected of a crime, will be arrested. Sound Orwellian? The Supreme Court also said people who are suspected of another crime might not be subject to arrest for not revealing their name.
So, lemme get this straight. You're NOT suspected of a crime and refuse to identify yourself, you get arrested. You ARE suspected of a crime and refuse to identify yourself and you DON'T get arrested? That's pretty fucked up.
You have the right to ask the police officer for their ID. If you cannot confirm that they are indeed
a police officer, you have no obligation to give them your ID.
(However, saying "If you show me your's, I'll show you mine" will probably get you arrested.)
If all I have to give is my name, then I'm not particularly concerned. Just make up a name that doesn't sound too suspiciously bland (like John Smith)
And what if you really are John smith? Even worse, what about the Michael Boltons of the world?
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
"Sound Orwellian?"
Nope. It sounds post 9-11. That's not to say it's better or worse. Simply that the motivation is fear, not in absolute power.
"Derp de derp."
Sound Orwellian?
No.
Not unless having a half-intelligent government of a nation of people is Orwellian.
The government reserves the right to know who exactly is in the country. You're a citizen, you have certain responsibilities to the state if you don't want to get arrested - or you're an alien, and you have even more if you don't want to get evicted.
The government has always reserved this right. Public anonymity to other private individuals has its uses and should be permitted under most cases, but public anonymity to the police is basically hiding from the government, which you should be detained for.
And the Supreme Court has always had the ability to refuse an appeal - whereupon the lower court's decision (federal appellate, IIRC) continues its effect.
Yes, the police's rights can be abused. But e-mail can be and has been abused, so is e-mail thus a bad thing?
If you don't like what the government's doing, show me YOUR plan, and tell me how it introduces no new shortcomings. For longstanding principles like this that are somehow "news" (on Slashdot of all places), I really doubt you can.
Fourth amendment defeated 5-4.
In this case, the police officer came upon a domestic dispute on the side of a roadway when Hiibel refused to identify himself. This is a little different from a cop walking up to you and asking for "papers." Under the circumstances, this request for identification (in the majority's view) is not unreasonably intrusive from a privacy standpoint. At this stage, asking for a name is not like patting him down or searching the car, both of which are more invasive and would require some additional justificaiton.
Also, before everyone stampedes for Canada, let's keep in mind that although there may not be any Federal Constituional prohibition against this, the States are all free to find that citizens in their jurisdiction enjoy greater state constitutional protection than the Federal provisions at issue here. That said, there is nothing preventing any individual state from a contrary holding under the exact same circumstances.
Personally, I disagree with the holding, but I am simply offering the rationale. The 5-4 split demonstrates, if nothing else, that reasonable minds can differ on this issue. (Also, the fact that O'Connor again "swings" the Court is interesting..)
Link to recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions here .
Bush Lies On the Record.
PS - there is also a ruling on Intel v. AMD from today (see the SCOTUS website) but I wasn't able to sort through the legalese.
The ruling was a very narrow ruling that said that Intel can be compelled to release some documents filed to a US court (in the Intergraph lawsuit) in a seperate lawsuit filed in Europe. Right now the ruling has no impact- I believe AMD would have to file a second lawsuit to actually get Intel to release the documents. This ruling just clears the way for AMD to file that lawsuit.
according to http://papersplease.org/hiibel/index2.html it went like this:
****
Meet Dudley Hiibel. He's a 59 year old cowboy who owns a small ranch outside of Winnemucca, Nevada. He lives a simple life, but he's his own man. You probably never would have heard of Dudley Hiibel if it weren't for his belief in the U.S. Constitution.
One balmy May evening back in 2000, Dudley was standing around minding his own business when all of a sudden, a policeman pulled-up and demanded that Dudley produce his ID. Dudley, having done nothing wrong, declined. He was arrested and charged with "failure to cooperate" for refusing to show ID on demand. And it's all on video.
On the 22nd of March 2004, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments on Dudley's case, a case that will determine whether Dudley and the rest of us live in a free society, or in a country where we must show "the papers" whenever a cop demands them.
***
so what the hell? did the court decide? that his quilty but it's still not alright to ask for the id????
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
The Miranda Rights are only for suspects who are being arrested. It is designed to remind the suspect of his 5th Amendment right to nonself-incrimination.
As it says on the Wiki police only need to Mirandize those who they intend to question. Snip: "Arrests can occur without questioning and without the Miranda Warning. Furthermore, if public safety warrants such action, the police may ask questions prior to a reading of the Miranda Warning."
What is music when you despise all sound?
It's often a moot point. If you were stopped in your car, they'd have your license number. They would just ask you "Is this your car?" If you say yes, you've identified yourself. If you didn't say it is, and continued to be evasive, they would assume you'd stolen it and arrest you. Same thing if you were in your house and they came to your door. You MIGHT have been safe walking down the street on a public sidewalk, prior to this ruling.
The idea that you might be able to withhold your name if you are guilty means that remaining silent is automatically a confession - either you're guilty of something else, or you're guilty of withholding your name. The police will ALWAYS arrest you, and find some other means to identify you.
Also, since the police can arrest you for withholding your name, if you are trying to avoid being arrested for an outstanding warrant, they can hold you indefinitely - simply by asking you your name every 24 hours until you tell them (so they look up your outstanding warrants). Yep - forced self-incrimination.
My guess is that there will be a future case that gets to the supreme court, where an innocent person in a legal demonstration refuses to give their name, gets arrested, and refuses for weeks to give their name - and gets held by the police without any realistic opportunity to be set free. Then maybe the court will realize what they've done.
A name is a name (Jack Brown), and gives the officer something to call you besides "Hey You", but as long as we're not required to produce some sort of definitive, unique-identity-signifying number of the beast, I'm not too worried.
In my state (PA), it is perfectly legal to use any name of your choice so long as there is no fraudulent intent.
Though it's not the name on my driver's license or birth certificate, Kijoro Kano is the name I use when someone has no legitimate reason to ask for it.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
so what the hell? did the court decide? that his quilty but it's still not alright to ask for the id????
Is being quilty kind of like being blankety, only thinner?
I'm out of this country. Fuck this, I can't be anonymous? I can't not have police ask me questions, pat me down for "weapons" looking for weed, have the swat team come into my house while I am putting on my clothes and point some automatics on me, where a government with unlimited funds can sue the shit out of me for years and years just trying to run me out of cash, and if I say I will fight they drop MORE charges on me. For blowing some glass pipes. Justice? They destroyed my friends lives. Made them sucidal. We had cops in the store before, and one of the co-owners probation officer patted him on the back. Now everyone just rolls joints. You think you are fine, walking down the street or selling pipes. Wave at cops, ask them if you are in the wrong. Then they decide to have a beef. I like cops, I really do. I like it when they save a kid from a child molester. When they help me change a tire. When they are there to protect me. But put to much power into their hands and the few bad apples abuse it. While in France I was told that at any time a cop could ask you for your ID. I told them no American would stand for that. That it was crazy. I am ashamed to be in a country where people are getting there rights eroded in order to "protect" them. What the hell are we fighting for? I'm gone, let the zombies come and tear this place apart.
The argument of the Supreme Court is that your name doesn't incriminate you unless there are extenuating circumstances so asking you to identify yourself doesn't violate your 5th ammendment rights.
So I guess the deaf armless man without wallet receives the big end of the stick?
Not only can they ask your name but if you meet a cop in the street they can look at your face, see how tall you are, see how you dress, see where you were at that moment in time and glean a whole lot of other information from you without even asking and without you even knowing. Hell, if you have a personal problem like acne on your face they can see it there and then unless you make a special effort to hide your face. It's shocking and nobody's even talking about what a scandal this is!
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
The Supreme Court only hears cases it wants to hear because the Constitution gives it that power. The Supreme Court is the judicial branch of government, equal to the Congress and the Executive Branch. That's why it's called the "Supreme" Court. (You do remember separation-of-powers and all that?)
/. publish news? YOu don't really think the squad of adolescents running this thing have a clue what they're talking about?
The Court determines its own cases, just as Congress determine the legislation it passes and the President determines the legislation he will propose.
Of course, the article is flamebait. Since when did
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
Although this ruling does not directly lead to such an outcome, it does make it a lot easier to pass a "produce your papers" law farther down the road. I have always been under the impression that I could not be compelled to answer an officer's questions without my lawyer present. Why should asking for my name be any different? Can I get in trouble for providing an alias? What use is this ruling if I still dont need to identify myself if it would be self incriminating? Under what circumstances would a police officer demand my identity if not to arrest me? And if I am suspected of no crime, does it make sense that simply not giving my name can turn me into a criminal? Are prisons not already overcrowded? To anyone willing to give up their rights and the rights of their countrymen in order to make catching terrorists easier, I say shame on you. You are helping to destroy what was once a noble human experiment. The ideals that the United States were founded on are what I like about my country. It seems ironic that the leaders of this country would ask me to give up my freedom to protect my freedom. Maybe they're working with Al Queda. As soon as personal rights are completely eroded, they can just march in and institute a Christian/Islamofascist dictatorship in order to protect me from the terrorists. Why should I trust George Bush or Joe Sherriff with any more power than absolutely necessary? Power is just too easy to abuse.
in soviet russia, police identify YOU!
I didn't see anything about that in the ruling. Read the line you quoted again--it merely says that the law in question does not involve the suspect produce a document. The wording doesn't even imply that the SCOTUS finds the concept of requiring paper identification unconstitutional.
No comment.
This is not as unusual as it sounds. Terry VS Ohio set the standard for frisking, where an officer has the right to search someone if the have any reason to think the person has a weapon on them.
I am already stopped a couple times a month and have to show my DL at road blocks, in the country side. I don't want this to go too far, granted, but its not as different as what is the practice anyway.
As I understand the Constitution (and I believe I do), you have the right to express your opinion, be treated the same regardless of race, gender, etc., be free of unreasonable search and seizure (which is argueably not what this is), to not have to testify against yourself, and several other nicities that I agree need protection, always.
But I don't remember seeing that being anonymous is an absolute right. It is implied, to a degree, with speech in some but not all ways. Commercial speech is different than political speech, for instance. It is implied in that justice should be blind, and treat you the same as everyone else. But not a blanket right to be anonymous in all things.
If something SHOULD be a Right, but its not in the Constitution, its not a Right. Petition, get sponsors, submit an Amendment, get it ratified by 2/3rds of the states, and its a Right. It's difficult on purpose, for good reason: To keep it from being used frivilously or in the heat of the moment.
I am not convinced that a Right to be anonymous in all ways is a good thing.
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
This can't be good for us "civilians" if the tools of the state are thrilled with this ruling
Officer.com
There can be no doubt that the GOP are FACIST PIGS that HATE FREEDOM and HATE AMERICA.
I'm out of this country. Fuck this, I can't be anonymous? I can't not have police ask me questions, pat me down for "weapons" looking for weed, have the swat team come into my house while I am putting on my clothes and point some automatics on me, where a government with unlimited funds can sue the shit out of me for years and years just trying to run me out of cash, and if I say I will fight they drop MORE charges on me. For blowing some glass pipes. Justice? They destroyed my friends lives. Made them sucidal. We had cops in the store before, and one of the co-owners probation officer patted him on the back. Now everyone just rolls joints. You think you are fine, walking down the street or selling pipes. Wave at cops, ask them if you are in the wrong. Then they decide to have a beef. I like cops, I really do. I like it when they save a kid from a child molester. When they help me change a tire. When they are there to protect me. But put to much power into their hands and the few bad apples abuse it. While in France I was told that at any time a cop could ask you for your ID. I told them no American would stand for that. That it was crazy. I am ashamed to be in a country where people are getting there rights eroded in order to "protect" them. What the hell are we fighting for? I'm gone, let the zombies come and tear this place apart. Sorry about the HTML mistake, and screw coward- just anonymous
are starting to get annoying.
Instead of trying to incite anger by giving vague summaries of stories, the editors should just be more blatant, like so:
"Here we have all the straw we need to construct a good strawman. Now we are going to bind the straw together to create arms and legs. You can almost see the neo-con blood flowing through it. Doesn't it make you angry? Now we need to connect the joints to create a fluid body. Doesn't he remind you of big brother? Now for the head, we use this prebuilt paper-maché mold of the Devil.. oops, I mean George Bush. Sounds Orwellian to me. Now beat the fucking shit out of it!!!"
Yeah yeah, mod me as troll or whatever, but you know its true.
In all honesty though, I am puzzled by it. I mean, Slashdot must generate some good ad revenue, so why can't they afford some decent editors? There are mods at forums working for free that do a better job.
If I am interpreting this correctly, it only upholds state laws that say you have to tell a cop your name etc. So you want to avoid having this law on the books? Write to your represntitive/senator. If they don't listen, vote them out, or hell run yourself.
It would be interesting to have a "geek" party, one that stands for privacy, fair use, and patent reform. Hey, narrowly-focused parties have worked before, like the Whigs, who became a full-fledged party, or the Prohibitionists(though you may not agree with what they stood for, they were pretty crucial in getting the amendment banning alcohol passed).
So you only have the right to remain silent if you are arrested? If you are not arrested, then you must speak.
I guess there IS one right that an arrested person has over a free man.
yet.
Ask me my name. I dare you.
That's pretty funny, except my name is Steve Stephenson. No shit. Guess I'm going for a ride in the paddy wagon.
By the way, this almost happened once, a drunk friend started a fight, I got asked for my name by a cop, and he didn't belive me. It was then that I was pratically begging to show my ID.
No troll intended. Isn't this Off Topic? I mean the whole posting is not related to nerd stuff, just privacy laws. Doesn't Slashdot focus on digital (computer related) privacy? How does this tie into the theme of Slashdot? Am I missing something? Thanks.
I don't know if this is Orwellian or not. But this is standar procedure in Argentina. If you are not carrying goverment issued photo ID on the street you could be taken to the near police station for up to 24 hours to "identify" you. Pretty wired, but people is used to :(
DNA in your Linux: DNALinux
Police Officer is a subset of Peace Officer. Other Peace Officers include Sheriff, Sheriff's Deputy, State Trooper, Highway Patrolman, Park Rangers, Game Wardens, FBI Agents, etc.
There's one major point most of the "major" media has left out about this ruling. The ruling only applies to the 20 states that have a law which requires persons to produce identification when they're suspected of criminal activity. This ruling does not apply to the other 30 states and the federal government which does not have laws which require identification.
In other words, this isn't going to turn into an East Berlin style state with cops asking for your papers - which hasn't been made legal by this ruling. You can only be thrown in jail or fined for not giving ID in a state that has a law that dictates that, and that's only in the case of being suspected of criminal activity.
Thicker surely? Come to think of it, all aspects of this case are definitely thicker than the average blanket. Quilty is highly appropriate!
DROS - Open-Source Robot Software
Since it only requires a name, I guess you could give them a fake one and they'd never know. Just don't go with a famous name, becasue they'd want to see some ID then - I mean how many people out there are named Optimus Prime. You might also want to stay away from professional athlete names also, since too many seem to be having legal problems. So just be creative and give them a name that you want to touch, but you musn't touch! - Max Power
I've discovered a remarkable proof, but this margin is too small to contain it...
Ask me again, I'll tell ya the same.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
An unconstitutional ACT is always null and void from the day it was set forth, no matter what court decisions are made. Courts attempt to determine whether an act is constitutional or not, they do NOT make an act constitutional or not. They can only provide their opinions and whether that will is carried out.
The judgment of the Supreme Court today is flawed and no one is bound to obey it. The law is such that these words are not laws, they are acts that can hold you forever. But they cannot change what the Constitution says without an amendment to the Constitution. Be safe and aware, but be brave and free.
Answer: No, sir.
If they're going to arrest you for not giving your name, they're just looking for an excuse to do it anyways. This just makes it too easy.
I still believe in my 5th amendment rights, and the magic words of Miranda, "You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be held against you
You'd be amazed how fast I got mute, if I'm not doing anything in the least way wrong. If I'm just standing on a sidewalk, minding my own business, it's no one elses business who I am.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
You know there's nothing wrong with that name.
There was nothing wrong with it... until I was about 12 years old and that no-talent ass clown became famous and started winning Grammys
Unless you've snorted enough crack to think that all police officers are nice, law-abiding citizens. In which case let's pause while I laugh my ass off.
You have it backwards, it usually is the crack user who has the negative impression of the police.
The opinion clearly states that the stop was based on "reasonable suspicion," and therefore this only applies in such cases, and it only applies in the state of Nevada.
Those crying "1984" and other nonsense need to actually read something other than the headline.
What?
Do you have a point? I would much rather deal with douchebags then have to show my papers to post.
I hate sigs.
These are Iraqi politics, the politics that if you dislike your neighbor, you can call the police on him/her and he/she must comply. The US has crossed a grave line. Previously, one could require blood, urine, DNA, et cetera for evidence, but now the contents of the mind can be demanded. This crosses a dire border, and I fear for the future of the Constitutional Liberties of Americans.
Since when has this country used intellectual elite as a pejorative term?
"And the SCOTUS is at liberty not to hear any case it doesn't like."
How does that make sense at all?
-----
SCOTUS is a court of limited jurisdiction, and it has a damned narrow original jurisdiction (mostly original jurisdiction over treaties & such). Original jurisdiction is when the case goes directly to them and is not heard by any other court first. Anyhow, the court may choose to hear or deny or do whatever the hell it wants with all the cases which come to it--this is the limited jurisdiction bit. They frequently ignore cases, allowing the lower court rulings to stand. I forget the figures, but it's only a few hundred out of several thousand cases they generally hear.
In order to consider a case, four of the nine justices have to signify an interest in hearing it, and they decide this on the court's own internal email list.
So they were correct in saying that SCOTUS has no obligation to hear any case unless they're interested in it, in which case they choose to do so.
IANAL, but I did take a course on this.
IANAL, but isn't there a standard process for registering a legal assumed name? So we all just register the common assumed name of "John Smith", or whatever, and when asked what our name is, we offer that up.... and its legally correct.
Seems to me all the guy would have to do would be to demand a jury trial (in a previous appeal, or even on initial trial). What jury would find that people are legally compelled to give their names?
On the other hand, people do tend to be stupid.
"A great democracy must be progressive or it will soon cease to be a great democracy." --Theodore Roosevelt
"People who refuse to identify themselves, even if they are not suspected of a crime, will be arrested. Sound Orwellian?" No it does not, and no, you will not be arrested. A cop who attempts to arrest someone without probable cause of them being a suspect of a specific crime can kiss his donuts goodbye. There is too much trouble out there for cops to be going around just pluckn innocent schmucks off the sidewalk because they want to manifest your Orwellian paranoia.
This account has been seized by the GNAA. That is all.
In fact, the Supreme Court ruled today that state laws which require citizens to reveal their identity to police officers are constitutional. Such laws do not exist in all states, but have existed in many states for several years (unchallenged until this point, by the way). I think this is an important distinction.
If you don't like this kind of law, you can ask your state government to not have one.
They're not taking him anywhere. (sound of gunshot)
--scene from the move Top Secret
for all the national conventions.
Now they will have lists of names to go with the photos they take.
Why not have a law that requires the insertion of an identity chip or life clock crystal?
(from the movie Logan's Run)
If you have nothing to hide then what worry you. Right?
Ok, so someone will hack the chip/crystal somehow.
We'll just quantum entangle everything and update it every week with mandatory reporting at designated control posts.
If this is the future...we better start building sanctuary for all the runners.
the-cloak.com won't be able to hold everyone, but can make revenue from banner ads selling ankh amulets on special.
I can tell from your legal name that you work for HP (or at least work with HP products).
now that we have the patriot act, the constitution is sorta like a rotting piece of history that i'm suprised the feds still let us access. has anyone seen the declaration of independence recently, or was i hallucinating when i read that as well?
Serenity now, insanity later.
Thank god for the 60's
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
omg this is a slippery slope we are sliding down soon bush and his cohorts will be burning the flag and pooping on the constitution and eating our children!!~!!@!!~ WHEN WILL THE MADNESS END!?!??!11
Why not have a law that requires the insertion of an identity chip or life clock crystal?
(from the movie Logan's Run)
If you have nothing to hide then what worry you. Right?
Ok, so someone will hack the chip/crystal somehow.
We'll just quantum entangle everything and update it every week with mandatory reporting at designated control posts.
If this is the future...we better start building sanctuary for all the runners.
the-cloak.com won't be able to hold everyone, but can make revenue from banner ads selling ankh amulets on special.
Wow..that was the most blatantly obvious troll ever. If that's the best you can come up with, then maybe abortions are a good idea after all.
trivista@cox-internet.com
Hopefully you'll get some gay porn to your e-mail box now. That way you won't have both hands free to type.
Let's get straight what's going on here. The Supreme Court didn't say that cops now have a constitutional right to ask for your name any time. What SCOTUS did was uphold (within certain vague limits) a Nevada law requiring you to give your name to cops upon being stopped and questioned. Since it's just a law, it can be repealed by the Nevada legislature. Who are put into office by the voters of Nevada. They can set themselves free, instead of hoping for the almighty Supreme Court to do so. Imagine that.
