Probable Cause and Your Rights
Video Transcript: When am I under arrest? Hi, I’m Ty Smith, an attorney in OKC with Wirth Law Office, and this is an important one because you need to know when the situation has changed from your just being cops just want to talk to you, they’re just kind of investigating to when have you been taken into some form of custody because then your rights kind of change around a little bit.
You’re under arrest when a reasonable person believes that he or she is not free to walk away from law enforcement, which is why if you’ve listened my previous videos, I encourage you to ask periodically whether you are free to go or not ’cause it needs to be clear whether you are being detained for questioning.
There’s some obvious ones too. If you’re putting cuffs, yeah, you probably can’t walk away with those cuffs. Put in the back of a car? Don’t try to get out of the car, you’re under arrest, okay? Don’t fight it. Arrest has to be based on probable cause for an arrest and I’ve talked about what that is in a previous video, but probable cause comes about when an officer has reasonable belief that you’ve committed some crime.
Now, once you’re arrested, the police can search a person. It’s called a custodial check because you are in custody and they can pat you down and make sure you don’t have any weapons or anything. You can say you don’t consent, but that’s not going to do much, and they will ask you questions.
Now as forever as I always say, you don’t have to answer these questions and I advise you actually don’t answer these questions. Outside of the presence of an attorney, I wouldn’t talk to them. You should know that they’re coming and they’re going to continually ask you these questions. Unless you are 120% sure that there’s nothing wrong with answering a question like if they ask, “Do you have to go to the bathroom,” can answer that I guess. But try to stay away from the substantive questions outside of the presence of your attorney.
If you want to talk more about this stuff, I would be glad to speak to you about it. As I said before, I’m Ty Smith, I’m a criminal defense lawyer in Oklahoma with Wirth Law Office, and you can reach me at theoklahomacityattorney.com, or you can call my office at (405) 888-5400 and I’d be glad to speak to you about this.