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
Let us not forget that in the USA it is now perfectly legal to hold a US citizen indefinately, secretly, with out being charged, and without access to legal representation.
Now that can all occur for simple not saying your name.
It may be a stretch, but it's possible.
Sarcasm withheld. You make your own judgments.
Sig
Appended to the end of comments you post. 120 chars
Eeeessh, I'm sorry for that!
My Dad grew up friends with someone named 'Carol Carol', and I went to high school with, no joke, a 'Richard Nixon.'
Security Agent demands you to identify yourself?
The 4th amendment may have just fallen, but the 5th amendment is still alive and strong.
Just tell him you shall not answer on the grounds that it might incriminate you.
duh!
George Bush + Linux = "I will not let information get in the way of the fight against Windows"
From the defendant's website (at papersplease.org):
"One balmy May evening back in 2000, Dudley was standing around minding his own business when all of a sudden, a policeman pulled-up and demanded that Dudley produce his ID."
Actually, he was standing behind his pickup on the side of the road. A passer-by called police to report that they had observed the man and woman in the truck and that the man punched the woman. A police officer, responding to the report of domestic violence, drove up to investigate. He asked for the defendant for identification as part of investigating the domestic violence report.
So he wasn't just standing around, and wasn't approached for no reason.
Thanks, that is only about the 13th time someone has done that. What happend to the trolls that where original?
I have never had an encounter with a police officer who was not an abusive, adrenaline-high thug.
Yet I am a very peaceful and easy going person. That is part of what an officer can not stand. He can not stand when you do not react to his threats and taunting and provocation as he would like you to. He can not stand when you do not feed back into his power. There is nothing an officer hates more than a peaceful response, or a defiant verbal response, because he wants to beat you, and all the better to beat you when you fight back and feed his sweaty, red-faced, shouting adrenaline high.
Doesn't it make you positively sick? And there is absolutely nothing you can do about it.
If you try to press charges, or even file a complaint, immediately the officer's superiors come in to back him up, and it is your word against theirs. And when it is you against them, you always lose. They are officers after all; if we can't trust their word, whose can we trust? An officer is a fine and respectable man, and we have this assurance from the many fine and respectable men who will come in to tear apart anyone who thinks otherwise.
I am deathly afraid of officers. I would rather be beaten and not report it than report it to an officer, because I fear an officer more than I do the bruises.
No, if you want to be free in this world, you need to hide. Just stay low, don't talk back, and don't speak up.
The moment you come in contact with an officer, your freedom is shattered.
This world is a crying shame.
If you want to be free?
There's a better world a 'coming.
Where we'll all be equal,
And we'll all be free.
A world which those who have the power
Will never see.
This land was made for you and me.
Godwins law satisfied in less than ten posts; that's gotta be some kind of Slashdot record... (and modded +5 no less).
As I read the ruling, it seems to have more to do with someone being stopped on reasonable suspicion (something the officer must articulate in court), rather than stopping people willy-nilly to check their ID.
I'm as much a privacy advocate as the next guy, but I don't have a big problem with this.
If a cop stops me on the street for no good reason and hassles me, I'll go along with it, as long as we're on the street and it's mano-a-mano. Once we're no longer on his playing field, the game changes. There's a time to assert your "rights," and on the street where the officer is on his home turf is not the best time... if he's really a bad cop, you're taking an awful chance in provoking him. Be cool, be the "grey man," and make a mark in your accounts receivable.
Restitution is best arranged later, either in court, or in front of his sergeant/chief.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
The problem is that the suspect asked whether he was being arrested, and if so, why. Since this was a Terry stop, he did not recieve Miranda rights protection.
The problem is that invoking the Fifth Amendment requires knowing that self-incrimination is possible (which is why Hiibel's argument of Fifth Amendment protection was rejected by the US Supreme Court, as he shouldn't have been worried about self-incrimination). There is no real way to *know* whether you are at risk of self-incrimination without a police officer disclosing what they are considering charging you with. This basically renders useless Fifth Amendment protection against releasing identity, even though the US Supreme Court specifically said that the Fifth Amendment *could* apply to releasing one's identity.
This is a severely broken system. If police have no reason to potentially charge someone, they have no reason to stop them. If they have such a reason, I do not understand why they cannot be compelled to inform the person of what they are being accused of.
May we never see th
Yes, my only tool is a hammer. And you're starting to look like a nail.
Not that it bothers me a bit what the Court says or what the Bush Admins want, but I think that this conversation strayed badly off course early on.
The phrase, "public anonymity," in the headline, is vaguely misleading. Anonymity is usually associated with someone actually doing something and not wanting to be known - whether for good or bad deeds.
What this court ruling really means is that the police no longer need to have a reason to "see some ID," and that protestations of innocence or proclamation of rights are likely to get you put in them pretty bracelets and hauled downtown.
So, if all you well-meaning Civil Libertarians and Progressives here on slashdot want to change this country, then I urge you to Vote Bush this year. Make your fellow countrymen so sick of what that moron has done to this country that they are willing to discuss real progressive policies.
sig not found
The way it was explained to me by a lawyer is you can refure to give your name or answer anything, but be prepared to be taken to the police station. Once at the police station you can request a lawyer. Needless to say the police are not going be your fans, so you better be doing it for a good reason.
It's a shame, because I do know some good cops, but you're mostly right.
Name, rank and serial number - so conscription must be next.
Practically, is there any reason why you wouldn't want to identify yourself to a police officer? Except for trying to be difficult or 'proving a point', I can't think of any reason why I wouldn't provide my name to an officer upon request.
Hah. You're calling someone else on unoriginal trolling? Well here's another unoriginal one for you, suck my dick you stupid fucking manwhore.
trivista@cox-internet.com
If I had mod points I'd dump them here.
Excellent response!
I have been in that exact situation.
copcrime.com
You are exactly right on all points but one.
When you try to report a cop crime.
They go digging further into your privacy to disect you for other crimes.
"To serve and collect."
That is the 21st century police officer.
Stranded on the side of the road because you ran out of gas?
Don't expect the officer to ask, "Need a lift to the nearest gas station?"
More like, "License, insurance and registration"
You are *NOT* free in this world.
No way No how.
For those of you keeping track, all 5 supreme court justicies who ruled against Mr. Hiibel (ie, in favor of the state law requiring citizens to identify themselves) were Republicans, nominated by Republican presidents. Both of the Democrats on the Supreme Court were among the minority who ruled in favor of Mr. Hiibel. Election time's coming soon kids!
Yes, my only tool is a hammer. And you're starting to look like a nail.
This is bad, sure, but there are two big things to remember.
First, a state or municipality must, in order to arrest you, have a statute that makes it a crime to not give your name to a police officer. I can imagine that certain, more libertarian states, e.g. New Hampshire, won't be enacting a similar statute. I'm screwed as I live (currently, only) in Massachusetts.
Secondly, the submitter is only half right when he says that, "someone will have to bring a separate case. And the SCOTUS is at liberty not to hear any case it doesn't like." It's wholly possible that a second case, one testing the exact point of law put forward will be interpreted in a more libertarian light by a Circuit Court of Appeals, thus creating binding precedent in that Circuit. If the Supreme Court doesn't grant certiorari, it stays precedent. Of course, different circuits may draw different conclusions, that's where we get the phrase "circuit split."
Investigative stops can be made for any reason. Therefore, yes, a police officer can always come up and ask you to identify yourself. And under this interpretation of the U.S. Constitution, you must always oblige and answer.
You only have to answer if the officer identifies that he is investigating. They cannot just start asking willy nilly and enforce this. Read the damn judgement people.
Standard disclaimer: IANAL... but...
Quote from the article:
"...the US Supreme Court Monday upheld a Nevada law that makes it a criminal offense for anyone suspected of wrongdoing to refuse to identify himself to police."
Assuming this is a correct interpretation of the decision, the way I see it is that if a cop stops me on the street and asks for my name, the first words out of my mouth should be "Am I suspected of some wrongdoing?". If the answer is no, or any variation thereof, I am NOT compelled to furnish my name. It's only if he says I'm suspected of something that I risk running afoul of this ruling.
And you know what? As long as I knew I didn't do anything, I *might* even be willing to go to court on those grounds.
Maybe.
Probably not. I'm a wuss.
But maybe.
If a pion (n-) collides with a proton in the woods & noone is there to hear it, does lamdba decay into the source pa
...has anyone seen them?
Just because you have a police uniform and a badge doesn't necessarily make you a cop. I can go buy a police uniform, fake badge and a gun tomorrow and have myself a blast with it. If I have to identify myself to a cop, the cop has to positively identify {him,her}self to me. That's all there is to it.
It's a very dark ride.
In my country is mandatory to have an ID card with data, picture and fingerprint.
Everybody has one of those and it's mandatory to carry it with you all the time, you'll be arrested without it.
We live with that. Actually, doesn't bother me at all. What bothers me is if my government spies on my phone conversations or my internet usage without a court order, which is illegal here.
This never says that you have to produce PROOF of your identity -- just your name. So why can't you just say "John Smith" and the guy leave you alone? I mean -- you're not under oath to tell the truth, are you?
I think my principles are reachin' an all time low
But what if I can't remember my name?
The supreme court claims that the principles of a Terry stop require your name. Interestingly enough, Terry clearly said that you don't have to answer. For this reason, I feel the decision is self-contradicting.
They attempt to rationalize this as below:
You have to answer, but if your answer matters, it and anything else you say may be thrown out (From end of decision follows)(possibly the only saving grace in this mess of an opinion):
Still, a case may arise where there is a substantial allegation that furnishing identity at the time of a stop would have given the police a link in the chain of evidence needed to convict the individual of a separate offense. In that case, the court can then consider whether the privilege applies, and, if the Fifth Amendment has been violated, what remedy must follow. We need not resolve those questions here.
The judgment of the Nevada Supreme Court is Affirmed.
Since when has this country used intellectual elite as a pejorative term?
I can safely say that I personally have never intimidated anyone into coughing up the truth; I have however, tricked boatloads of people into doing just that, because, well the vast majority of criminals are about as sharp as a balloon. Comedy aside, when I ask someone for their name, usually I don't care what name they give me, I won't bother to verify it. Also, the vast majority of criminals don't carry their ID's with them. I wouldn't say I view everyone as "guilty until proven innocent." I see hundreds, maybe even thousands of people everyday that I never think twice about. Now the guy who watches my every move, keeps on approaching people, looking over his shoulder, and everyone who he approaches is looking around, wait there goes a hand to hand exchange.... that guy I will definately think is up to something. Why, because he does all the things I did when I was trying to get away with stuff. Anyway, another ignorant comment from someone who, more likely than not, never rode in the front of a patrol car. Freakin' street lawyers, man.
Man, he is gonna have a blast with colour, theatre, centre and a few others.
Now, I haven't read the decision, and of course IANAL, but it seems to me that all the supremes did today was uphold the constitutionality of a Nevada statute. This doesn't necessarily make it the law of the land. Another state could pass a law forbidding police from arresting people simply for refusing to provide ID (or tell their name, whatever). Any real lawyers out there who have a clue?
"those that ignore history are bound to repeat it." two words, nixon era.
Serenity now, insanity later.
For what it's worth, the courts also cited vagrancy laws dating back to 1787 in their decision. I thought that was pretty amusing, but I don't find it surprising or threatening.
Well, the door was open...
No not really. As the dissenting justices pointed out, your name is the key to all the great national databases that store information about you. Databases that can be searched from inside most modern police cars. Thus the name is all that they need.
And you can probably forget giving a false name because that would probably set you up for some kind of fraud rap or perhaps "lying to a police officer".
This is, really, all that the bastards needed.
The few of you that actually read the ruling, know that stating your name is acceptable form of identification according to the ruling. I think it is perfectly reasonable for an officer to ask someone's name in a Terry stop. This is not a significant intrusion and the Terry stop happening means there is something being investigated. Ignorance is not bliss....it is the bain of civilization. Educate yourself before you comment.
Again, as I stated, I think disagree with the ruling on general principle, but I think we need to read the facts of the case and the language of the ruling, before being too reactionary on this particular one.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=97501&cid=8338 624
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
"Am I suspected of a crime?"
"No, but you must identify yourself when asked."
"Well in that case I refuse."
"You are under arrest!"
--or--
"Am I suspected of a crime?"
"Yes, actually. So who are you?"
"I'm not telling!"
"Move along, then."
I think this little uncertainty will be sorted out in short order.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
Always interesting to see how people react to the SCOTUS decision of the week.
If you agree with it, the Court is the arbiter of moral correctness and their pronouncements are the voice of God (well the closest thing to it in our atheist society).
If you disagree with the decision, the Court is corrupt, invalid, and people start screaming about how this decision shows how we must change the balance of power in political parties in our other branches of government (quick quiz, what are the other branches of US government?)
What is even funnier is that the same people flip flop between these two opinions between weeks as the latest SCOTUS opinions come out.
Right, and how often do you think a cop would lie if given the chance?
"Yes, your honor,we had a suspicion. Sure, she's an arthritic 98 year old, blind and wheelchair bound BUT we had a suspicion."
I think most of us lose all respect for officers when we see the multiple idiotic charges that are usually laid (and get dwindled down to a Alabaman cliched busted tail light). Everyone and the judge knows that the most charges are over the top but never once has anyone paid for it...because we allow the cops to play the reasonable suspicion cards.
After seeing the charges they laid on the cowboy (and how they treated teh supposed victim), I think it tells you all you need to know about officers and the truth.
Prehaps we all need to standardize on a fake name? Sure, it exposes us easier to being identified as having given a phony name, but the civil disobiedience effect can not be denied.
I propose Emmanuel Goldstein become our chosen name. Imagine 10,000 arrests filed each month against Emmanuel Goldstein for refusing to give an ID. Seems almost too appropriate to me.
What ever happened to, "Don't say anything without a lawyer?"
Can you just not say anything except, "I'm not answering any questions until I see my lawyer?" Or do you have to give name if they ask?
Mark
Here in Boston, the transit police are implementing a policy of randomly checking the IDs and bags of subway and train riders. They will be patrolling trains (with police dogs) starting before the upcoming Democratic National Convention in July. This is not a temporary policy change for the DNC, it is a permanent change.
So... no more Miranda rights then? "You have the right to remain silent"
You mentioned walking around without a wallet.
A friend of mine had lost his one weekend on a night out in the city. As a result he had left to look for it in his car which resulted in him having to wait for some other friends outside the club because he couldn't get in. Some altercation had occured inside the club, and because he was milling around outside he was promptly questioned by police.
My friends name is Josh Smith, and when he told police this they refused to believe him, handcuffed him, and took him to the station. They had his name on file from a previous arrest, a DUI i think, but in the end they charged him with obstruction. Just because he had lost his wallet and they assumed the name he had given was fabricated.
Ever hear the old saying, "There is a little truth in everything." and since Orwell was mentioned, this might be a fitting watch or listen to, if you have about 2 1/2 hours to spare.
Although I do not personally agree with all of what is presented, I feel it is on topic with this discussion in regard to direction.
The following is in streaming RealVideo format and titled The Road To Tyranny by Alex Jones.
I have no affiliation with this site or its content, I just feel it is something to 'stick on the mental shelf'.
Damn, I have a bunch of other emails I never use, would you like me to post them also?
And it wasn't a troll, it was my opinion and the fact that you can't respond to my opinion with anything other than bs says more about you than I.
A. Send a videotape of it to the news media.
B. Send the tape to America's funniest Home Videos.
C. Be laughing too hard to even point the camera.
D. Wait till their done then go over and give him a real beatin'.
Anyway, read the last two pages of the decision.
That said, I still don't like the decision, and I still don't quite like the actions of the police officer.
Not even the original poster bothered to read it. The law at issue in Nevada stated that the police could ask for ID during an investigation.
In Dudley Hiibel's instance, a witness reported seeing him hitting his daughter. An officer went to investigate. He found Hiibel and his daughter on the side of the road. The officer attempted to conduct an investigation by merely asking for his name, but Hiibel refused. Thus, he was arrested under the law.
The original poster stated that the "Supreme Court of the United States ruled that anybody can be compelled at any time to identify themselves."
That was clearly NOT the holding of the case!!!!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
I'm surprised that no one has mentioned John Titor when they read this: The site (Disclaimer: I personally think the guy is an incredibly good internet hoaxer, but a lot of what he said is extremely chilling)
Or, just one big thing to remember: Bush can get a law railroaded through the Republinazi Congress with a wave of his fey wrist. Is it that hard to imagine the Freedom Identity Act of 2004 (requiring anyone in US territory to present the national ID card to any agent of the government or be held without bail or counsel as a suspected terrorist for an extended period of time)?
Big changes are in store for us once he wins the election (or loses but refuses to leave office). (Don't laugh; it's not that far-fetched.)
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
What about me? My name's John Smith!
The law that was upheld only requires one to give a name, it says nothing about a drivers license etc.
I (belatedly) posted about the same limitation, but until I read the opinion, I would assume that they ruled that this particular law does not compel a suspect to produce "papers", leaving open the question as to whether or not a law specifically worded to have that requirement would be valid.
Also, I'd be curious as to whether both the specific law and the opinion use the term "suspect" throughout, which would imply some (though minimal, to be sure) reason for suspicion by the officer in order for the law to apply.
Either way, kind of an icky ruling, it's just a question of how icky...
That's it.
I'm changing my name to "Fuck Off Pig".
So does Anonymous Coward have good karma?
Once arrested, you do not have the right to withhold your name. You do have the right to refuse other questions, but you must give your name.
Plainclothes Detroit officer refused to show ID; severs fleeing woman's finger
Isn't that how it's always been?
They can't charge you for how you PRONOUNCE your name, can they?
You live at Wrigley Field?
Nice Blues Brothers reference...
I have something in common with Stephen Hawking...
....providing false information to the Police man. And, if you don't show an ID, it's up to him to decide if he believes you or not.
There are lots of things that you don't have to tell cops, but if you do tell them, you can get into much bigger trouble for lying. So you'd better not go using Wrigley Field as your address unless you live there, but you can do just fine with "General Delivery, Your-town, your-state". And you'd better not use that kind of name for police, but you can probably try "Bob. Just Bob" if you want (or whatever your first name is.)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
In the 9 years since I first got my driver's licence, I've never had so much as a parking tickt. No moving violations, never even been pulled over, nothing. About two months ago I attended a protest after the local police dept. refused to bring disaplinary action against an officer convicted of raping several women while on duty. Wouldn't even launch an investigation into similar allegations against 2 other officers. I've never been to such an event before, but I felt quite strongly about this issue and chose to attend, in the ~7 weeks since then, I've been stopped 47 times.
Yeah, never happens in the good ol US.
I need a FireSomething extension to load on my State-issued SmartID.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
What SCOTUS also did was take away your right to refuse to answer in any state that does have such a law.
And the Republinazis who control Congress can easily pass a national law ("The Freedom Identity Act of 2004", say) that requires you to identify yourself whenever you're asked by an agent of the government, upon pain of going to federal pound-me-in-the-ass prison.
Not to mention that this clears the way for national ID cards, which clears the way for a whole host of tyrannical Republo-crime.
I guess it's time to try and become a billionaire so I can buy some rights. Hope they haven't stopped allowing people to become billionaires yet.
I, for one, welcome our new Antichrist overlord.
The third movie sure made up for the lame bullshit of the second one :) The first is still my favorite, but the third came close; it was actually *funny*, which is what the whole idea was in the first place. I wonder if Ford cringes while viewing the second movie (whose name I shall not utter here)? Talk about horrible lines!
The interaction between Indiana and his father (whoever scripted Connery for that role was a genius) was very, very well done. I enjoyed TLC immensely and still do.
Dad! DAD!!!!
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
I am a forigner (talking about the U.S.), and i just love the american constitution! What a great piece of paper! But i downright hate the USA in its present form. Yes i hate some americans. Does this make me a terrorist? I appeal to all american citizens to help stop this downwards spiral. let it go no further. My democracy basicly follows yours down the "civil-liberties drain". And since i don't get to vote on this, maby you should! Peace Casa
Just this year, in response to the rather radical change in US human rights, I have registered to vote. (So has my remaining parent).
/. users registered to vote"...so many checked "hate in incumbant", and maybe--as an extension--all that came with him.)
Hopefully, they will have worked those bugs and security exposures out of the E-Voting system.
And, I guess I have to post this not as the A/C, but as myself, so I won't be arrested.
But, if enough people get them out of office? Maybe this country can be turned around.
(Had to laugh at the poll of "why
So there.
then he has real reason to arrest you on suspicion...
What with anti-privacy king, David Blunkett, about to try and force everyone to use ID cards (in much the same way that Australia did - and failed). Now, I have nothing to hide, and don't actually mind a certain amount of data gathering (if it actually benefits me in the long run), but this ID card business is making that red flag wave quite vigorously.
So, I don't think the need to identify yourself to police "if they have a reasonable cause for suspicion" is a particular violation of human rights, but having everything you do traced via an electronic chip is. After all, I've never heard of a case where, after being asked by PC Plod "what is your name?", the target simply answers "Not telling".
What would be the point of not identifying yourself, and under what kind of circumstances would you want to do so?
Beeyatch.
Funny I get more work than I can handle, yet I somehow manage to squeeze it in.
Maybe the Court should be made up of IT people. We get the job done. Period.
8000 cases? No problem I have a bash script I wrote in '97 that will take care of it.
-- taking over the world, we are.
My father was John Johnson. So was his father. My mother would have killed both of them before naming me John. It's not even my middle name.
"Let's not go there"
If after reading the opinion you still think the court is wrong then by all means post and say so. However, I think most people (myself included) will see why the court decided the way it did and not get nearly as excited as the submitter of this "story" wants us to be.
If I'm not mistaken, giving a false name _IS_ a crime.
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.
Just make up a name that doesn't sound too suspiciously bland (like John Smith)
My name, Jose Jimenez.
KFG
...the cops get a in line asking people to give their names, or get arrested. Sounds like a good way to shut down demonstrations, no?
how much of my name go i have to give? first, middle, last? if it's my whole name (as i suspect it is) then this is almost as good as a national identity card -- there are people with the same first and last name as me but i know my full name is unique. sure, you can lie and make up a name but giving false information to a police officer is illegal.
"it's just so they can call you by name" uh, i doubt it. here in LA all officers have access to massive databases from their cars.
this is fucking bullshit.
fear is the mind killer
EOM
...instead of a symbol, though, I'll change my name to a gesture.
You all can call me "middle finger".
I honestly can't remember the last time a police officer asked for my name...
FLR
to have a country where everyone is a criminal" - attributed to Hitler.
"Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain
"Do the Right Thing. It will gratify some people and astound the rest." - Mark Twain
You really should watch the video. The abuse of power is more telling when you see just how the officer treats this citizen on the side of the rode. And, yet, apparently there is no recourse for how the police treated him and his daughter. Makes the law laughable when it can get away with -- even after Supreme Court review -- treating people like this.
Please send me your name it's the law! Dare if you don't -> then everyone here goes to jail for complicity in not revealing me your name -- LOL!
Stupid government, where are my rights?
By the way, I'm from Canada and our government is also stupid!
The Charter of Rights and Freedoms in Canada explicitly grants citizens the Right to freely move about within the country. Under Section 6 "Mobility Rights" http://laws.justice.gc.ca/en/charter/#circulation
(1) Every citizen of Canada has the right to enter, remain in and leave Canada.
(2) Every citizen of Canada and every person who has the status of a permanent resident of Canada has the right
a) to move to and take up residence in any province; and
b) to pursue the gaining of a livelihood in any province.
>>The argument of the Supreme Court is that your
>>name doesn't incriminate you unless there are
>>extenuating circumstances so asking you to
>>identify yourself doesn't violate your 5th
>>ammendment rights.
A programmer would look at it this way: being unwilling to identify yourself immediately produces the needed extenuating circumstance, because it is now the law that you have to provide your identity. This indeed grants you the right to withold your identity, because failing to do so would incriminate you for the crime of failing to identify yourself.
IANAL (I am not a lawyer.)
is not go outside at all and just hang out posting on slashdot as "Anonymous Coward"!
Oh wait, everybody has been doing that for a long time already...
I was the next man!
What about homeless, autistic mutes? Do you have to "verbally" say something? I do not like "names", to identify me I just hold up one finger!
I am not against the "identify laws", just "talking to the cops"! Just stare at the police officer and twitch some and when (s)he asked for 'ID' hold up your finger for the 'ID'! In a few years, every cop in a Amerika will have some form of biometric reader to scan the anyone. So, this will be all moot in a few years!
"I'm a dirty white tomcat, enter my world..."
I'm at the point now where I'm glad if they don't draw their gun. I had one almost break my the back window of my friend's car with his nightstick when I told him I didn't have a driver's license.
And I was riding in the back seat.
The court held that police, based on reasonable suspicion that a person is involved in criminal activity can compel him to identify themself.
I lived under a 100% pure dictatorship. So I can tell how it will work for you.
- "Reasonable suspicion" was sanctioned as a valid cause for the "suspect" to identify himself to the law enforcement officer, just hours after the coup.
- "Reasonable suspicion" allowed a law enforcement officer to detain the "suspect" if he didn't identify himself. The purpose of detention was to allow law enforcement to identify the "suspect" using their databases.
- A "state of permanent war" was officially anounced by the dictator, effective since Sept. 11th, 1973. It basically allowed the armed forces to have police powers. Now in the US it's pretty much the same, with three-letter agencies having extra powers. Oddly enough, "war on terrorism" started Sept. 11th, 2001 (many of you already know what happened somewhere in the world in 9/11, 1973). Our "state of permanent war" ended somewhere in the late 80's
- "Reasonable suspicion of being a communist" or a "terrorist" or a "subversive marxist" (all synonyms) was the cause of the death of almost 3000 people. In the US, the analogy is rather obvious.
- Most of those former law enforcement officials and former members of the armed forces are now happily retired, living in the suburbs...
- "Reasonable suspicion" was abolished in 2000. And we still have to carry "papers". Our recent pseudo-democratic governments got addicted to those extra powers.
Those were the facts. Now, most of that is history. But history repeats itself somewhere else.
The ideals that the United States were founded on are what I like about my country.
I suggest you read a history book. This country was not founded for life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; it was life, liberty and property. This has always been a nation to protect the wealth, since God has decreed and blessed his will on to the 3%.
Fortunately, there was a part in the middle where the middle class had their chance, but all of that is changing. Today the 3% are corporations rather than pasty white men.
This was SCOTUS, not POTUS. I realize that this is Slashdot, and our membership here requires us to rag on the POTUS at every opportunity, but you could just put that in your sig instead of having to twist the ending of your post to get it in.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
You are on your way to a political rally. The police set up a roadblock, and request the names of everyone going through the roadblock. They now have all those names to put into their databases, and we know the present administration would never make anything like an 'enemies list' like Nixon did would they?
Now, my general concern is that the police take it as a license to start identifying people on their way out of opposition political meetings and the like, but I think that the majority opinion is worded quite clearly such that the verdict is only on identification during the course of an existing criminal investigation....
Allow me to introduce you to Gilmore vs. Ashcroft.
A sample:
"United States courts have recognized for more than a century that honest citizens have the right to travel throughout America without government restrictions. Some people say that everything changed on 9/11, but patriots have stood by our Constitution through centuries of conflict and uncertainty. Any government that tracks its citizens' movements and associations, or restricts their travel using secret decrees, is violating that Constitution," said Gilmore. "With this case, I hope to redirect government anti-terrorism efforts away from intrusive yet useless measures such as ID checks, confiscation of tweezers, and database surveillance of every traveler's life."
So, when you say:
You inslut the memory of every person who ever died for daring to try and find a better life away from tyranny by comparing the mere need to identify yourself to a police officer with the controls that the tyrannical regimes of the 20th century used to keep their population from seeking freedom.
By that token, I daresay you insult the memory of those same people by not paying enough attention to what's already happening.
If Jesus wants me it knows where to find me.
Nice to see that people would rather mod me down than respond.
Must be nice to live in your world. In my world officers demand ID on a whim. And they get it because they can always find a reason to arrest someone. This changes nothing. Unless you have the money to make a stand in court, you have NO RIGHTS.
This case DOES matter to the other 30 states that DIDN'T already have this law on the books...
I find this rather interesting. Having parents who are both lawyers and working as a secretary in a law firm for two summers I can honestly say that of the thiry or so police officers that I have had first hand experience with, I can really only name two who have come off as complete jerks. The other twenty eight or so were nothing but kind and where most certainly not an "adrenaline-high thug". That being said, it really only does take one bad encounter with an officer to leave one with a life-long bitterness for all officers. Sir, just how many encounters with officers have you had? One, two perhaps? For the two to three months per year that I have worked with accused criminals, I can honestly say that a majority of the complaints centered where made against a few "bad cops". This does ruiling does not please me in any way shape or form, however, those of you who make a point and refuse to comply with this, I ask that you do so in a courteous manner. You might be suprised with the response that you get.
What I don't understand is that this decision flies in the face of their previous position protecting anonymous writing. Indeed anonymous or pseudoanonymous writing is protected for political reasons as well as for "barrier to entry" reasons. If you could be detained or questioned regarding your "true name" in the public square, how long will it be until they can require the same of you in any other public forum.
This is very disturbing. Combine this with automated agents of the police state requiring machine verification of your identity and your have one hell of an Orwellian nightmare.
Imagine if the police or their agents suspect everyone in a county or being possible illegal aliens or a prison escapee. This alone would justify the mandatory production of electronic credentials. Suspicion alone would be enough. Since they can't do racial profiling for illegals, everyone is suspect.
If you have neve read the SCOTUS majority opinion on anonymity, here is an excerpt from Justice Stevens...
"It is offensive -- not only to the values protected by the First Amendment, but to the very notion of a free society -- that in the context of everyday public discourse a citizen must first inform the government of her desire to speak to her neighbors and then obtain a permit to do so..."
This discusses anonymous free speech specifically, but how is that any different than non-criminal free participation in society. Indeed, suppose the citizen in question is speaking anonymously at a public forum? This is in direct contradiction to previous decisions.
In the above example, the suspicion issue is woefully inadequeate. If you are a British policeman in pre-1776 America, the person at the podium may indeed be Thomas Paine. Requiring him to identify himself is exactly what anonymous or pseudoanonymous protections were intended for.
So next time a cop wants your name, tell him you are speaking in an anonymous public context. Give that to the Surpremes...
Sheesh...
This is going to be how they get the ISP's to betray your trust.
Before everyone stampedes for Canada, try to remember that up here, anyone is required to identify themselves to the police (name, address, phone number, etc) at any time, for any reason whatsoever. Also, anyone randomly requested to do so by an officer is required to turn out their pockets for inspection. I kid you not.
One of the differences between Canada and the United states, as you can see, is that Canadians inherently trust their government and agents of the law; this is in stark contrast to America, where all power is suspect and subject to scrutiny. I am not intending to pronounce judgment on which system is superior.
You should love the Declaration of Independence instead of the Constitution. The Constitution could be rewritten any day, and it probably will be when we realize that the three brances don't work any longer. The Declaration of Independence founded this country. It defines the American dream with the words: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Words every government should recognize as the essence of life.
Live those words and not the ones in the Constitution. You can't take my freedoms without infringing upon my inalienable rights.
If only the courts recognized the Declaration of Independence as a legal document...
In Oz, you all always call each other "mates". It's actually derived from "inmates" back from the days when Australia used to be a Brit penal colony. Looks like you're still prisoners of a sort.
The opinion is worth reading, especially the dissents. There is more going on than a tautology about "we'll arrest you for not complying with our order to comply". Sure, but that depends on whether they have the right to order you to comply, now doesn't it? There is, of course, no real different between "failing to comply" and "not complying".
Innocent until proven guilty is cool, but so is "not target of an investigation until targeted with probable cause". They must have wanted this one bad, because they turned a statute targeting criminal investigations into a Terry stop rule. What's a criminal investigation? You, until we're satisfied otherwise.
Get it? Who's a suspect? Everyone--unless we say otherwise. Now that's the big deal. What rights do suspects, as targets of what is, after all, an official interrogation in connection with a crime, have? The right to remain silent? Nope--the right not to incriminate themselves.
What's not incriminating? Well, for starters, your name. Lessee. We got our list of incriminating names here (yup), and our list of persons we can ask (everyone)--well, we're in business. You don't have anything to hide, do you? Honest people don't, you know.
So what happened here? We established a class of persons--everyone--who can be interrogated by the police, without probable cause (the old standard), or being charged (and read their rights), and who do not have the right to remain silent as long as the questions are the kind of thing any person can answer without self-incrimination.
In the other corner, we have a list of things that can't possibly be incriminating (names) that we check to deny people reasonable rights like boarding airplanes.
What do you get when you add "reasonable, non-incriminating questions you must answer" and "reasonable security precautions that have a small percentage of false positives"? Tyranny.
"Yes, the police's rights can be abused. But e-mail can be and has been abused, so is e-mail thus a bad thing?"
email doesn't walk around with guns and can't quite put you in jail yet. Or did I miss something?
A name is a name (Jack Brown), and gives the officer something to call you besides "Hey You", but as long as we're not required to produce some sort of definitive, unique-identity-signifying number of the beast, I'm not too worried.
Are you aware that giving false information to a police officer is a criminal offense in most states?
"When the president does it, that means it's not illegal." - Richard M. Nixon
My guess is that the S.C. takes a brief look at many cases and says "The lower court was correct. We'd be wasting our time handling this. We have nothing new to say."
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
So _how much_ of my name must I supply? Is a nickname OK? Can I write an "X" on a piece of paper (that's a legal signature in the US, i.e. any mark made with the intent to authenticate) and say "That's my name, now buzz off."
I'm identifying myself as CowboyNeal.
Hmm. From a court case:
Moreover, a police officer does not have any duty under federal law to warn or protect any particular member of the public unless either (1 ) a "special relationship" exists between the victim and the criminal or between the victim and the state or (2 ) the victim faces a special danger not applicable to the public at large.
Ensley v. Soper, 142 F.3d 1402 (1998).
Now you're obstructing justice and lying to a cop. And you're probably a terrorist. Hope you enjoy Guantanamo.
Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
That depends on state law I believe. Many people use pseudonyms, the real question I think ends with intent. If I want to remain anonymous (which this case might have made obselete) I am able, just like big celebrities, to use a fake name when it suits me.
If I use a fake name to perform fraud, then its just part of the big fraud pie and not necessarily illegal in itself.
I'm sure this varies greatly from state to state.
I just read the "slip" opinion. The facts in the opinion do not match the recorded incident. Hibel was not asked for his identity. He was repeatedly asked to "show his papers." (Such a request from anyone in authority sends chills down my spine.) Have we reached such a place in the USA where the Supreme Court manufactures facts to support their opinion.
The U.S. Supreme Court has become arrogant, and is not following the law. See the section titled Corruption in the U.S. Supreme Court: Unprecedented Corruption: A guide to conflict of interest in the U.S. government.
Oh no, the US is becoming like the rest of the world. They start catching up, and the change frightens them. If only they caught up faster, then maybe we wouldn't have to put up with all the friggin idiotic posts about the world coming to an end.
I need a nap...
if you have the right to remain silent after you are arrested, why cant you remain silent before you are arrested?
This was a very bad case to use for such a land mark decision. Police already had reasonable suspicion to question the gentlemen's name and whereabouts.
Of all the countless people harrassed by police for their ID and what they are doing -- merely because the lazy and ignorant cops thought they looked like they were up to something, some stupid lawyers had to push it in a case where the man was actualy up to something, and the cops had good reason to suspect it.
Scotus did say they would re-visit the decision should a better case come up where the defended was actually up to nothing and no reasonable suspicion was present, that results in a conviction for some other past offense.
But by then, the damage will have been done. National ID cards and the like.
Note the subject. Be carefull what you want. Most people confuse the two. Law enforcement is about arresting and punishing the guilty. Crime prevention is about harrassing people. Once we decide that Crime Prevention is our goal, we open up a whole new book of rights for the police to invade our privacy and we wont' be able to do anything about it. After all, only the guilty have a reason to hide something right?
I am sure there will be people protesting at both the Democratic and Republican conventions, but things like this have a definite chilling effect on the first amendment right "of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances".
Not only is RB so wrong, go read that site and see what kind of idiots are editorlizing over there. The thing reads like a talk-radio show, full of random invective that is absolutely meaningless. The first story has Moore making a public speech with some hyperbole about Bush being happy if Canada does some conservative thing or another. The editor of the site lays into him with an utterly moronic attack of essentialy, "How does Moore know that Bush would be happy?" Except he uses lots of flaming language to make his pointless point. Guys, IT'S HYPERBOLE, learn about the English Language and its uses. It might as well be a bunch of people just posting, "I hate Michael Moore" "Me too, he's a dumb-ass" "Yeah, I hate him too, he sucks."
It is hard to imagine a better argument in FAVOR of Michael Moore than the existance of that web site and the idiots over there don't even know it.
Oh yeah, in case the felcher who mod'd you offtopic wants to do the same to me, think a little deeper here. Moore and his book, "Dude where's my country" and the movie "Farenheit 911" have major themes about the gradual loss of citizen's rights since 9/11 -- the SCOTUS ruling that started this thread is just another example of that loss. In other words, ON-FUCKING-TOPIC. Got it?
Are you too young to remember Pierre Trudeau using the War Measures Act to suspend civil liberties when Quebec terrorists kidnapped a British diplomat? Canada fought its own nasty little war with Quebec separatists in the 1960s and 70s and used many of the same tactics that we are currently using in the States. I remember an uncle of mine from New Brunswick lamenting the fact that the RCMP did not have the same kinds of files and data on Quebec radicals that the FBI had on US anti-war radicals.
Go look up the Act to Combat Terrorism (Bill C-36) and its companions.
Is High Times and other pro-marijuana literature still banned in Canada? Or has that sort of anti-free speech law that Canada used to be infamous for finally died out? Its been a while since I've been North to visit the relatives.
Sorry, I know that both Canada and the world have romantic notions about what an ideal place Canada is (kinda like Norway) and I don't really mean to piss in your Wheaties, but you need to read your own history. Canada has had many of the same fights over civil liberties vs security that the US has had. And civil liberties have lost many rounds in Canada.
FreeSpeech.org
And now, with this ruling, a government-issued document to prove you are who you say you are because the officer "reasonably suspects" you might not be because of a hunch. Or else you will be arrested and held until indentified to the satisfaction of the local government (or higher).
You do have to identify yourself to police in Canada, that is true.
You DO NOT have to empty your pockets. That is a search, and a search is conducted after an arrest.
Any cop who tells you otherwise is just utilizing your ignorance of the laws to his/her advantage. There must be reason for an arrest (albeit, not much - anything deemed "reasonable" by a court will suffice) before a search can be conducted.
I'm reminded of a quite infamous case in Ontario where a cop who had issued a speeding ticket to a person noticed a shiny new SLR on the passenger seat. Being a bit of a photo bug himself, the officer starts chatting and eventually asks to see the camera. Apon moving said camera, out pops some cocaine - man is arrested. Man is found not guilty due to illegal search. The officer had no grounds to search the vehicle.
Canadian and US laws are quite similar in this respect, actually.
Be careful, there's a fine line between "asking" you to show him what's in you pockets, and arresting you and searching those pockets.
Are you a felon?
Yes, but not convicted. Yet.
Even in Canada this is true.
Sorry to shatter anyones belief that Canada doesn't have such a requirement.
The decision, while unfortunate, does not permint the police to require identification at any time. The decision held that the the police must actually be investigating a crime and there must be some reasonable basis for suspision, that it applies only in states where there is a law on the books and that you are only required to provide your name. In the cirumstances of the case you are not required to show any identification. If the police had probable cause to arrest you then you could not be compelled to answer, but they would probably inventory your drivers license when they arrested you. Check NPR's coverage and I suspect also Tuesday's NYT.
I love all three (and of course, Raiders of the Lost Ark is both my favorite and the greatest of the three, and one of the all-time great movies period), but I have particular affection for Temple of Doom that I don't for Last Crusade, the conventional wisdom about how Last Crusade is "better" notwithstanding.
Before he can ask "Where are you going?" say "I'm lost. How do I get to (this place where I'm not going)?"
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
A person's identity obviously bears informational and incriminating worth, "even if the [name] itself is not inculpatory." Hubbell, 530 U.S., at 38. A name can provide the key to a broad array of information about the person, particularly in the hands of a police officer with access to a range of law enforcement databases. And that information, in turn, can be tremendously useful in criminal prosecution. It is therefore quite wrong to suggest that a person's identity provides a link in the chain to incriminating evidence "only in unusual circumstances." Ante, at 12.
The officer in this case told petitioner, in the Court's words, that "he was conducting an investigation and needed to see some identification." Ante, at 2. As the target of that investigation, petitioner, in my view, acted well within his rights when he opted to stand mute. Accordingly, I respectfully dissent.
Stevens (or his clerk writing for him) in his dissent seems to be the only member of the court who addressed the issue of just how revealing a name can be in an age where large databases are omnipresent. IANAL, but his reasoning seems quite convincing to me. In some circumstances revealing one's name is indirectly, but powerfully, self-incriminating, and thus should not be compelled.
When you deal with police, be nice, be polite, be unemotional, and move slowly. If they are committing an injustice, let it go, gather your evidence, then sue. Do not threaten to have their badge, do not threaten them in any way. Let them threaten you.
And you know what... show that video to a black man over 50 or 60 and you ask him if Hiibel got off easy.
Worst of all, the ruling doesn't say you have to show your "papers". You just have to tell the cop your name on demand, which they deemed did not constitute potentially incriminating evidence to the police. Unless they make having a stupid white drash name like Dudley Hiibel a crime in and of itself, you can't be arrested for telling the cops your name. And if your name allows them to pull up warrants on you.... GOOOOOD!!!! Your name wasn't incriminating. The crimes that inspired the warrants were.
If a cop asks my name, I'll tell him. I'll be cooperative. I'll say yes sir and no sir. I will give him absolutely no reason whatsoever to accuse me of being troublesome or resisting. I will not be an unsympathetic, arrogant trailer trash prick like Hiibel.
Start a happiness pandemic
Someone that is arrested has the Right to Remain Silent, but NOT the regular person that is simply being anonymous?
And I had an uncle named B.S. no first name or middle name mind you just the letters B and S. Want to talk about someone who would not get along well with this ruling?
Bad Panda! No Bamboo for you! In matters of importance ACs will not be responded to. Want to say something critical,OK
The Queen has virtually no power over the *British* people and you think she has real power over Australians?
Look up the term "constitutional monarchy" sometime. While you're at it, look up "Charles I" for an example of what happens to monarchs who try to seize absolute power (Hint: it involved him, a chopping block and a decent sized axe).
But if you've been arrested, and don't have a driver's license or other special case, the rules are all different. According to the Brown vs. Texas case, you don't have to give your name, and they can book you as a John Doe.
That's not always your best move legally :-(), especially if you're not guilty of anything, or if you _are_ guilty of something, but you can do it. Remember that police can usually get away with holding you for up to 48 hours for no particularly good reason, and if they happen to bust you on a Thursday and the 48 hours expires on Saturday and there's no judge around til Monday, well bummer for you, 'cause John Doe doesn't get out on bail or on his own unrecognized recognizance.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
West Addison, Chicago, Illinois, 60613 is the address for Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs. the joke is that in the movie The Blues Brothers Elwood Blues gives a policeman who stops him the address for wrigley field as his home address.
Suchetha
learn from yesterday, plan for tomorrow, party tonight
or one out of three ain't bad
This seems to increase the already existing threat of identity theft where a criminal caught conveniently without "papers" memorizes an innocent person's identity prior to the incident and gives that to police instead. When innocent person doesn't show up at court (because they know nothing about it), warrant is issued. Chaos ensues.
I really don't see what the entire fuss is about. All the law states is that you're supposed to state your name if any law enforcement officer asks you for it...mind you merely state it, not confirm it by showing ID.
With all respect to civil libertarians, I wish they'd realise that opposing every new law with ominous sounding phraseology like `Big Brother' , `assault on civil liberties' , `belief in the constitution' yada yadda is counterproductive. By doing so they're indulging in stereotypical behaviour.
As a result people are less likely to take you seriously when the next DMCA comes around or another Skylarov is arrested for speaking freely..Ever heard the story about the boy who cried wolf?
Choose your battles wisely guys!
Once again, /. has almost reported the news.
/. is great for getting an overview of the news, but sometimes the story isn't quite right. Remember to check your sources!
The case does not require any person to identify themselves to any police officer at any time. Reading from the court's opinion, you see that identification is only required when "a person [is] detained by an officer under suspicious circumstances". Civil liberties advocates should be further relieved by the court's affirmation of Brown v. Texas that the detention of a person must satisfy Fourth Amendment requirements. Even in the absence of a court-issued warrant, Terry v. Ohio affirmed "an officer's reasonable suspicion that a person may be involved in criminal activity permits the officer to stop the person for a brief time and take additional steps to investigate further" and further, "an officer may ask a suspect to identify himself during a Terry stop".
Answering the obvious question, the court notes: "Hiibel argues unpersuasively that the statute circumvents the probable-cause requirement by al-lowing an officer to arrest a person for being suspicious, thereby creating an impermissible risk of arbitrary police conduct. These fa-miliar concerns underlay Kolender [v. Lawson], Brown [v. Texas], and Papachristou [v. Jacksonville]. They are met by the requirement that a Terry stop be justified at its inception and be 'reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified' the initial stop."
And on one last note pertaining to the Fifth Amendment: "Hiibel's contention that his conviction violates the Fifth Amendment's prohibition on self-incrimination fails because disclosure of his name and identity presented no reasonable danger of incrimination."
The box said, "Requires Windows XP or Better"...
So I installed Linux.
I only post anon, and have acieved over twenty +5
Excet for this post, I usually post amazing exposes, insider information, links to buried evidence, etc.
Everytime I do so i do it to reward anonymity.
I think accounts are stupid because they are usually anon anyways at the fundamental level.
but I archive each of my +5s as a trophy, though they are spread on a few computers. I will have to compile them as a group to prove a point one day.
as an anon poster i hate non-cerebral trolls more than ANYONE because they make my work harder and besmirch my reputation by association.
Was there an existing criminal investigation here? My thought is that, if a cop can't give you a reason for his suspicion, he doesn't have a reasonable suspicion.
Whatever happened to "You have the RIGHT to remain silent?" I guess you don't have those rights unless a cop reads them off to you?? I'm pretty sure you don't have to talk to any law enforcement or give them any info at all, all you have to say is something to the effect of "I'd like to talk to my lawyer." But i'm not exactly sure of the latter.
If I have the right to remain silent, then why must I be compelled to give out my identity?
*shurgs* Haven't had enough run-ins with law enforcement to know how the system works.
A Penny for my thoughts? Here's my two cents. I got ripped off!
Didn't the Supreme Court recently make a decision protecting anonymity?
: foner.www.media.mit.edu/people/foner/Essays/Civil- Liberties/Project/supreme-court-upholds-anonymity. html+thomas+paine+supreme+court+anonymity&hl=e n
A link with some highlighted terms:
http://www.google.com/search?q=cache:twOguz2u57QJ
Somebody has a line about how there have been fake cops accosting people, so if somebody stops you, how can you tell if they're really a cop, or just a guy in a cop suit, which come to think of it, is really all a cop is?
But your signature line is encouraging people to support Jim Feldkamp for Congress, who was recently an FBI agent (i.e. a cop), and who lists one of his big issues as Homeland Security, in particular getting Homeland Security interfering with\\\\\\\\\\ protecting small towns like yours, not just big cities. Homeland Security are the folks who want to take away our civil liberties wholesale, unlike your small-town thug cops who just want to take them away retail. Furthermore, Feldkamp's web page doesn't list what party he's running under - is he an independent, or a stealth Republican, or a stealth Random-Right-Winger-Party? What baggage is he bringing with him, other than cops looking under your bed looking for Terrorists? I certainly hope someone with that background isn't claiming to be Libertarian, or if he is, I hope the Libertarians notice.
bill
dot
stewart
at
pobox
dot com
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Well, if the thing you admit to has a smaller penalty than the penalty for not providing your name, you're set. Just admit to jaywalking, or a minor traffic violation.
Yes, but here's a problem.
You give a name that isn't really yours. For whatever reason, the officer decides he doesn't believe you. He now has reasonable cause for suspicion and demands to see your identity, search your person and arrests you.
Further, without identification, how do you prove your name to them satisfactorily? I tend not to bring any forms of identification with me when I go out because I don't drive, drink, smoke or go to bars - so carrying ID around with me is just a burden.
At least in Florida, if an officer asks you to identify yourself as part of any investigation, you need to answer. Fail to answer, and you are obstructing justice, arrested, and then legally forced to answer.
This has been the case for as long as I can remember, and is true in Canada as well.
All they've done is clarify that you have no more rights online than you do on the street. Perfectly reasonable, and those of you who think they are "owed" anonymity need to grow up.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
The court in this case was upholding a state law, not a fundamental power of law enforcement. If your state has no such law, this doesn't apply to you.
The Supreme Court is basically running an experiment on this issue. They're allowing a law to remain on the books for the moment with the promise of revisiting it if cases arise when it is clearly harmful. They're willing to risk some chilling effects in the mean time, in deference to the judgement and political authority of the legislature, which they're not really supposed to replace.
Also note that the vote was 5-4.
Another way to look at it is that they basically punted the issue until a couple years later when the "war on terrorism" hype dies down. The court quite deliberately operates on the cusp of social upheaval, and doesn't like to force it before there are people ready to undertake it politically. If they're going to make strong affirmations of civil liberties in areas that don't have so much case law history (like most of the PATRIOT ACT issues) they'd rather do it when people have been thinking about it more.
If you want to see this issue resolved, raise a big stink about it. Call your representatives. Conflicts between state and federal laws, for example, always get the court's attention, though there may not be a good way for congress to intervene here. Not that they'd likely get anything passed in the current environment, but even making the front page of the paper is a good start. Whine about it to your friends who don't read slashdot. You'd be surprised how many people truly care about their civil liberties, but rarely act on the topic because they have other things higher on life's priority list. We've got an army of civil libertarians on Slashdot, some of whom actually have friends who don't read Slashdot, and we really do have the power to sway public opinion and get this into public dialog.
If we can get the law into public dialog, there's a pretty good chance we'll get a test case. The court always struggles finding good test cases, because bad cases make bad law, but a sense of social urgency can sway them on exactly what issues of a case are important for consideration, and thus how suitable a case is to test the law.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759.
Back when I was in college in the 70s, bus tickets and train tickets and airplane tickets weren't things that only applied to one particular person who'd been granted permission to travel - they were bearer tickets that said you'd paid for your seat.
Getting around in a car _does_ often require you to carry papers. Cops can stop you any time they feel like it and demand them. Usually they only do this if you've done something either wrong or suspicious-looking while driving, but if you think that cops can't or don't ask for papers without that, then you must be a clean-shaven short-haired white boy who didn't start driving until you got out of college and acquired a clean non-sporty-looking car. Furthermore, many state and local police run sobriety checkpoints on heavy-alcohol weekends and inspect everybody's papers when they go by.
Back when I lived in New Jersey, I was once stopped at a checkpoint coming back from an election-night party, and the cops were not only asking for my papers, but asking where I was coming from and where I was going. Unfortunately, at that time I had a burned-out taillight that I did not want to call attention to, so I did not tell him what I was thinking, which was that I was going to America but had obviously made a wrong turn and could he direct me back across the border.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Hi Hanzosan.
That's great! I'm going to send that post to Michael. I actually know him, you see. Yes, the singer Michael Bolton who lives in CT. So I'll try to post this as AC. :)
Haha. I love it. When you see this type of response, you know you hit a nerve and hit it good. They know you have them in a logical trap but they are so frightened by it that they can't admit they are wrong and come to grips with their intellectual hypocrisy.
Anyone who expresses an opinion that is unpopular must be a troll. Thats how it works around here.
The Cato Institute provides a useful list in their amicus brief.
Many states have enacted that a police officer "may demand" the name of a Terry-stop suspect, but provide no explicit criminal penalties for refusing to acede to that demand.
Citizens (at least in the USA) can't do squat. We can't elect presidents, we can't make laws, and we surely can't "delegate power" to officers.
We can't refuse payment to officers. Only people higher up in the power structure can do that. We can't change the law. Only people higher up in the power structure can do that. We can't create state or federal legislation, and we can't vote on it either, anyway. We can't stop "officers" from demanding our name, or our papers. We can't force an officer to arrest someone in violation of a law, or even to pursue the apparent violation of the law. Only their superiors upstream in the power structure, who of course uniformly consist of other people we didn't, and cannot, select, control or reward, can do that.
I can tell you for a fact I haven't delegated any power to anyone nor have I ever been given an opportunity to, nor do I ever expect to have that opportunity made available.
If you want to call a spade a spade, then simply be honest and observe that the power structure is top down, not bottom up.
Fact: The USA is not a democracy. It is a highly mutated republic with ponderous socialist leanings. Your butt will do what it is told, when it is told, or you will go to jail.
The USA/"mommy" government at every level will tell you when to jump, and how high. They'll tell you you must wear a seat belt. They'll tell you you can't pierce your body parts. They'll tell you what you can say, and where you can say it, and to whom. They'll tell you what varieties of sex you may, and may not, engage in. And when. And where. You may not assist someone with a terminal illness to die. You may not have more than 2 pets. You may not put up an antenna in your yard. You may not listen to various radio transmissions. You cannot keep a horse on your property. You may not refuse to pay taxes. You may not refuse to serve as cannon fodder in any conflict the power structure deems expedient at the moment. You may not use various drugs. You may not grow hemp, even if you are a rope manufacturer. You may not build your home without windows. You may not build your home without a smoke detector. You may not build a business without building in physical access for the handicapped. You may not... ah, fudge.
Look, go home, toe the line, pay your taxes. When the officer comes to your door, be polite, give your name, and hope that's the end of it. Because if it isn't, you're about to get an object lesson in the power structure. You won't like it.
It's not going to change, either. Look around you. No, those aren't aliens in disguise. You don't need a tinfoil hat. You just need a comb. Those are actually sheep.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
..if you're not used to it. But I'm living in a country where you have to carry your ID card with you and present the police on demand... but guess what? It's not a police state! In fact, it's far more liberal than the USA. At least you can come over here for holiday or a buisness-trip WITHOUT getting arrested at the airport. I dont want to start a rant about some parts of the body stuck in other parts, but you might start doing something against the stuff that *really* puts civil rights to danger (e.g. non-existant protection of privacy, police violence and so on) instead of yammering about rulings that (hey thats new!) really helps the police doing its job.
bickerdyke
I am Sparticus!
Is this the end yet?...How 'bout now...how 'bout now...how 'bout now?
that would sell their asses to any politician or cop - and not even on demand but voluntarily.
And this is not even for security from "terrorism" or anything else, but just because somebody in authority says they have to.
And also so they can claim to be "better citizens" than those who correctly suspect the government of
being a crooked extortion and protection racket.
Well, sorry, morons, but in fact you're all gutless punks - and I use the term in the prison sense.
I spit on you slaves.
Have a nice day, fuckwads.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
I'm pretty sure they can demand your identity if you've been charged with a crime.
Police still cannot just walk up to you and say "papers, please." This is not Soviet Russia. They are still required to have reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing before they can compel identification. Personally, I would feel more comfortable if the standard were probable cause, which is a much stronger condition to meet, but at least they do not have free reign. Now would be the time to actually write your representatives and senators instead of whining and bitching about 1984 and Soviet Russia. Congress can always pass a law explicitly requiring probable cause, but it would require lots of noise from their constituency. It's too bad people just don't give a shit. We whine and bitch all day, but are still to apathetic to do anything about it.
Sorry, what's "Terry-stop"?
Picture this: In Germany you not only have to identify yourself, but you have to do so with a valid ID-Card with picture (ID-Card "Personalausweis"; Passport or Drivers Licence), which is machine readable (of course).
Failing to do so can get you arrested till your identity is confirmed (which could also mean having your fingerprints taken, depending on the circumstances).
Identity is confirmed by looking up your info in a nationwide system of databases which holds all citizens' place of residence, because you are (of course) required by law to register your place of residence with the "Landeseinwohneramt" (roughly: state residents office), which is normally situated at a police station. Failing to do so within a period of time (I think half a year) after you moved to a new place of residence could cost you quite an amount of money in fines.
I always envied you americans that you could happily live your lives with the minimum of a social security number (if at all) and I pity you for your lost right of anonymity.
Someone's got a sig about boxes. "Soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order, starting now.", I think it said.
Does anyone know if it's legal to summon the judge hearing your case as a witness?
You read wrong.
The police are not allowed to ask for a name, if there is already an existing case against the victim.
The police are allowed to ask for a name, if the victim is not known to under prosecution, and if the police suspect that a crime may have been committed.
Providing a false name is a crime, providing no name is a crime - try telling Frederick Goldberg or Caleb Rubenstein that revealing his name will cost him nothing, especially when it's the highly professional (and ethical!) German SS soldier asking, and he's living in Berlin, circa 1938.
Heck, try telling Mohammed Abdulla Ben-Sharif that no harm will come to him by telling the good policeman his name, when he's wandering through New York on a chilly September night.
And how long until some good policeman is forced to detain a suspect for providing an obviously false name? Only to find out that his name is really Winston Smith?
You will love Big Brother. And remember, Big Brother is watching!
I could be wrong here, but I thought I was taught that our country was founded based upon the premise that the people ruled and that powers were to be handed to the government reluctantly -- innocent until proven guilty and freedom to travel.
If I'm stopped on the street by an agent of the government, they had better have a reason to interrupt my day.
Charge me with a crime or get out of my way.
Simple scenario:
1. Cop stops young man and asks "What's your name boy?"
2. Man asks "Why are you stopping me?"
3. Cop says "I said, 'What is your name, boy?'"
4. Man says "Unless you have a specific charge, you may not stop me and request personal information."
5. Cop says: "You're under arrest for not providing your name."
Laws are to protect the individual from the tyrrany of the State not make the State's life easier. That is the way of the Old World -- we left that and fought for our Independance from that -- I think.
If you argue it's for "public safety" then you'll have nothing to hide when the police search your posessions without you being present. Oh wait, the TSA already does that...no matter that those locks on your luggage are for thwarting ground crews from stealing items from your luggage. Those TSA fast-food industry rejects would *never* do that, would they?
A number of few years back (1993ish) I was walking down the street when I was stopped by a rookie police woman who asked me several questions, then demanded my id saying there had been a theft in the area recently.
Having taken a couple of law classes, and being a cocky kid, I refused. I was then handcuffed and placed under arrest for obstruction. At that point I demanded she call her supervisor which she did.
10 minutes later the supervisor came over to the intersection, got the story. He chastized the rookie and let me go, asking if I would like to file a complaint. I responded that all I'd like is an apology. A week later I was sent an official one signed by the chief and the rookie.
The excuse I got was there was a car theft earlier in the day. It turned out to be by the car owner's boyfriend who was 10 years older and whom I looked nothing like.
I feel good about standing up for my rights. I also feel lucky I was smart enough to call in the supervisor before everything was made official.
-
A Canadian
Had a few similar encounters with police in Sacramento, CA. While it is true that there are fine upstanding officers - my own experiences are no exceptions.
One time after complaining about their intimidation tactics only to be told, "why don't you go back where you came from" by one of the officers. Me not being white of course I quite pissed. I complained to the superior officer and was told that "they dealt with very bad people so you have to understand."
Also, wondering if the laws are different in California. As the police officers were serving a warrant at a resident I happened to be in, I was rounded up, and asked for name, residence, occupation and if I had a criminal record. I was also told to show my Driver Licence. Being naive I gave the information truthfully abeit reluctantly. How often do police non-chalantly trambled on a citizen's 5th amendment rights? Do they really have the right to ask those mentioned questions? I know now I don't have to answer some of the above questions, but how many other people are just as uninformed?
I go by "Cletus Van Damme."
And my social...
078-05-1120
Off topic, but since that number's the most misused ever maybe you should go with one of these instead.
I'm sure this varies greatly from state to state.
Correction: It varied from state to state. Apparently that is not the case anymore.
--- Journals are boring; Go to my web page instead
welcome to the new America, the land of the brave and the home of the free...
soon to be indistinguishable from those other guys who played oposite the US in the years of the cold war...
Papers? - You'll be lucky to hear the word "please".
Change your name to "Shop Lifter".
..
You then don't need to give your name because doing so would incriminate you
I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
hand amputation
finger chopping
beating with metal pipe
arm breaking with metal pipe
... presumably more videos exist but DOD refuses to release them
From the Wall Street Jounal Online Edition
I believe Juanita
But if you go look at what really happened, the cop didn't demand that Hiibel state his name (at least in any of the parts of the tape that were audible enough to get on the transcript), the cop demanded that Hiibel produce papers - repeatedly. No assertions about "ok, if you won't show me your papers, give me your name as required by law" - just increasingly voluble demands for him to show ID. And the court let them get away with that, and upheld the conviction because Nevada's law does let cops demand names and Hiibel didn't volunteer his name.
About 20 states have laws that allow police to demand your name - the Supreme Court majority opinion lists them, but doesn't say how much more each state tells cops they're able to demand. You should probably go check if you live in one of them. But realistically, don't be surprised if the other states all quietly make laws requiring this, encouraged by Homeland Security or the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators or some other shills.
Of course, if you're driving, and have a driver's license, state laws pretty much all require that you produce it. (I don't know if this applies in non-state jurisdictions, such as US colonies like Guam and Puerto Rico, or Indian reservations, or military bases with Federal police, etc.) If you've got a license with you, but aren't driving, the rules may depend on your state law.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
We have the same issues with the pigs; :)
it is true that they are educated in such way that they consider themseves some sort of guardians of slaves or similar, and they behave accordingly;
it is true that most people behave like slaves too.
They do not have the correct notion of freedom, ant they piss their pants when the police asks for "papers" - and instantly they begin negociate some bribery.
As far as I am concerned , I just LOVE when the pigs are starting the chicanes with me. Because they also fear the scandal here, and that's exactly what I provide for them; because they are PAID with MY MONEY! They should SERVE me, not PISS ME OFF!
Anyways, no real chance of sueing police officers over here, it's just too expensive and futile, but what you can do is offering the pig a battle they don't want with a weapon they can't handle: public scandal. (not too effective either, but at least it has some pros)
Not too many citizens know their rights, and almost none realize that their actual legal rights are a very dim version of what they should be;
And of course, this will eventually lead to just another bloodshed, but we'll talk about revolutions in another post
In this particular case, the police officer should have just ask for the car identification at their base , and if the owner's name showed up, they could just do some talking, no biggie; but the slightly fascist officer needed some struggle and stuff in order to tame his own complexes. tsk tsk tsk
FREEDOM to you all.
This decision is part of a growing trend in the US in favour of bigger and more powerful government after the world trade center attacks.
Unfortunatly, the primary effect of the attacks has made americans willing to give up many, previously cherished, rights so that they may benefit from the security that follows.
May the Maths Be with you!
I need to have an ID with me and the police can ask for it, if they feel the need. Does this make Belgium a police state? No. Does this make it impossible to walk around without your ID? No.
I have been asked once for my ID (Exept from traffic related stuff) and they were cleaqrly looking for someone who looked like me. Checked my ID, fast search and a sniff at my cigarettes and I was on my way. Took about 3 minutes of my time.
The next day I say them doing that same thing with somebody who like vaguelee similar to me and sure had the same description. That person copuld also go within 3 minutes.
Now what if I would have been the person they were looking for? They would either see that with the ID card, or take him to the station and solve it their.
If I would not cooperate, they would have to do the ID-check with me, taking people away from catching the real killers.
This is the practice how it works now. It works reasonable. Is it flawless? No and everybody knows that. The moment the police would like to pick out any group, they can easily do so without that group having an ID and because it will have a larger impact (go to the station every time) it will be more anoying to that group.
Also they could find the crime that could be connected to your description if they realy try a bit. (They ar looking for a causcasian 30-40 year old man in a costume and a portable walking in the neighbourhood of officebuildings. He stole some paperclips. Shoot on sight.)
I am more woried that an other country forces Belgium to change a Belgian law that was voted for and welcomed by most.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Of course, I will continue to list my address as
1060 West Addison
Chicago, Illinois
60613
Always a wise choice just in case a group of Illinois Nazis come looking for you.
And your brother Jake.
"Frankly, that comment totally trivializes the entire Holocaust."
You miss the point, idiot.
It started with Jews, and then ended with anyone who disagreed.
Idiots like you are the reason I will be leaving Amerika.
Does this mean if a police officer refuses to identify himself to me. I can citizen arrest him?
Personal Anecdote:
A few years ago when I was pranking my highschool (senior prank), before we got far someone called the cops.
When the cops arrived an officer came up to me and asked what my name was. I responded by directly questioning him: "Am I legally required to tell you?", to which he said no. I then asked "Am I legally required to stay here", to which he responded something like "no, but I would recommend it" in a huffy tone. After that I just walked away, and he didnt do anything about it.
Later when the cops left some of my friends who were hiding called my cell phone to say the coast was clear, and the pranking continued (albeit more stealthily).
General Case Logic:
So anyways, even though the laws may vary from place to place, and the laws may have changed from then until now, if you directly ask a cop whether you are legally required to divulge information before you do, you are more likely to get a better outcome than if you unquestioningly divulge the information or if you flat out refuse. Remember, cops, like regular citizens, are allowed to ask you pretty much anything they want. However this also means that every question a cop asks is not necessairily backed up by the force of law.
In this sort of situation there are 2 relevant peices of data that form a 2x2 grid of options,
(1) Whether you legally obliged to show the information.
(2) Whether the cop *thinks* you are legally obliged to show it.
These make up the following cases:
(A) Laws require you to state your name, but the cop doesn't think you are required to(or isn't sure about it): Cop says you dont have to state your name, so you don't. You win even though the law is against you.
(B) Laws require you to state your name, and the cop knows it. The cop demands your name with force of law, so you tell him. You lose, but you are not any worse off for asking.
(C) Laws don't require you to state your name, and the cop doesn't think you are required to(or isn't sure about it). Win/Win. The cop says you are not legally required to divulge your name, so you don't, and you win.
(D) Laws don't require you to state your name, but the cop thinks otherwise. The cop says you are legally required to state your name, so you do. You lose (in terms of divulging information), but later you can probably use the fact that the cop misled you to fuck him over in a court of law.
against being a hysterical jerk?
So, the guy gets carted in for questioning and has to pay a $250 dollar fine. If they'd drop the fine, I figure it'd be no harm no foul.
However, fining someone for not identifying themself, ie: making it a misdemeanor or what have you not to identify ones-self does open the door to police abuse because a suspect doesn't know when the cop asks for identification whether or not the cop really has a reasonable suspicion, probable cause or whatever the requirement du jour is in that area to be asking the question.
I mean sheesh, the hysterical jerk already helps pay the cop's salary (taxes) he also has to pay for his own questioning?
In Soviet Russia... Well, I do understand how that sounds on /., but still... :) In Soviet Russia and in Russia in general, you are required to give your passport anytime a police guy asks for it. You can be held in a police station for several hours if you don't. More than that, there's a (voluntary; yeah, indeed; fucking fascists) requirement to "register" wherever you live. You got it right. Once you move, you have to go to police and either show 'em a document that you're renting a flat or some person have to come along and provide evidence he's a legal owner of some [local] living place and is going to give you a corner to live. If you don't, you'll have a problem every time an officer stops you and asks for papers. You won't be able to get a job legally. I guess, that's what starts to happen to you. Watch out guys. There's some real shit nearby. To fight the terrorists, for sure.
And whatabout the checkpoints? Each district boundary had a Militia (police) post. Periodically this would be closed and they would check papers, not just of the driver but any passengers as well.
I understand that even in Soviet times, the militia would do sweeps looking for Chechnyan/Georgian criminals (Southerners in places like Moscow and Leningrad were assumed to be criminals)and for young persons of military age who hadn't served. People living in Moscow or Leningrad had a special stamp in their internal passport cionfirming that right. This was also frequently checked.
And President V.V. Putin is doing his best to bring it all back!!!
See my journal, I write things there
Ahh, Blues Brothers, what a movie!
Martin
citizen-criminals have no right to anonymity in the eyes of the law
all citizen-criminals in the United States are already assumed guility unless they're really police or government employees working for any of the three-letter criminal services.
it's vital for citizen-criminals to identify themselves and submit to any degredation deemed fitting by police--anything less would put the citizen-criminal on a greater or equal footing with the officer and that's just not right,right?
citizen-criminals are never too young to enter the criminal-justice system--and with an ever lowering barrier to entry it won't be long before the privitization of the criminal-justice system (notably the prisons) begins generating serious revenue for domestic and international interests
it's all about money
in the end, everyone loses to the system
and in a system with no apparent winners there will
be those who will gather to eventually destroy it
the gamble taken by the 10% controlling the show is that they
get a good return on their investment before everything is sacked
or the hope that they're lucky enough to control whatever is left
Every new form of media has it's own Requirimento
Part of the reluctance of giving a name is that this simple identification will give the police officer immediate access to all records on you. The answer? Officer: "What's your name?" You: "John Smith."
The only reason they want your identity is so they can go to their database and find your records. So basically its a means of indexing who you are. There are many types of databases that help people do their jobs. There are school databases to track students. Financial databases for tracking money. Police Databases to track crime. Sometimes cops get hunches about people. They watch people all day so they have an intuitive feel for a "dirty character". It might be totally unsubstantiated that there pulling over a black guy or a guy with tattoos or a nose rings because they have a "hunch". The database is what gets used as a quick jury. So instead of guilty by jury. Youre guilty by database or innocent by database. So what were the alternatives before databases? Before tracking records were available? Cops rely on their databases and statistics to figure out whats wrong. If you can't measure problems you can't very well fix them. Child molesters and killers are problems someone talking bad about their boss isn't. You have no idea how much these databases have saved lives. Of course none of this works if you cant index people.
We've had this in denmark for a loong time, doesn't seem to be a problem.
The police can ask for this information:
Name and address
My birthday
What are the baaad policeman going to do with those information?
-- Make software not war
Remember the poor lady who happened to be called Monica Lewinsky? People at work asking her, "What's this about you and Bill?". Endless embarrassment just because she happened to have the same name as a certain overweight White House intern.
Does that mean I can plead the fifth and not be bothered to give my name?
Go read the Supreme Court's ruling. Here's an extract where they describe how they saw the event:
The officer asked him if he had "any identification on [him]," which we understand as a request to produce a driver's license or some other form of written identification. The man refused... After warning the man that he would be arrested if he continued to refuse to comply, the officer placed him under arrest.
The man was arrested for failing to produce a driver's license or some other form of written identification.
I don't see why he didn't just show the papers. But then again, he did no harm, so it does all seem like bullshiz.
I have had a few encounters with law enforcement. Some ask for ID others don't. After a night of playing hockey, some friends and I were standing in a parking lot and talking for quite sometime. Since it was a night game, the hours were late and spanned into early hours. A cruiser rolled up and asked, "whatcha doing?" Our reply was, "Oh we played hockey, and no we're just talking." The officer was nice, "That's cool, just making sure nothing wrong and such. Hockey sounds fun, I gotta get back to the streets." No ID checks, no baraging questions or invading requests.
Another time was exactly the opposite. Had to work a closing shift at work till 10:30PM. After the shift we all talked. Half were in a car, half were in the lot in front of the work place. All were wearing workshirts and in uniform still. Two police cruisers rolled up with spotlights. Those in the car were told to remain still and show their hands. Those not were told to stand still and show hands. All of use were asked what we were doing and why we were here. Then ID were demanded and more questioning. About 20 minutes later they returned, we all had NO records. Then we were all told that we had to go immediately home.
I'm confused with the law.
then you don't need to worry about this :)
n/a.
Prehaps we all need to standardize on a fake name? Sure, it exposes us easier to being identified as having given a phony name, but the civil disobiedience effect can not be denied.
Maybe George W Bush would be a good choice.
I propose Emmanuel Goldstein become our chosen name. Imagine 10,000 arrests filed each month against Emmanuel Goldstein for refusing to give an ID.
How many people would understand the reference? Anyway the 21st century version of him is Osama bin-Laden.
A name is a name (Jack Brown), and gives the officer something to call you besides "Hey You"
If they aren't important, and not identifying, then why are USA citizens compelled by law to disclose them?
What happens when one gives a fake (but plausible) name to the cops without producing ID?
If the cops want to be (absolute) hardcases (thanks to the events of Tuesday, 2001-09-11 in the USA), they'd just arrest you and 'take you downtown' anyway so what's the point.
Imagine this situation happening to an undercover human rights worker documenting atrocities in order to expose them. If this situation happened to them they would be in serious trouble!
Now imagine if this scenario happened to somebody (wildly) famous like William Henry Gates III....
(No, I'm not counting the speeding incidents from the 1970s I've heard about).
At this rate, 'Your papers, please' is probably just around the corner unless this type of stuff can be stopped....
That address is in the middle of the river!
The previous has been a secret message to my comrades.
If something is NOT mentioned in the Constitution, then IT IS NOT A FEDERAL CONCERN.
Get out of the country, you just failed Civics.
Technology -- No Place For Wimps! Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia Chatroom -- http://www.wemissjerry.org
I think Germany has found a pretty much acceptable way:
You are required to carry your driver's license while driving (duh) - it acts as an ID too (contains a picture of you, your adress etc.)
Also its recommended that you carry your ID (Personalausweis) but not absolutely required.
They can ask you for your ID if they think you did something wrong/committet a crime (shoplifting, whatever) or are a (imporant) wittness for a crime or routine checks while driving (usually only for trucks) - if you cannot provide an ID then you will be taken to a police station where your identity will be confirmed (pretty logical, otherwise we'd have alot of "John Smiths" here who just had forgotten their ID while being criminally active)
The only other time you will be asked for ID is near the border, where (since the normal border checks were no longer used) police will randomly stop cars (where randomly usually means, looking somehow suspicious) to check for illegal aliens, wanted criminals etc.
And of course there are the ever popular "suprise" checks near the border to the Netherlands, looking for illegal drugs (lots of drugs are smuggeled in this way)
+++ MELON MELON MELON +++ Out of Cheese Error +++ redo from start +++
"You have the right to remain silent..." "You have the right to an attorney..." "You have the right to cable TV should you be incarcerated..." -- Mahoney
This issue has been active in Denmark for quite a while now. Anyone must give the following information to a Police Officer (who also has to identify himself/herself (?!?!) with an ID): Name, CPR (Civilian Personnel Register - like a Social Security Number) and Address. Failing to comply will result in immidiate arrest.
The new knife-law here also extends the Police's possibilities of searching people not being charged with anything...
Never buy Sony CDs - they will open up your computer to anyone..
I have to say, she nicely put into words my own feelings on both the second and third movies after watching the dvd releases. I used to dislike TOD because it was boring in the beginning, then took off. So I was sleepy when it took off and then it just exhausted me. I used to love TLC because it was so fun and funny. Now I've reversed my opinions, surprisingly for the same reasons. I find TOD builds slowly, and then when it breaks I've got all this tension that's built up and TOD takes it and rides for the rest of the movie. Almost in tears when Indy waves his arm and the kids come running back into the village. But this Alexandra chick was spot-on with what's wrong with the third movie. The joke where Indy says "With any luck, he's got the grail already" is exactly what Marcus Brody is all about. Cutting to him running around "Does anybody speak English?" totally ruined the character.
And TOD has held up better in the special fx department. TLC looks sooooo fake in so many places, and it always has. I saw that one in the theater when it was brand new. The tank falling off the cliff always looked like a Tyco plastic tank toy being rolled over those cliffs they use to make GI Joe commercials, and it was always so completely obvious that Harrison Ford and James Bond were sitting in a blue-screen room on a stupid biplane model. But TOD looks real, every step of the way. Even the mine chase looks real (although I can't watch the mine chase without having flashbacks of the arcade game). TOD is just really really good. The only real problems I have with it are the girl who's only useful for saying "You're gonna get killed chasing your damn fortune and glory" and for being someone for Harrison Ford to talk shit to.
Ah well. Conventional wisdom about what's the better movie never holds out for me. I like Star Trek V, too. ;) And the second back to the future movie is my favorite.
Like what I said? You might like my music
I guess the right to remain silent will only be granted AFTER you get arrested?
I find it ironic that our beloved Govt. PAYS FOR online anonymizers so residents of Mainland China can remain anonymous from THEIR government, yet OUR Govt. no longer allows ITS CITIZENS the same umbrella of anonymity!
in Greece, Europe, we have national ID cards. These cards include a photo, a fingerprint, our name, address, job, and religion. Recently the European Union demanded to remove the fingerprint, job and religion and the government complied. In Greece it is required by law to produce identification, including telling your name and providing your ID card, whenever you are asked to do so by the police, and answer their questions. They also search your bag etc. Many European states such as Greece, Germany and Finand have mandatory army service for all men. Some countries outside Europe, such as Israel and China, also have mandatory army service for all women.
I see that USA is becoming more like Old Europe. You, the Americans, must protect your rights because you had the opportunity to live in a free country. Now your rights are threatened by private interests. Don't let your country lose its fame as a free country, because if USA stops respecting its citizens' rights, then the governments of all modern western nations, including Europe, will try to do the same in greater extend.
Like how it's suspicious for someone to plead the fifth, so you should arrest him for crimes he's not required to admit to. The whole *point* of the fourth and fifth amendment is so the government can't make up some excuse to question and search anyone they please. When it's only the burden of being a suspect, you make a suspect out of everyone. And what's more suspicious than not answering "reasonable" questions? If the government wants to know my name, they're either going to have to volunteerly get it out of me or ask someone who knows me who's willing to state it. It's clearly not something they have any right to compulsory get out of me.
Eurohacker European paranoia, gun rights, and h
I can't speak for other states, but in missouri an Officer must be in uniform, wearing a badge with a clearly unique number, and outside of emergency situation and such be willing to provide proper i.d.
A non uniformed officer usually must start with providing proper id.
However if you get pulled over by a marked car and a uniformed person with clearly visible badge aproaches you from that vehical and doesn't do/say somthing really suspicious or out of line, I'd recomend having a really good reason for insisting on an id. Judges have some leway and if you make a total ass of yourself for the sole point of being a pain in the butt it won't be looked on very fondly.
Mycroft
https://signup.leagueoflegends.com/?ref=4c3ed6600b6ea
In upholding his conviction and the mandatory identity-disclosure law, the majority justices also said the law only requires that a suspect disclose his or her name, rather than requiring production of a driver's license or other document.
This bodes well -- it would seem to put the kibosh on any effort to turn this into a "must produce your National ID card on demand" ruling.
From the majority opinion, describing how they saw the incident:
The officer asked him if he had "any identification on [him]," which we understand as a request to produce a driver's license or some other form of written identification.....After warning the man that he would be arrested if he continued to refuse to comply, the officer placed him under arrest.
In other words, what the SC majority upheld was an arrest for failure to produce a driver's license or some other form of written identification. Your link is probably talking about what various statutes say, not about what was actually upheld.
Hearsay? or do you have a reference? would be interested to know. Cheers.
Since when was giving an officer your name a bad thing? To anyone who does business, spreading your name around is actually pretty everyday stuff. If it's part of a policeman's procedure, well, being polite rarely gets a negative response.
:D
;)
I'd give him a business card, and tell him to call me when he needs a computer fixed. If he looks me up, he'll just find a lot of satisfied customers.
What I don't understand is why people assume the police are made up of thugs who want to dominate people... most policemen are simply your average guy who's trying to do their job, and pulling their hair out when they get no respect for it. Their pay isn't all that incredible. They likely have families that they want to keep safe. And many times, their lives depend on a piece of plastic that they wear about their bodies... and the training they received. So do they really deserve to be snubbed when all they want is to be sure you're not someone they're going to have to risk their lives against?
More importantly, if you act like an asshole, expect to be suspected of something. Manners go hand in hand with honesty. You don't have to tell him what your political affiliation or your annual household income is. Just something that you would likely give to an attractive stranger in any case.
*shrug* maybe I'm missing something.
The Penguin Producer
People speeding are a danger to other road users - it seems obvious to me that there should be a law to discourage some maniac from crashing into your car at 100Mph.
Customarily one waits until after providing identification and receiving the ticket/warning before asking the officer for his badge number... Just for future reference.
Food not Bombs is a nice platitude but it breaks down when you notice that the Bombees are usually well fed
> "Michael Moore [revoketheoscar.com] is a screwed asshole"
>-Ray Bradbury
Is that one of those sites run by right-wing clowns with plenty of vitriol and hate, but precious few facts to hit him over the head with?
Guess we'll have to disagree, then
Conventional wisdom has nothing to do with it, for me. After Raiders, TOD was a real letdown for me. I thought the plot was boring and the acting wooden. It might be because I have a dislike for "voodoo" movies in general, however. I haven't seen any of the DVDs; I saw all three in the theater and have them on VHS, so I don't know if the DVDs differ (special editions or whatnot)
*shrug*
In any case, Raiders is still in my top five all time great adventure flix.
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
This bodes well -- it would seem to put the kibosh on any effort to turn this into a "must produce your National ID card on demand" ruling.
How so? It seems to me to be the first step towards just that situation. If this law goes unchallenged, what would stop someone from saying "Well, we can already ask his or her name, but that may not give us what we need. I propose that we be able to ask for any information that we need in order to best protect the innocent!" Laws like this are gateways to more restrictive laws that would be shot down if they were proposed in their full strength up front. It is far easier to fool people by taking steps like this and then expanding them (see the so called Patriot Act for further evidence).
Thats the sound of your rights being chipped away.
I hate to bring this up, but I always believed that the Second Amendment is the perfect gauge to how much you have lost your rights in this country. Less Second == less rights.
Even if you don't think were just sheeple now, were really not far from being worse.
i cant seem to come up with a sig.
Oh and He's left wing, not right.
Food not Bombs is a nice platitude but it breaks down when you notice that the Bombees are usually well fed
As off jan 1st 2005 we also will have a law like that.
:( :( :(
You don't have to carry your id, but you must be able to show some id at once. (weired)
it sucks. especially since i don't see the purpose. let's say i'm a.. terrorist. Suuuuure I will carry my real id. so here it doesn't help.
btw : the police aren't allowed to ask for the id just to check if people carry an id. they can only ask for it if it serves the situation.
so holland is also fucked by a paranoid government.
Privacy is terrorism.
> NO, its about michael moore, not by him.
> Oh and He's left wing, not right.
I think it's time you worked on your reading comprehension skills, don't you?
This is tough because a lot of my friends are cops and I see both sides of the dispute. But as much as I like them I know they'll push whatever limits they're given. Many times there will be political pressure to push the limits. The police are not our enemy, but an excess of police power, for any justification, is the enemy of a free people. I think we're far enough down the police power road now that our claim to the title "home of the free" could reasonably be disputed.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
They actually said that it was NOT unconstitutional to require that you identify yourself.
Current laws on the subject are the usual mish-mash - some States do, some don't.
This does open the gate for Federal legislation making it a crime to not identify yourself to a police officer, but that hasn't happened so far as I know.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Canada does not have such a law, police must have a reason to ask for such information and unless you have committed a crime you are not forced to oblige.
Does that mean a Canadian officer must first ask you if you've committed a crime before asking for your identification? What if you are SUSPECTED of committing a crime? Is that reason enough to ask for ID?
Actually, in California giving a false name is a felony - it's very similar in other states...
Basically it's 'obstruction of justice' and sections 1510 and 1511 are almost equally applicable (depending on whether or not you really are a suspect of a crime).
"Omnis tuus capsa sunt inesse nos"
Good! A little sanity in the midst of all the paranoia. I can live with giving the policeman my real name. The question remains, though, as to what is meant by identifying oneself. If I am the only Fred Smith living in Notlob and a policeman in Bolton demands that I identify myself, have I satisfied the requirement by telling him "I'm Fred Smith, of Notlob." Can he legally detain me while he authenticates my claim? That's what concerns me.
"Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past." -- George Orwell
The headlines for the newspapers in this area do not read "US Supreme Court rules police can ask for name", they read "US Supreme Court rules police can ask for ID". No matter what the technical ruling of the Supreme Court is, the powers that be are spinning this to spread the impression that a formal, state issued ID is always necessary.
Take for example: If an officer asks for your name and you give it the officer may ask for ID to prove it. If you fail to produce the ID then you are guilty of obstructing justice. At this point the Supreme Court ruling would not apply because you would indeed be guilty of hindering an investigative action--verification of identity.
Take for another example: A fellow on the block always mows his lawn at 8 AM on Saturday morning. He likes to get it done before it gets to be 104 degrees outside and also likes to have it out of the way so that he can enjoy the rest of his Saturday. On a particular Saturday the elderly woman who lives two doors down from him isn't feeling well and calls the police for a noise disturbance on Saturday morning. Normally this wouldn't be an issue but the elderly woman is the mother-in-law of one of the police captains. The captain isn't actually on duty but the patrol officers know that he's going to be in a sour mood if he has to come in to work on Sunday after receiving a telephone call from his mother-in-law early Saturday morning. The patrol officers decide that they'll just take a casual cruise by to see what the situation is. They find the guy mowing his lawn and ask him to stop to speak with them. Normally this wouldn't be an issue but the fellow has had a rough week at work and just wants to get the lawn done to go back to bed. The police ask for his name so that they can fill out their paperwork and the fellow quips "John Doe". He doesn't feel that his name should be included on a report for a noise disturbance because 1) he's mowing his lawn, and 2) the police have declined to identify the person who made the complaint. The police ask for his ID to verify his name. He's out mowing the yard and informs them that the ID is IN HIS HOUSE.
How long can the police detain the man? They certainly don't want to let him go back into his house because then they'll need a warrant to get him to come back out.
Can the police enter the man's home to retrieve the ID without a warrant?
From my understanding of (experience with) the law the police can detain the man for as long as they feel like chatting. If the man turns away from the officers to leave they will physically restrain him and possibly charge him with "obstruction of justice". The situation can continue indefinitely until 1) The man calls his lawyer (which he cannot do because he's out mowing the lawn and the cell phone is in the house), 2) the police get bored (they're always bored which explains why they would detain the man to chat indefinitely), 3) the man takes any action which can be misconstued to be hindering the duties of a police officer.
The stalemate is this: The police will not leave until they have the man's ID. The police will not let the man enter his house to retrieve the ID. The man will NOT give the police permission to enter his house to retrieve the ID.
The solution: The police detain the man until he becomes agitated enough to turn away and try to walk back into his house. The police reach out to restrain the man and immediately charge him with obstruction of justice and disorderly conduct. At this point the police have just cause to enter his house and retrieve his ID. By this time the man is explosive with rage and the police can lock him up or send him to the psyche ward.
Honestly, all of this existed before the Supreme Court ruling. The Supreme Court ruling just makes it public debate and shows how some lawyers have far too much free time on their hands.
+++ATHZ 99:5:80
I guess you have the right to remain silent after you are arrested but not before.
Now, my general concern is that the police take it as a license to start identifying people on their way out of opposition political meetings and the like, but I think that the majority opinion is worded quite clearly such that the verdict is only on identification during the course of an existing criminal investigation....
Then why don't you tell us all what criminal investiagion this guy was a suspect in?
As it was said earlier. He was just standing around and the cop decided to interrogate him. He had no good reason to suspect him of ANYTHING.
Yet for some reason this guy is supposed to provide him name to a guy who clearly can LEAGLLY harrass him and is obviously a dickhead.
Clearly none of these judges have ever stolen a cop's girlfriend before......
Life is too short to proofread.
okay, hypothetical here
cop walks up. asks you for your name. you are required to give him your name. you do not. he arrests you and says "you have the right to remain silent"
before they arrest you, you have to give your name. after they arrest you, you can stay silent as the grave.
What is the flight velocity of an unladen swallow?
not to hear MOST cases, but the fact that it doesn't hear a case is a tacit affirmation of the lower courts ruling. You do have a right to appeal every case to the circuit court.
"If they're going to arrest you for not giving your name, they're just looking for an excuse to do it anyways."
Note that the Court distinguished this fact in this case:
"The request in this case was a commonsense inquiry, not an ef-fort to obtain an arrest for failure to identify after a Terry stop yielded insufficient evidence."
This was not a broad rule-setting decision, this was a narrow decision ruling on this situation only (although yes, it does set a precedent, albeit a narrow one).
WeRelate.org - wiki-based genealogy
Perhaps you need to work on yours. Michael moore never met a fact he didn't hate. and he likes nothing better than spewing baseless vitriol.
Food not Bombs is a nice platitude but it breaks down when you notice that the Bombees are usually well fed
A little more complicated than that. Mr. Hiibel was arguing vociferously with his daughter over her boyfriend, and some busybody neighbor saw them arguing and called the sheriff, who sent a deputy out on a "domestic violence" call.
By the time the deputy arrived, they were stopped by the side of ride, with her inside pouting and Mr. Hiibel leaned up outside the truck fuming. When the deputy stopped, Mr. Hiibel went over to get in his face, and it went downhill from there. In the end they were both arrested, him basically for picking a fight with a deputy, and her for helping her dad when the fight broke out.
It's all on the tape.
I think basically what the Supreme Court said could be boiled down to: "Don't be a dick when a deputy's trying to sort our what's going on."
The decision by SCOTUS *ACTUALLY* says that the police can require you to give your name when you *ARE* suspected of a crime or wrongdoing. They can't just stop you and go "what's your name".
Also, the case had little to do with being anonymous. It was about a man who was suspected of a engaging in a domestic disturbance who refused to identify himself when stopped by police.
Your headline and description leads the reader to believe that all sorts of anonymous activity is illegal, and that is just not so.
You need to report this information accurately...
--TheGoldWater
is not something I invented... I was introduced to the concept during my military days. In fact, I think the first time I heard the term was from a military intelligence type when we were at a deployed location.
"The grey man" is a mindset, and a useful one to know; it's practically second nature to anyone in the intelligence business. It refers to an individual who blends in... who notices things, but is not noticed himself... a person who becomes part of the background... whose only distinguishing feature is an utter lack of the same. A person who doesn't make eye contact, wears conventional clothes... has a normal haircut... walks at an unhurried pace... speaks only when spoken to, and then only in normal, steady, measured tones... doesn't joke or interact unnecessarily with others... is often reading a newspaper. This is the classic "grey man." Looking at him, you'd have a hard time guessing his nationality, profession, personality, destination, or anything else about him, precisely because he is deliberately very, very bland.
In a world of individualistm, most people are not this way... it's often necessary to actively cultivate this profile. This is also a concept taught in counter-intelligence schools, executive protection, counter-terrorism, etc. It's the ultimate evolution of the "keep a low profile" admonition.
Anyway, that's "the grey man." I hope that wasn't more long-winded that you wanted.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
I wonder if this fellow could have explicitly invoked his Fifth Amendment rights and gotten away with it? Had he brought it up explicitly it might have been enough to tip the scales in his favor. As the writer for the majority said, they would entertain ruling differently in a case where Fifth Amendment rights were more clearly violated, such as a case where the name proved to be a key link in investigating and prosecuting a crime.
The right to remain silent is not in the constituion. The right is "nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself". What this means is that you can't be forced to provide statements that would serve to incriminate you. It does not say anything about not giving your name.
The miranda rights are somewhat of a formality of this. It is a formal notification that, if you say something to the police, they can throw it back at you in court, and thus you don't have to say anything to them. However that means things that could implicate you in a crime. Your name isn't one of those things. You will be required to state your name in open court, should you get there (first step in questioning is always a name).
Along those lines you can't refuse to testify against someone else, provided it doesn't also implicate you. If you witness a murder you did not participate in you are NOT allowed to not testify about it. There is no violation since the 5th ammendment only covers testimony against yourself, not against others.
Basically the purpose behind the 5th ammendment is to take away the motivation from the police to coerce testimony, false or true, out of someone. They can't lock you up because you refuse to testify against yourself. It is NOT to provide total immunity against saying anything to the authorities. It doesn't cover giving your name, or testifying against someone else.
The law requires that they produce their ID and allow you to inspect it. They can restrain you first, but they still ahve to let you verify they are who they say they are. If they fail to do so, a judge will crack down on them.
Same general thing for traffic stops. The car must be fully marked to make a traffic stop. Doesn't have to have a light rack on the top, but it must have all proper external markings. Reason being otherwise any fool could stick a flashing light in their car and claim to be a cop (some do just that). That's why they always use marked crusers for traffic duty. They'd use unmarked cars if they could, easier to hide, but they can't.
You may encounter a cop that doesn't know this, and tries the obstruction thing, but it'll be his ass when it hits a judge.
As frightening as the Bush White House is, the anti-democratic, anti-constitution drift of the Supreme Court renders it the most dangerous branch of our federal government and the one whose work will do the greatest damage to the US over time. The court of last resort has seldom been a friend of the people, but this court is so extremist right wing that it could finally kill what's left of democracy in America.
I scanned the PDF of the ruling looking for the answer to two important points:
- Any peace officer may detain any person whom the officer encounters under circumstances which reasonably indicate that the person has committed, is committing or is about to commit a crime.
- The statute does not require a suspect to give the officer a driver's license or any other document, provided that the suspect either states his name or communicates it to the officer by other means.
OK so much for "Your papers please." Still this is one more step along the road to a police state. Little by little we are whittling away at our civil liberties. Many of you say "If you are not breaking the law why should you worry?" I say this, "People who live with a non-opressive government do not need civil liberty. If, however that government becomes opressive at a later date, the lack of civil liberty will only make the change easier."In a lot of ways, we are less free than the former Soviet Republic. While in Prague a few years ago a tour guide was surprised when I got up during a meal and walked outside to smoke a cigarette. She openly laughed at me when I purchased a package of antacid tablets in a large department store, and was afraid to walk out without a reciept for fear I would be stopped and accused of stealing. Do you se how sinister it can be. When we live in a society where it is assumed we are guilty, we begin to act as if we are guilty. This is a sad day for the United States.
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. -- Benjamin Franklin
Insert Generic Sig Here:
I may be wrong here but reading the decision it seems that technically the court ruled that the Nevada law requiring people to disclose their identity is constitutional. It did not rule that in all states, all people must disclose their identity to officers. However, if your state has such a law then you had probably better do it.
Here's the problem, if you didn't RTF opinion of the court without blabbering your mouth off. The dude was skidded in his truck over to the side of the road, with his wife and kids in the truck. He appeared to be intoxicated. So, would that not be reasonable suspicion? Also, he was arrested under a statue that basically said that he was obstructing justice. So, before all you get out of whack, try digesting the actual facts before the court. Besides, the Geneva conventions state that when you are a prisoner of war, you are required to give your name, rank, and serial number, and nothing else. So, if you're not a suspect, you have nothing to worry about yet, since the court has not ruled on the "give your name, get arrested for a _different_ crime" problem.
This post isn't directed at the parent but rather most of the tin foils that fly off without RTFA.
From papersplease.org:
Dudley was standing around minding his own business...
No, actually, he wasn't. According to this AP article, he was having an argument with his daughter. The cop didn't randomly approch him demanding ID, he was investigating a disturbance.
Did anyone even read the first line of the case:
Petitioner Hiibel was arrested and convicted in a Nevada court for refusing to identify himself to a police officer during an investigative stop involving a reported assault.
Further in the report:
The sheriff's department in Humboldt County, Nevada, received an afternoon telephone call reporting an assault. The caller reported seeing a man assault a woman in a red and silver GMC truck on Grass Valley Road. Deputy Sheriff Lee Dove was dispatched to investigate. When the officer arrived at the scene, he found the truck parked on the side of the road. A man was standing by the truck, and a young woman was sitting inside it. The officer observed skid marks in the gravel behind the vehicle, leading him to believe it had come to a sudden stop. The officer approached the man and explained that he was investigating a report of a fight. The man appeared to be intoxicated. The officer asked him if he had "any identification on [him]," which we understand as a request to produce a driver's license or some other form of written identification. The man refused and asked why the officer wanted to see identification. The officer responded that he was conducting an investigation and needed to see some identification.
The officer was investigating a reported disturbance, not approaching random people demanding "papers". Actually, I'm surprised this even made it to supreme court. You are obligated to identify yourself when you are under suspicion of commiting a crime. Ever been pulled over for speeding? Hell, in this case the officer even stated the fact that he was conducting an investigation. The only weak point I see here is that it (the case document) doesn't quote the officer stating the exact nature of the investigation or informing Hiibel that he was under suspicion. All it says is that he "was conducting an investigation".
I agree the outcome of this case is a blow to civil rights, however, I think the events that lead up to this case have been blown way out of proportion. In the 33 years I've been around, I have yet to see police officers approaching random people demanding "papers".
Yeah, I'm posting this a day late so no one will probably see this post anyway...
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
Beng arrested and being convicted are two entirely different things. The 5th ammendment provides that you do not have to give testimony that would lead to your conviction. What this means is that if you are asked a question tthat the turthful answer to would be an admission to participation in a crime, you don't have to answer. Giving your name is not such a case. Simply identifying yourself is not any kind of admission to any kind of guilt.
You'll notice in court that the first thing everyone who testifies is required to do is identify themselves, the defendant included. Even if the defendant elects not to testify, they still are identified. Now that's all the defendat has to provide, other than a plea, bu the do have to identify themselves. This is nothing new, this is how our legal system has been since the beginning.
You aren't allowed to esacpe warrants by refusing to give your name. If you were, no one would ever be arrested "Well yes it looks like him, and he is at the correct address, but he wouldn't give his name so under the Jackass Slashdot Statute we can't arrest him." A warrant for arrest is just that, a document ordering your arrest. It isn't a conviction of a crime.
You DO have the right not to give testimony that proves you are guilty of a crime. You DO NOT have the right to not identify yourself.
that's how people end up going by their middle name.
colleague at work was always known as Blaine, last name Hood. Found out later he was actually R. Blaine Hood. Parents can be cruel.
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
Even if you're a complete idiot, they'd much rather you state your claim for the public record, demonstrating in your own words just how much of an idiot you are. It's a nice paper trail that helps them cover their own ass.
A few years back, I was working in the (hellish) restaurant business at a place so busy it was practically beating off the customers with a stick. Or, more exactly, managers were allowed to (occasionally) inform a customer that "the customer was always right" only until "the jackass is a jackass, not a customer".
One (black) manager told me about how a few years back, an obnoxious (white) law student didn't like the (fast but cranky) service he was getting, and sued the manager for discriminating against him because the student was white. Came case day, the manager's lawyer defended essentially by stating the manager was discriminating against him becuase the student had been an obnoxious jackass, not because he was white. The law student pro se'ed, and rambled on for about 15 minutes, citing this precedent setting case and that.
The (white) judge listened politely, and at the end of it, told the student: "You're going to be a good lawyer some day. And once you get your degree, I'll be happy to welcome you in my court again. But you were being a jackass, and apparently still are a jackass, and moreover you are wasting this court's time today. Case dismissed with prejudice."
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
A name is a name (Jack Brown), and gives the officer something to call you besides "Hey You", but as long as we're not required to produce some sort of definitive, unique-identity-signifying number of the beast, I'm not too worried.
Are you nuts? Watch the video, then decide whether or not this should make you shit your pants. With a name, cops have the ability to look into every detail of your life. Unless they have a sound reason for it, they should leave you the fuck alone.
I recently had a cop from the Port Authority (on the NJ side of the holland tunnel) threaten to hit me with his obese SUV in the middle of a Dunkin Donuts (i.e. on video, plenty of witnesses, etc). The Police are not people you should trust blindly. A considerable amount of them are the bullies who beat you up in High School.
Anonymous Coward: ... more often then not the case is that they are hoodlums and bad guys ...
... the honest hard working law abiding MAJORITY ...
... Is it bad I don't know who one of them is?
QuickSilver_999:
'k, these are the two I wanna lock in a room until only one is ambulatory
The witness said that he saw "a man with a black cowboy hat" who "slugged the female". Dove was there to investigate the report.
From the facts about Hiibel's case, it sounds like he did not slug his daughter. Does this mean that the actual case of violence continued on un disturbed, as the cops harassed these people?
Fucking pigs can do anything you can't stop them from doing. Word to your mother.
This is NOT a blanket right for officers to stop and question or demand your name. There must be reasonable suspicion or reasonable relation to a criminal investigation underway.
If the officer does not have (or cannot prove in court) reasonable suspicion, then the case could reach some serious legal trouble--because reasonable suspicion or relation to an investigation are what the supreme court requires for such stops.
All your preview button are belong to hello kitty.
To play devil's advocate for a moment: what's irrational about accepting the fact that our political system is changing -- and to therefore cast your vote for the brand of rulership that'll cost you less?
To play devil's advocate again: ...and in what way is a rich worker voting for the lower-tax candidate any different than someone on welfare voting for more the guy who happens to promise more social programs?
Government isn't about freedom or any of that other artsy-fartsy stuff. Once upon a time, some governments might have been, but not in our lifetimes. Government is about who gets what size slice of the pie and who's gonna be better for your bottom line. That slice often comes at the expense of people who aren't like you, which makes winning even more delicious, and losing all that more distressing. Once you come to that realization, election season becomes fun again, because all of a sudden, it starts to matter who wins.
Think about it. Every four years, around 100,000,000 people out of 300,000,000 fight over the scraps, and even though 50,000,000 of those people are pretty much guaranteed to leave empty-handed, we all choose to do our fighting with pencils, mechanical levers, and hacked-up automatic banking machines, rather than fists, guns, and knives. Pretty fucking amazing, if you ask me.
The ACLU provides a list of handy tips that can be printed and stored in a wallet in the event that you're stopped by the police
Earlier, some people voiced concerns about being stopped by police imposters. You can always call the local police station to find out whether an officer has been deployed to your area.
Personally, I think this recent ruling is outrageous. I would be willing to inform an officer of my identity if and only if he first told me why he was asking.
Incidentally, a lot of people have brought up the fact that the officer who stopped Hiibel didn't pay attention to his daughter, the supposed victim. This is the only circumstance where I believe the officer acted completely correctly. If it were really an abusive situation, it's best to get the suspect under control before checking on the victim. Similarly, if you happen to witness a crime, force yourself to watch the offender, not the victim. The offender is not likely to remain in the area long, and the split-second you devote to him alone may help you see a scar or tattoo that would positively identify him in the future. Once he is gone, help the victim.
I use the pronoun "he" as a gender-neutral term.Live free or die
So it would be reasonable for him to have refused once or twice, but then cave...
There's no good reason for police to force obviously innocent people to identify themselves. If they have any suspicion of guilt they can ask and demand ID, but for people they have no reasonable suspicion of, it's pretty dangerous.
I'm sure they'd love this at protests.
I just re-read the story, after trying to correct the misinformation...it appears the author actually read the finding, but played it up to sound like the Supreme Court gave officers free reign. They didn't, and as someone that read the finding, he should know.
This story shouldn't have been posted in its current form...I wish we could rate stories down as flamebait.
All your preview button are belong to hello kitty.
For example, the Civil War was fought not over the right of the Southern States to secede from the Union but whether the slaves had a right to secede from the South. Since the real motive for the Southern States to secede was to maintain their prohibition on the right of slaves to secede, their claim was nullified as soon as slavery was abolished.
There is simply no comeback to the proposition that people should be allowed to secede with others of like mind and, via the equivalent of right of eminent domain, form sovereign experiments upholding their values -- at least there is no comeback that isn't a declaration of war.
Seastead this.
I learned in law enforcement school that technically as soon as an officer stops you, and you don't have the option of walking away, that's an arrest. If you don't have the option of walking away, that's an arrest. It doesn't matter that you aren't in handcuffs or in the back of a patrol car. They just aren't suppose to start interrogating you. But anything you say is a spontanious confession.
I learned that the hard way once.
An example given was this:
Officer: Do you why I pulled you over?
Suspect: I was speeding.
That's enough to give you a speeding ticket in most states. You confessed to the crime. The simple answer is not to confess to anything. If you believe they're going to give you a ticket, or arrest you, don't confess to anything. I hold that to be true to even giving my name.
It's important to remember you're dealing with a human being (most of the time), so giving enough information will ease the process along. If it'll satisfy the officer to give some information to not piss him off.
I got out of a speeding ticket once exactly like this. I got pulled over, the officer asked me why he pulled me over, and I told him I didn't know. He got all pissed. He then told me I was driving at over 90mph. I told him that was impossible, and described the vehicles I was following and my estimated speed. "I was behind a white Chevy truck doing approximately 65mph for the last 3 miles."
Already knowing what information they'll get from me, by reading my tag number, I tell them everything they need to know and a bit more, but that's my choice. When they run my tags, they'll see my name, and most states will get the fact that I have a concealed weapons permit. When they ask for my license, I'll give my drivers license, concealed weapons permit, and tell the office, "I have no weapons in the vehicle". An officer will frequently be concerned for his safety, so if they want to check me for weapons, I let them. This is reasonable, as plenty of officers have been shot by seemingly unarmed suspects.
But, if I'm not a suspect, I consider it unreasonable.
Recently, I was outside a pool hall in a good neighborhood. The area I was in doesn't allow indoor smoking, so I was outside smoking, as were 1/2 dozen other customers. They picked me to harass. That was unreasonable. I was standing on private property, not causing a disturbance, doing absolutley nothing illegal or suspicious. The bouncer apologized to me after it happened. "The cops are assholes around here.", he said. I finished drinking and playing pool a couple hours later, and walked home. It was a violation of my rights. They had no suspicion that I had done anything wrong. I gave just enough information to make him go away, but it took 1/2 hour, and my girlfriend was very concerned. She was inside talking to friends when it started, and came outside to see me being searched by the police. She didn't quite understand how or why the police were searching me and asking me a bunch of questions, when I hadn't done anything wrong. I was literally standing there smoking a cigarette, minding my own business.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
His case is a bit weird. Did you see the video? I saw it just after the case was reported nationally.
The police had a report that there was something going on (possible domestic violence). He was beligerant from the start, which is understandable since he was in the middle of a fight. Too quickly into the conversation he started saying "just arrest me." He needs to work on his IPC skills.
In this case, he had done an appropriate thing. They were having a verbal argument. Rather than continue it, and be distracted driving, he pulled over, got out of the truck, in an attempt to 'cool off'.
The police will try to use this case to prove that anyone must supply any requested information. They already expect it, so this will just give them a nice court ruling to quote.
Serious? Seriousness is well above my pay grade.
Inside the Federal Government's 'Star Chamber'
By TERESA HAMPTON
Editor, Capitol Hill Blue
Jun 22, 2004, 06:05
Each and every weekday, 11 federal judges meet in secret in Washington and review FBI and Department of Homeland Security requests for warrants to spy on Americans.
And, on average, the court approves seven warrants a day, according to records obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.
But while the numbers of warrants issued are obtainable (only after a long, bureaucratic battle with the Department of Justice), very little else is known about the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which meets in secure chambers at the Department of Justice Headquarters.
Some privacy groups refer to the court as a "Star Chamber," a secret coven of judges who hold the future of Americans in their judicial hands. Although the court was created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978, it has become recent tool of the Bush Administration to wiretap, follow, investigate and harass Americans under the guise of the war against terrorism.
And the law allows the court to conduct its business in secret, with no oversight from any federal agency or legislative body, including the U.S. Congress.
"This secrecy is unnecessary and allows problems in applying the law to fester," three U.S. Senators - one Democrat and two Republicans - told the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee in a letter last year.
The three - Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania and Charles Grassley of Iowa - say their own investigations have found widespread inaccuracies in warrant applications, breaking of the law by top government attorneys and outright sloppiness in executing the warrants.
"Without oversight and public scrutiny, there is no compelling reason for the court or the Department of Justice to follow the rule of law," the letter said.
Errors in warrant applications have quadrupled since 2000, the senators found, and one FBI agent made so many repeated mistakes he was barred from ever appearing before the justices again.
Yet even with the mistakes, applications for warrants are routinely rubber-stamped by the court. Records obtained through FOIA show that of 3,887 applications for warrants submitted to the court from 2001-2003, only four were rejected (all in 2003). Before those four rejections in 2003, no application before the court had been rejected among the 12,612 processed between 1979 and 2000.
Before the 2001 terrorist attacks, the court reviewed between 500 and 700 applications per year. Since the attacks, the applications have more than doubled, with a record 1,724 applications submitted in 2003.
Legislation pending in both houses of Congress would grant the Department of Justice and the secret court even more leeway in approving wiretaps and surveillance. The Bush Administration wants the law expanded without any oversight by Congress but an increasing number of Representatives and Senators say they want to know more about the court's activities.
Last year, the American Bar Association also urged more Congressional oversight, saying it is impossible to determine if the court is following the law or abusing it.
Specter says the record shows widespread abuse.
He and his fellow Senators say the FBI secretly videotaped a meeting even though the court didn?t authorize video, continued to intercept an American's email even after the warrant expired and continued to tap a wireless phone that no longer belonged to the target and was, in fact, used by an innocent American not connected to the investigation.
They also found the supervisory special agent assigned to terrorism at FBI headquarters admitted under oath that he didn't know the legal standard for obtaining a warrant from the secret court even though he was the one who approved the applications for the warrants.
In a closed hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee, a top FBI attorney admitt
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
I call Bullshit! From the decision:
This is, perhaps a RTFA moment.The request for ID was done in the context of what the courts call "A Terry Stop". A Terry Stop requires some sort of cause. The decision also requires only the provision of a name. From the wording of the decision, I get the feeling that simply a verbal provision of name might have been enough.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
Named for the 1968 case, Terry v. Ohio, in which the Supreme Court ruled that the police have the right to question and frisk (for weapons, not other items) anyone whom they have a "reasonable suspicion" (as opposed to "probable cause") has been involved in criminal activity.
Very few policemen get prosecuted for violating people's rights. When was the last time you heard a police shooting was not ruled justified? Police testimony also gets more weight in court simply by the nature of their profession (except for predominantly black juries who know of or have seen the police abuse their authority).
They call me... Tater Salad. ...and this is my son, Tater Tot, who's covered with moles...
Whoop de frikkin do. Its "one of those sites run by right-wing clowns with plenty of vitriol and hate" ABOUT Moore. Dumbass.
Personally, I'm well off as a result of my own efforts, presently give about half my income to specific charities of my choice every year, reasonably healthy for my age, have a great family, and love what I do for a living. Sorry to dissapoint.
On the plus side, some of the lefties marked my second sally as "Troll"; I guess I really uncovered an irrational spot in someone. That's always worthwhile. :)
Regarding choosing who and what I am, no. I'm not a lot of things - not an artist, not a lottery winner, not endowed with a fabulous natural physique - but it is not anyone else's obligation to "solve" these "problems" for me. Nor is it mine to solve your problems for you. If my lacks, or problems, are insurmountable, that's for me to deal with as best I can, if indeed I can at all. If I fail, then I fail. Everyone fails. Everyone dies. Game over. No big deal, really. Just one more tiny, tiny tickmark on a list of billions.
On the other hand, if you choose to help me with my issues - as opposed to being forced to - that certainly is, and should be, your right. I just don't think it should be tax deductable for either party.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
If I were the POTUS you'd be on the SCOTUS!
It is worth pointing out that for those of us who work(ed) for our money, money is time.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
This will probably get burried. From reading the slip, it appears the Supreme Court didn't get to see the video of the arrest that most of us saw.
The court appears to be saying that this thing is up to Nevada's Legislature entirely. This judgment could be corrected in the Nevada Legislature, at least for Nevada. However, because this Supreme Court made this ruling, similar corrections need to be made to laws in all fifty states.
So it might be incriminating, so we should just arrest them anyway? But they'd be wrong to arrest in that case? So, according to the supreme court's ruling, you could press charges for being forced to incriminate yourself by revealing your identity. After-the-fact-justice. Give the government a chance to get you somewhere where Haebius Corpus doesn't apply... god that's a frightening thought that such a place exists within US influence.
I'm as mimsy as the next borogove but your mome raths are completely outgrabe.
He'll probably just misunderstand your post too, though. Expect a reply along the lines of:
"Who's a dumbass? You are? Why are you calling yourself a dumbass on slashdot"
only with worse spelling and grammar.
When the only countries I can think of are Iraq, Russia, Canada, and Mexicoke, then I can conclude that America is the freest on Earth. Thank you American educational system.
MARGE: It took the children thirty minutes to locate Canada on a map!
HOMER: Oh, Marge. Anyone can miss Canada, all tucked away down there.
My father in law just borrowed my bag, and he went thru the US (only transit).
When he arrived he noticed something not right about the luggage. He opened the bag, and he found a note stating that the bag was forced open (my locks look like shit on my samsonite suitcase) due to new US regulations.
WHAT PRIVACY ? Now the US has the right to look into my underwear even if I do not go to the US ?
This is ridiculous, forget about your privacy if you live there. I just cancelled my trip to the US, I just do not want to deal with shit like that, I better go to south america now, I feel safer, and no-one goes thru my private things in my baggage (or at least I have the right to be present)
I may be mistaken but I believe I have met this guy (Mr Hiibel); I worked with one of his sons (Josh) here in Vegas and I have to state my opinion of their character with an example.
Setting: Internet startup in Las Vegas
Memorial Day 1999
Co-workers: CEO (ex-Army), Raz (ex-Army) and Me (ex-Navy)
Normal workday for the startup, all workers present less Josh (Teenage Hacker/Slacker).
At about lunch-ish a call is made to Josh to see if he is OK and to ask why he is not at work. His reply is that it is a Federal Holiday, Memorial Day and that he will not be comming in. Needless to say he was told to get in to work.
About Josh at this time -
Military service - None
Drivers license - No
Social Security Number - No
Drives a car in the US - Yes
Works in the US - Yes
Expects benefits and privileges - Yes
Everytime I have been asked for identification, whether or not I was guilty of something I have given it freely, I have accepted my punishment and moved on. Crimials should not have the right to protect themselves from their victims.
The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese!
Okay, I haven't read all of the posts on this topic, so if somebody has already made this point, sue me.
It was brought up on the Neal Boortz radio show today that if a police officer asks for your name, he's searching for information. Therefore, if you voluntarily give him your name, you've just consented to a search. Could be, but I'd like to hear from a lawyer well versed in Constitutional law first.
The other scary thing I heard today was that Bush plans to unveil next month a sweeping mental health initiative that recommends screening for every citizen and promotes the use of expensive antidepressants and antipsychotic drugs favored by supporters of the administration.
Damn! If that's not getting close to a totalitarian state, I don't know what is. We're just a step or two away from hearing, "Your papers, please."
Both Republicans and Democrats want to control your life. The only difference is which areas of your life they want to control.
Hi Mike. Nice to see you posting on slashdot.
Just because a site corrects your factual errors and points out your lies and inconsistencies does not make it hateful.
I know
IHBT
IHL
Food not Bombs is a nice platitude but it breaks down when you notice that the Bombees are usually well fed
I think the years has changed how we the people and the courts think. I also think that the 5th ammendment covers our identification if we believe it to be private. "nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation."
The Police are public officials, and I think it suspect to deny identifying ones' self but that does not change the fact that the police can now go door to door asking names, arresting anyone who does not comply or has a warrent. I was arrested im my home for having less than 1 gram of marijuana. For the non-drug users, thats not enough for a roach much less a joint. The police lied to my wife while I was at work, told her they had a warrent, they didn't, she is not a lier/thief so she simply trusted the "Good Guys" gave them the bit of illigal substance we had and allowed them to search the house. I was called at work and told to come home to talk to the police. Both me and my wife were arrested.
So now its a crime to falsely or not identify ones self, soon it will become a crime to not identify ones self before being asked.(I don't think the jews will like this.)
If you believe yourself to have multiple valid names, it is not a crime to use any of those names. (They are not _fake_ names.)
Everyone should legally change their name to either John Doe or Jane Doe.
"Computer Scientists can count to 1024 on their fingers" (non-mutant, non-mutilatated, human computer scientists)
Or wait, I suppose the guy who built the house is a "criminal," because he's from the "user" class that takes from the people who capitalize upon the ... no, no, wait, I'm the "criminal," because though I owned the land I failed to build a house on it, meaning that the person with the creative, intellectual energy to build the house has the right to ... aw, screw it.
Seriously, Ayn Rand has one or two decent points to make, but that one right there ranks as one of the most totally asinine platitudes I've ever heard. Way to go, Ayn.
Breakfast served all day!
From a a very well-written essay on why privacy is a fundamental and important right (written by the former privacy czar of Canada, warning Canadians not to lose rights Americans already have):
"But though we tend to take it for granted, privacy - the right to control access to ourselves and to personal information about us - is at the very core of our lives. It is a fundamental human right precisely because it is an innate human need, an essential condition of our freedom, our dignity and our sense of well-being.
If someone intrudes on our privacy - by peering into our home, going through the personal things in our office desk, reading over our shoulder on a bus or airplane, or eavesdropping on our conversation - we feel uncomfortable, even violated.
Imagine, then, how we will feel if it becomes routine for bureaucrats, police officers and other agents of the state to paw through all the details of our lives: where and when we travel, and with whom; who are the friends and acquaintances with whom we have telephone conversations or e-mail correspondence; what we are interested in reading or researching; where we like to go and what we like to do.
A popular response is: "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear."
By that reasoning, of course, we shouldn't mind if the police were free to come into our homes at any time just to look around, if all our telephone conversations were monitored, if all our mail were read, if all the protections developed over centuries were swept away.It's only a difference of degree from the intrusions already being implemented or considered.
The truth is that we all do have something to hide, not because it's criminal or even shameful, but simply because it's private. We carefully calibrate what we reveal about ourselves to others. Most of us are only willing to have a few things known about us by a stranger, more by an acquaintance, and the most by a very close friend or a romantic partner. The right not to be known against our will - indeed, the right to be anonymous except when we choose to identify ourselves - is at the very core of human dignity, autonomy and freedom.
If we allow the state to sweep away the normal walls of privacy that protect the details of our lives, we will consign ourselves psychologically to living in a fishbowl. Even if we suffered no other specific harm as a result, that alone would profoundly change how we feel. Anyone who has lived in a totalitarian society can attest that what often felt most oppressive was precisely the lack of privacy.
But there also will be tangible, specific harm..."
Go read the rest of this prescient article. Unfortunately its being used as an 'antiblueprint' by Ashcroft et ilk. Everything warned against Ashcroft wants to implement.
Hey, we've got a new guy in the office whose name is (no kidding) William Wacker. I guess his father must have been Richard...
Stop by my site where I write about ERP systems & more
of a unit whose members are actively instructed not to stand out... and most counter-terrorist units are taught this way. If you get outed as a 22nd regiment SAS guy in a bar in northern ireland, you'd better make yourself scarce... same thing if you're a Navy SEAL in a market in Pakistan.
The more you can blend in, the more effective you can be at gathering intel... something these type of units do very actively. Nobody should remember you, or anything about you... there are plenty of places in the world where getting ID'd can get you dead.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
The argument doesn't make sense either way: if it's just a name, and not something they can use to identify you, then there's no reason they should compel you to provide it. And if it is about unique ID, then you should be afraid. Very afraid.
Ceterum censeo subscriptionem esse delendam.
Apparently this was "suspicious" enough for the cops to become "interested" in me. They didn't arrest me, but I'll admit that it was quite suprising and a little scary to be questioned as to what I was doing and why. I mean, what could I say, "I'm whistling because I want to."? What if the cops (there were 2) had been 1% more nervous or didn't like my haircut? What if my skin wasn't white colored? What if I wasn't in my business casual clothes? No, I didn't get arrested. I'm not saying the cops abused me or their power.
Just FYI. Welcome to America. You have the right worship television and the dollar. You have the right to have your vote discarded and ignored. You have the right to lose your sons and daughters in an unjustifiable foreign war, started by an idealogue. You have the right, in essence, to nothing.
If, despite all optimizations, my program needs 100GHz of CPU power, and only 1GHz processors are available, then I'll just use 100 of them to get the job done.
If 8000 requests are received, and one Court can only handle 80, then the obvious solution is to have 100 Courts.
Unlike CPUs (even those with SMP), the Courts will scale nicely, and I will not be deprived of my rights.
Actually, there are some, including myself, who would argue you have the right to yell fire. You just don't have the right to use freedom of expression to outweight the theater proprietor or any other audience member from suing you for property damage, loss of revenue, and inconvenience.
So I disagree with Orwell or whoever it was that decided on the "fire in the theater" case. While the outcome may be the same, the underlying argument is wrong.
Personally, I don't see how the Court decided this. By providing name, the guy could have provided evidence for a crime simply by giving police information that changed the crime from assault and battery to a domestic violence crime. That, on its face, is self-incrimination.
With this, it would be legal for a police officer to attend a nonviolent demonstration and go around asking each person there for their name and so compile a database of dissidents. Anyone who refused to answer or otherwise attempted to obfuscate their identity is liable for arrest.
The cops have just been handed a great big intimidation tactic.
So what happens when a few thousand people change their name to "John Q. Public"?
.sig
Will people with common names like "John Smith" be required to give a more unique identifier?
Why do the police have the right to identify you anyway, and why should I have to assist them in that task?
-- this is not a
Wow, current stats for the parent post are 30% Funny, 40% Flamebait, and 30% Troll. I'm guessing either I pissed someone off or some mods are completely devoid of humor today. GO ahead guys, I've got karma to burn...
Yes, my only tool is a hammer. And you're starting to look like a nail.
... or at least one who would bother to view the video from the officer's dash camera. The officer asked if Hibbel had any ID on him, and Hibbel replied 'No, I... why should I have any ID?'. Hibbel had told the officer that he didn't have any identification the first time that he asked for it, then the officer repeatedly demanded that Hibbel produce his identification. He never directly ask Hibbel to tell him his name.
If you think the real issue is that Hibbel was hitting his daughter, then I want to know why the officer started the investigation with the suspect rather than talking to the 'victim', which they never got around to doing. A second officer was present, who could have easily talked to her, and asked if she knew who the man was. Instead, they barricaded her in the truck, and then tackled and handcuffed her once she got out. The first question the asked her once they calmed her down?... It wasn't 'do you you have any ID on you?'. It was 'What's your name?'. She promptly answered 'Mimi'. Yes, Hibbel's not too bright, and his daughter reacted about average for seeing her fathered arrested for no good reason, but the officers utterly failed to use any intelligence or reason in their questioning of Mr. Hibbel.
www.abditum.com/hiibel/no_id_arrest_MEDIUM.mov
This Supreme Court ruling isn't even relevant to the case. Hibbel never refused to tell the officer his name. He never confirmed that he had ID with him, but was refusing to show it. He just told the officer he didn't have any ID on him. The only relevant ruling would be to say that the police can arrest you for not carrying ID. I've never accused any court or judge of making up laws (in fact, I generally think they have too little discretion), but that's exactly what they did in this case.
My guess is that Hibbel's lawyer was more interested in getting his name in print next to the words Supreme Court, than getting justice for Hibbel.
Why the officer approached him is moot. If the phone tip and standing next to a truck with skid makrs legally amounted to anything then the officer was perfectly free to to hold him for assault or whatever. He didn't, and presumably couldn't.
The entire point is whether - in the absense of any other grounds - an officer has the right to pull out a gun and forcibly imprison someone for the sole "crime" of standing motionless and silent.
If the officer can do so in the absence of probable cause to arrest, then yeah, he may as well be walking up to random innocent people and assuming that anyone who refuses to answer must already be guilty of something.
-
- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
Please, don't trouble yourself to read the whole Opinion, where you would have seen the internal contradiction talked about here: Stupid, but funny
For the short of attention span (And/or intellect, like me), the opinion very specifically addresses that fact that the officer asked for ID, not a name, yet ignores that fact when discussing the priors, including the blindingly obvious one the parent just referenced.
Dumbass, indeed.
Stupid, but funny.
(what was I saying about Dumbasses..?)
And you'll see it happen all the time.
Oh, and also, on occasion, you may be grabbed from behind and forcibly restrained by a cop- Who does'nt identify himself, or give ytou warning.
If they think than can do it, they will. And if we let them, we're hosed.
Actually you'd better not lie to the cops. That's a seperate crime, at least in California, under PC148. Lying about your name is a seperate offence as well under PC148.9. So you're better of just being quiet, after you tell your name of course.
Yet another toe-hold on the slippery slope of
Liberty has been snatched out from beneath
us. A few more fall, everytime.
Hardly seems like this is what America was
supposed to be about, but then again the
secretive and big-government-spying happy
Rebuplicans are currently in power, so this
is right in line with their ideology.
This has inspired a t-shirt design - feel
free to use it if you like.
My First Name is "Fuck",
my Last Name is "the Supreme Court".
--
> There's no police state brewing, move along.
Is it just me, or does anyone else see this and read it as "Scrotus" first?
http://www.cnn.com/2004/LAW/06/21/scotus.police.id /index.html
Is there any way to safely get out of a situation where you're attacked by a dirty cop? If you kill him in self-defense, would you still be tried as a "cop-killer"? Dealing with cops sucks in every respect, and this ruling just makes it worse. Do note, however, that although you have to identify yourself, you are NOT required to present an ID card or document. The cop has to take your word on it.
Si la vida me da palo, yo la voy a soportar Si la vida me da palo, yo la voy a espabilar
This is interesting. I hadn't known this. What happens if you say "you think I was speeding"? Certainly that can't be a confession?
If a cop pulls you over, he is legally permitted to pat you down for weapons, with or without having seen that you have a concealed weapons permit. You didn't "let him"; you were legally obligated to do so. Even though he can't search your car or your person without your permission, he can pat you down for weapons, since that's considered to be something he is doing for his immediate safety. Also, if he "happens to find" something illegal on you while legimiately checking for weapons, you can be prosecuted for it, which is why it's not a good idea to carry anything illegal on you, even if you think that a cop couldn't search for it without some cause.
I'd rather be lucky than good.
I can certainly see your point.
Here in the UK, if a police officer stops you in the street you are entitled to ask for the reason why, and they must tell you. They can't stop you solely on your appearance. You are also entitled to know the officers name and the police station where they are based. If they don't have a good reason then they are leaving themselves open for a whole load of shite should you complain.
You are not obliged to answer questions, though you might end up getting nicked if you refuse to give your name and address and they think you are hiding something. You are only obliged to give your name and address if you are arrested on suspicion of having commited an arrestable offence.
If you gave false information, then you might end up getting charged with wasting police time.
I don't know how that compares to the US.
Ah well, I don't agree with all that Jim has to say, I am somewhat close to his campaign and spoken with him on quite a few occasions. He's not a perfect candidate, but the alternative (keeping Peter DeFazio around) is very distasteful to me.
"Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives" should be a convenience store, not a government agency.
The trouble for me is that I don't trust anyone in government. I don't want a cop who I beat at soccer in elementary school to cause me problems later down the road, just because I was accidentally in the wrong place at the wrong time.
I wouldn't want to give my name to a criminal, and I wouldn't want to give my name to a police officer either.
If the officer thinks I'm involved in a crime, I would rather have him prove it based on facts, rather than based on what my name is. If I don't give my name, and the officer thinks that I may have been involved in a crime, then I would expect him to arrest me, fair and square. But if he can't figure out my name, and he can't link me to a crime, then he will have to release me.
Now, if I *am* a criminal, I just made his day go by much easier by telling him I don't want to reveal my name, because now he knows who to arrest first. It's a win-win situation for legitimate goverment interests, as well as private citizens.
The only reason the government would choose a solution that is not win-win for everyone is if they were making a grab for power that only serves themselves.
As long as the government must release suspicious non-name-givers who can't be linked to crimes, I think their individuality should be respected, and they should be released, no questions asked (pun!).
If you want to learn about or share your bad experiences with URAA restored copyrights, then read up on Golan v. Ashcroft .
I would think that because doing so before would up your chances for said ticket (it looks confrontational beforhand). But if an officer issues you a ticket I would expect his service/badge number to be on the ticket, it has been on every ticket I've recieved.
At any rate I expect things to be seriously amis before asking an officer to provide his bonnafides. The one time I've done that concerned a case where IMHO he seriously endagered me. The three tickets he wrote me were tossed out. Two of the tickets could NOT co-exist without a second vehicle doing somthing which would be illeagle even for an officer unless he had his top-lights on. I simply asked the officer how many other vehicals were on the road, he said none, then I asked at what point he turned on his lights. As soon as he answered the judge got a rather 'concerned' look on his face and the pa effectively droped the charges though I can't remember the wording he used. The officer looked really puzzled. I saw him with a sheepish look a few minutes later talking to the pa as I came out the bathroom across the hall.
But the point is MOST officers are decent people (waited 5 hours overnight with a local county cop for first day tickets to SW:TPM, really cool guy) doing a hard job with little pay. No need to give them a hard way to go by asking them to prove who they are when it's fairly obvious unless they do somthing that seems really out of line or otherwise with good cause. Pretty much the same guidelines you'd expect them to have before stopping you and asking who you are.
Mycroft
https://signup.leagueoflegends.com/?ref=4c3ed6600b6ea
Orwellian thinking doesn't rule here.
You might want to read the transcript of the video of what happened instead of relying on an article in a newspaper. The article you cite contains factually false information, as does your post. Please correct.
And while you are at it, tell me your name. You see, I am investigating a report of libelous statements made by a person who goes by the user name Java Pimp of Slashdot. The report was made anonymously, but if you do not comply with my compulsory order to utter [type] your full legal name in a posting immediately after this one, you shall be subject to arrest under the laws of Scalia police state.
I, on the other hand, can remain anonymous. For, if you ask me my name, I shall arrest you for impeding an investigation.
Heh. I'm not Mike.
Did you even read my post? Did you look at the sources I cited? Half my post was cited directly from the Case Documents, Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial District Court of Nevada , ET AL.
I know, I know... don't feed the trolls...
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
IANAL
If you give the police a name other than your own, that can give them cause to prosecute you. If you still want to do that, don't use "John Smith" (or worse, a more plausable name). Tell them "You can call me Ernesto Miranda". That way, you are making a reference to "Miranda v. Arizona" and the fifth ammendment. And, they would have a very hard time making a case that you lied about your identity vs. withheld it (though they may be able to get you for witholding it). And it would be seriously embarasing to an officer to tell a judge, "I didn't realize, your honor, that Ernesto Miranda was the name of the Plaintiff in a landmark supreme court decision that pertained to the rights of people when dealing with police investigations." It might even jepardize the officers testimony in other cases. And they probably will indeed be refereing to you as "Mr. Miranda" when talking about you even after they learn your real name. Technically, I believe Miranda applies after you have been arrested, which could happen in short order. But if you are going to fight, you might as well do it with some style.
Incidently, based on census statistics regrding the distribtion of first and last names, one would expect there to be about 4000 people in the US who actually are named "John Smith". Actually "James Smith" would the most common male name and "Mary Smith" the most common female name.
The Terry decision that gave police the right to ask for identification prohibited them from arresting someone for failure/refual to provide ID papers. However, the police in this case did not ask for Hiibel's name, they asked for ID documents and arrested Hiibel for refusing to produce ID documents he already said he did not possess.
Hiibel made a jerk of himself as did the officers who arrested him.
While the disenting opinions were logical, the majority opinion was falacious. Block quotes are from the majority opinion:
But if he had any outstanding warrants it would have been incriminating. So, if he told them his name he could have been arrested and if he didn't tell his name he also could be arrested under this decision, thus nullifying a persons right.
While police in this case did have reasonable suspicion and thus were within the rights to question Hiibel, they did not provide information to him, under demand, that would substantiate that fact, therefore one can argue that he was also within his rights to refuse questions about his identity. Actually, they did mention the heard about the fight earlier but when he specifically asked about the matter under investigation, they evaded the question. But his daughter said she had hit him, not the other way around. If that is true, then Hiibel was the victim not the assailent. Therefore, the police (though they didn't realize it) were demanding that the victim of an assault, who had not indicated a desire to press charges, identify himself.
This is falacious. It basically says that since the fourth ammendment does not require him to identify himself, it does not apply. But the fourth ammendment does apply, not because it requires him to identify himself but because it restricts the rights of police regarding seach and seizure. In order for it not to apply, the supreme court was obligated to explain why a request for identification did not constitute unlawful search and seizure.
No, actually, why the officer approached him is not moot. The officer approached him while conducting an investigation and given information up to that point (location, description, etc...), Hiibel was a suspect.
The phone tip and standing next to the truck with skid marks did legally amount to an investigation to which Hiibel was trying to play dumb. [I don't know what you are talking about officer, I was just minding my own business. That caller that reported an assult with a description of my truck in this location didn't know what they were talking about... what skid marks? I skidded for a different reason other than fighting with my daughter, yada yada yada...]
You are correct that the tip and skid marks are not enough to hold him. They are enough, however to warrant the investigation. Since the description and location of Hiibel's vehicle were in the tip along with a man assulting a woman, Hiibel, being in that location, with his daughter, with the truck, with the skid marks, did obligate him to cooperate with the officer. Hiibel wasn't approached for "no reason", he was approached for a very specific reason. If we could all legally play dumb and not cooperate, then no one would ever be able to be investigated or even arrested unless the police officer was the primary witness to the actual crime.
The investigation of a possible crime may or may not lead to anything more that the officer could then use to hold him. That's the point that's moot. The fact that Hiibel was trying to play dumb and refused to give up his name while he was being investigated is what he then was in trouble for.
The point of my post was that the outcome, whether an officer has the right to require someone to present ID when they are not under suspicion, has no relevance to this case. Hiibel was not approached for no reason and he knew it. He had an altercation that was reported and when the officer showed up to investigate he tried to play dumb.
Assuming the transcript of the video is accurate (I can't hear the audio here at work), the only thing Hiibel might have had going for him was that the officer never really makes it clear what it is that he is investigating. One would think the officer would atleast inform him that "we had a report of a disturbance in this vicinity..."
Now whether or not there was an altercation, or if Hiibel really was just hanging out minding his own business you could also say is moot. What matters is, the claim of this case, that Hiibel was approached for no reason, is baseless since the officer was there for a very specific reason: to investigate a report of a possible crime of which Hiibel was a suspect.
I will have to retract my statement about _never_ seeing police officers approaching random people for no reason... I'm sure most of us have been through atleast one DUI checkpoint. But then, the constitutionallity of that is still being decided...
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
We don't all actually live in igloos. We just tell you we do to see if you'll believe it.
That said, I do live in an igloo, and after the first few years, you get used to it. Just a pointer--If you're seriously considering moving here, and you get a deal on an igloo, make sure there's no yellow snow on it. Nasty stuff to sleep near.
The key difference between a Programmer and a Senior Programmer is that one of them is Mexican.
Sure, the officer was perfectly free to investigate. He can investigate almost anything. He may see me shake hands with someone and suspect it was a drug pass. Anyone anywhere can be a "suspect". Such Terry stops can be done virtually at will. If you look at the dissent wriiten by the other Supreme Court justices you will see a long string of rulings all stating that cops can make a brief Terry stop and ask questions explicitly stating that there is absolutely no expectation of answers. Since Terry stops can be done in the absence of cause the officer has essentially no special powers - nothing beyond basic safty and a brief chance to ask 'is there a problem here' and see if someone has a complaint.
You are suggesting that in the absence of cause and the absence of arrest a person has LESS rights than when there is cause and has been an arrest. That is absurd.
An officer can whitness be cut someone's head off and arrest me for murder, but then I have an absolute right to remain silent. Obviously I'm not likely to be able to get bail if I refuse to so much as give my name, but they candrag me through a murder trial and either convict or aquit me - but either way they CANNOT imprison me for not ansering.
But if I'm only a "suspect" on a whim rather than an arrestee for cause, and if the officer is only "investigating" on a whim rather than arresting for cause, well that makes it ok to pull out a gun and forcibly imprison me for sitting motionless and silent.
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You are suggesting that in the absence of cause and the absence of arrest a person has LESS rights than when there is cause and has been an arrest. That is absurd.
Of course that is absurd. But I think we are trying to make the same point here. Based on the outcome of this ruling, you now can be required by law to identify yourself during one of these "Terry stops".
From the ruling:
Although it is well established that an officer may ask a suspect to identify himself during a Terry stop, see, e.g., United States v. Hensley, 469 U. S. 221, 229, it has been an open question whether the suspect can be arrested and prosecuted for refusal to answer, see Brown, supra, at 53, n. 3. The Court is now of the view that Terry principles permit a State to require a suspect to disclose his name in the course of a Terry stop.
Note the require a suspect... piece. Some States may vary whether you are actually required and what penalties... but yes, the Supreme Court just made it real.
This is the whole reason this made it to Slashdot.
But to debunk the conspiracy theorists who I complain should have read the court documents
From the ruling:
Hiibel argues unpersuasively that the statute circumvents the probable-cause requirement by [Hiibel's claim] allowing an officer to arrest a person for being suspicious, thereby creating an impermissible risk of arbitrary police conduct. These familiar concerns underlay Kolender, Brown, and Papachristou. They are met by the [Court ruling]requirement that a Terry stop be justified at its inception and be "reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified" the initial stop. Terry, 392 U. S., at 20. [Finally]Under those principles, an officer may NOT arrest a suspect for failure to identify himself if the identification request is not reasonably related to the circumstances justifying the stop.
[my emphasis]
So, no, an officer can't just ask you for your name for no reason and arrest you if you don't comply.
The point of my original post was the fact of the unfortunate outcome of this case when the circumstances involved in this case had nothing to do with a random stop.
All the conspiracy theorists in this thread are crying about how this innocent bystander was approached for no reason and arrested for not cooperating. This was not just a random stop.
Again from the ruling:
The sheriff's department in Humboldt County, Nevada, received an afternoon telephone call reporting an assault. The caller reported seeing a man assault a woman in a red and silver GMC truck on Grass Valley Road. Deputy Sheriff Lee Dove was dispatched to investigate. When the officer arrived at the scene, he found the truck parked on the side of the road. A man was standing by the truck, and a young woman was sitting inside it. The officer observed skid marks in the gravel behind the vehicle, leading him to believe it had come to a sudden stop. The officer approached the man and explained that he was investigating a report of a fight...
Previously in the ruling:
Here, the initial stop was based on reasonable suspicion,...
The officer was dispatched to his location because of a report of a possible assault on a woman and given a description of Hiibel's truck. He was not approached for no reason as Hiibel and the conspiracy theorists seem to think.
From the Court ruling:
Nevada's "stop and identify" statute requires a person detained by an officer under suspicious circumstances to identify himself.
Hiibel tried to play dumb like he was just hanging out minding his own business. He got burned. He knew better. The officer surely knew better or there would never have been a report of a possible assult at that location involving that truck, etc. The officer was conducting an investigation and Hiibel was compelled to cooperate and did not. That's why he was arrested.
But because Hiibel wanted to stick to his story about playing dumb and being randomly harrassed, the Supreme Court has now extended the requirement of identification to include Terry stops as well.
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
Of course that is absurd.
So do you agree the 5-4 majority oppinion is fundamentally broken? That it denies innocent and non-arrested "suspects" fundamental rights that are normally assured even after you are arrested?
reasonable suspicion
The requirements for a Terry stop are extremely low, as to be nearly non-existant. That is exactly why all of the cases in the Supreme Court dissent explicitly state that the officer's powers are nearly non-existant. He only has the power to breifly call a time out to see if anyone has a complaint of if there is apparent evidence of a crime, that and safety (he may check if anyone involved is carrying a weapon that could present a threat during the Terry stop).
The majority of all Terry stops amount to nothing, ordinary innocent people.
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This is a right granted AFTER an arrest. Providing your identity to an officer of the law who's doing his job or an investigation isn't (imho) and invasion of privacy or an outragous request.
OTOH, the rest of the questions, where are you going, what are you doing...ect. Seem to me to be invasive. Then again, you don't want to piss someone off that has a gun. I find that general answers that are polite and non descriptive are the best way to go. Until you're threatned with arrest, then it's time to shut up. At that point there's no communication you can provide that will be to your benefit (and most will be to your detriment).
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B - D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
So do you agree the 5-4 majority oppinion is fundamentally broken?
I wouldn't say it's broken. That's the way our system works.
That it denies innocent and non-arrested "suspects" fundamental rights that are normally assured even after you are arrested?
Actually, all "suspects" are innocent (at least they had better be presumed innocent according to our system) and aren't arrested until an investigation turns up enough evidence to justify it.
Witholding your name is not a fundamental right in that being required to produce it does not violate your 4th and 5th amendment rights.
When you are investigated as a suspect you have always been required to produce some form of identification when asked to do so. Please note I'm not talking about simple "Terry" stops here. Even if the police do not have enough evidence to make an arrest, they still need to know who you are and how to get ahold of you if they need to follow up the investigation, or make an arrest if they later have enough evidence. Many times as a suspect (innocent or not, from the police point of view that's what they are trying to determine), many times as a suspect you are even bound from leaving the city, county, etc... pending the investigation. (I forget the actual term at the moment, but then that's another discussion).
The 4th ammendment only protects you from unreasonable search and seizure, it does not protect you from being investigated as a suspect, even if you truely are innocent. And under an investigation you are compelled to cooperate. The 5th ammendment protects you, not from remaining silent but only from being "compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself." Having a name and presenting it does not incriminate you so, during an investigation it can be requested and required.
Now, the unfortunate outcome of this case. Some states have always had laws that require you to present identification, be it verbaly or otherwise, during even a simple "Terry" stop. Nevada, in this case is one of them. Up until now, it has been up in the air about the constitutionallity of such a law. This fact is also in the Case document:
Although it is well established that an officer may ask a suspect to identify himself during a Terry stop, see, e.g., United States v. Hensley, 469 U. S. 221, 229, it has been an open question whether the suspect can be arrested and prosecuted for refusal to answer, see Brown, supra, at 53, n. 3.
But then in the next sentence, the court makes its unfortunate ruling:
The Court is now of the view that Terry principles permit a State to require a suspect to disclose his name in the course of a Terry stop. Terry, supra, at 34.
So, what was once up in the air has now been set in stone. Nothing else has really changed.
The conspiracy theorists are up in arms about how, now people can be stopped for any or no reason, even non-suspicious activity, and be required to present identification, verbally or otherwise, under threat of arrest, and that simply is not the case.
From the ruling:
They are met by the [Court ruling]requirement that a Terry stop be justified at its inception and be "reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified" the initial stop. Terry, 392 U. S., at 20. [Finally]Under those principles, an officer may NOT arrest a suspect for failure to identify himself if the identification request is not reasonably related to the circumstances justifying the stop.
Four situations can happen,
This is the one for the conspiracy theorists.
1, you are sitting on a bench in a park feeding pigeons. An officer walks over for no reason and requests ID. Even under this ruling, you are NOT required to identify yourself, as the officer is not investigating anything. You can ask him what seems to be the trouble, etc... If you are not suspect of anything you do not have to answer and he cannot arrest you.
If he did a
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
I wouldn't say it's broken.
You have less rights as a causeless suspect that you have as an arrestee for cause. Quite broken.
all "suspects" are innocent [] aren't arrested until an investigation turns up enough evidence to justify it.
And remaining silent is evidence to pull out a gun and forcibly imprison someone?
Witholding your name is not a fundamental right in that being required to produce it does not violate your 4th and 5th amendment rights.
According to 4 Supreme Court justices there is an entire judicial history stating that you have the right to remain silent. Or to look at it from the other side, there is a LACK of any right to imprison someone simply for remaining silent.
And under an investigation you are compelled to cooperate.
No.
I am certainly *NOT* compelled to cooperate with a search warrant for my home. I am prohibited from interfering. They can certainly request the key to a lock and I may voluntarily aid them to avoid having them cut the lock, but I have every right to stand there silent and motionless refusing to aid them while they cut that lock.
it does not protect you from being investigated as a suspect
Right. Let them investigate all they like while I stand there silent and motionless not interefering with that investigation.
The 5th ammendment protects you, not from remaining silent
Ample rulings including many Supreme Court roulings) say exactly that. And particularly odd then that police are explicitly required to inform you upon arrest that you have the right to remain silent - by Supreme Court order. But now you you are denied that right if you haven't been arrested yet?
has now been set in stone.
Hopefully not. And there are four Supreme Court justices all set to re-carve that stone. It only takes approval from four justices to get an appeal heard by the Supreme Court, so the next case to come up for appeal *will* be reconsidered anew.
now people can be stopped for any or no reason, even non-suspicious activity, and be required to present identification, verbally or otherwise, under threat of arrest, and that simply is not the case.
The standard for "suspicious activity" is virtually zero. A handshake can be "suspicious activity". So yeah, it pretty much amounts to a groundless threat of imprisonment for doing nothing and for exercising my right to remain silent, just like the Miranda warning says.
This has always been the case. If it weren't, no one would ever be able to be investigated or arrested because all they'd have to do is claim innocence and the officer couldn't touch them.
NONSENSE!
Most states have no such law and it certainly does not seem to prevent them from investigating crimes and arresting actual suspects for probable cause.
If he has cause he can arrest me. If I decline to give my name and address and other info then a judge is probably not going to grant me bail. They can then try me as John Doe #482. They can convict me of the crime or not, but not for remaining silent.
the events of the incident was basically situation 2.
[Implying a guilty suspect playing dumb]
No, as I recall he was NOT guilty of anything. I'm pretty sure that if anyone had done anything it was the daughter. Yeah, I just checked Google - the daughter hit her father's shoulder.
So your "park bench" store acutally goes as follows:
Someone reports a park "mugging". It turns out my friend and I were arguing over my frisbee and he yanked it out of my hand and ran off. I sit on the park bench. The officer comes up and questions me. I do not wish to file a complaint against my friend. The officer proceedes to arrest ME. Doh!
I'm usually a big fan of the Supreme court, but they botched this one. It only takes the decision of a single justice to fix it. The majority of the country gets on just fine without such a law. This ruling is an appalling curtailment of your right to remain silent when an officer questions you. Sure officers will look more carefully at those who are less helpfull, but it is not cause to imprison someone.
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