What would you do if???? (An ethical issue)

[gcc123]

OK...HERE IS THE SCENARIO I HAVE BEEN DISCUSSING LATLEY IN ETHICS CLASS, MAYBE i CAN GET SOME MORE THOUGHTS ON THIS.

OK...YOUR ON FOOT PATROL, YOU TURN THE CORNER, AND YOU SEE A KNOWN LOCAL DRUG DEALER, AND A 2ND PARTY, WHEN THEY SEE YOU, THEY START TO SPLIT UP, ALL OF A SUDDEN A BAG OF NARCOTICS HITS THE GROUND. YOU DON'T KNOW EXACTLY WHO DROPPED THE DRUGS, BUT YOU SUSPECT IT TO BE THE DRUG DEALER.. NOW LET'S SAY THIS IS THE 4TH TIME OR SO THAT THIS PERSON WILL BE ARRESTED FOR DRUG SALE, AND IF YOUCAN BUST HIM HERE, YOU WILL BE ABLE TO MOST LIKELY FINALLY GET A CONVICTION AND BE ABLE TO PUT HIM AWAY FOR AWHILE, AND GET HIM OFF THE STREETS. BUT YOU DON'T KNOW IF HE IS THE ONE THAT HAD THE DRUGS IN HIS POSESSION. WHAT DO YOU DO?? DO YOU ARREST HIM, AND TESTIFY THAT HE WAS THE ONE IN POSSESION OF THE NARCOTICS, SO YOU CAN GET RID OF HIM, EVEN THOUGH YOU REALLY DON'T KNOW IF HE WAS THE ONE IN POSSESION, OR DO YOU NOT, BECAUSE YOU REALLY DON'T KNOW WHO'S IT WAS???

[Mo Trooper]

Hopefully every officer on the board would answer this the same way.

There is no way you can or should arrest him. End of story. Doing so and lying in court would be an insult to all honest officers. Anyone who answers otherwise should think about another career.

[Flatfoot003]

I second Mo Troopers response. I myself have found myself in this position many a time, where dope has popped up almost out of no where and you have a good idea who had it in their possession, but you can't say you saw them holding. That is what's called "found property", not evidence! If he's that much of a knucklehead you will get ample chance to hook him up another time.

Stay Safe, Flatfoot003

[Kahuna5150]

Your job, house, and family are not worthing risking or trading in an attempt to get a drug dealer. Obviously you have to lie in order to say the drug dealer had the drugs. Aside from the ehtical and personal integrity issues, why in the world would you risk your freedom, (get prosecuted for perjury), money, (get sued for false arrest, civil rights, etc), and your job, (get fired from the agency you work for) all in an attempt to get one drug dealer off the street when 10 more will show up to take his/her place.

I'm not saying you shouldn't be dedicated to cleaning the streets up and putting these guys in jail, but not by doing something illegal or wrong yourself. If this is his/her 4th time getting arrested for drugs, don't you think there would be a 5th, 6th, 7th, etc time in the future that would be rock solid and legit?

Never lie... Mistakes can be forgiven in most cases, but lies last forever...

Kahuna

[stein810]

something similar to that scenario has happened to me.... except the dope dealer was just hanging out on the corner in a big time narcotic area. he split when he saw us. after we caught him we took him in on his warrants but there was a decent sack of crack lying right by the car sitting on the corner where he was hanging out at. we just took it is a misd lockup and did a seperate pcr on the recovered narcotics. it is obvious that the sack of crack was the idiots. we did not see him with it but my partner and i are not going to lie just to get a dope case. my job and LOW PAY isnt worth it.

[CTMarshal999]

One of my instructors in the academy put it simply...IF YA AIN'T GOT IT, LET IT GO.

I agree with ALL of the above. You'll get him again, the right way, and you make it stick with good solid paperwork.

[try163]

Hmmmm,

Based on what you have in your post, I would say no you don't have probable cause to arrest anyone if you did not see who dropped it. Remember though we are dealing on probability and not something that is definite. If you saw the drugs hit the ground and these two walking away, I believe you have more than enough reasonble suspicion to make an investigation and detain them. Maybe they will give you a confession as to which one had them. Highly doubtful, but if you run them for warrants, maybe you will get a hit and they may have more drugs in the pocket. Or ask them for consent to search their person. You certainly have enough to do a pat down for weapons. Known drug dealer, high crime and drug area, where there is drugs there may be weapons. Remember probable cause can be built. Articulation is key.

NOW, that being said, I do not advocate lying in court and certainly not on the street to where you would have to go to court and lie there also. I had a guy one night, known dealer walking by himself that I and another guy pulled up on. About ten feet from where we stopped him was a small bag a marijuana. And that was the direction which he came from. Did I suspect it was his? YES. Did I arrest him? NO. I didn't see him drop it, I couldn't see the ground because I pulled up in my car and there were cars parked along the curb so I couldn't see the sidewalk where it was. Basically I didn't know if he dropped it or if it had been lying there already.

Here is another scenario that happened to me. I was on a vehicle stop with my partner one morning. I came up the passenger side and my partner interviewed the driver. After a couple of minutes talking to the passenger I went to the driver and gave him field sobriety tests because we believed he was on something and not alcohol. As I interviewed the driver I saw the passenger stick his arm out the window on the right several times. When another unit arrived I gave the driver the the tests and locked him up for DWAI drugs. When I went back around to the passenger there were four or five individually wrapped packages of what appeared to be crack cocaine on the ground outside the door. After they field tested negative for crack cocaine, I locked him up under the Public Health Law in NYS for possessing fake drugs. A misdemeanor in NY. Did I see him drop the stuff. No, but I saw his arm motions and I know that the stuff was not on the ground when I initially approached him on the passenger side and engaged him in conversation because I looked. Was it probable that he dropped it? Yes, it was right next to the door, a couple pieces were just under the car next to the door and there were more pieces individually wrapped on the floorboard and cigarette tray which I located during my inventory search of the vehicle. The passenger gave us an oral admission that they were selling the fake stuff to buy the real stuff (happens all the time). And the driver admitted to driving under the influence of crack.

So I guess that is an example of the difference from where you just don't know, to where your observations built probable cause and you can articulate that. :winkee:

[jaybird]

I don't think there is any rule why you can't pick up the dope then stop and talk to him. Just pull a Terry stop. You've got more than enough reasonable suspicion to detain him to talk to him.
If he ends up talking about the dope or says somehting incriminating or you find that you have enough to mirandize him, then do so. If you don't, then let him go, you got the dope and its not being sold now. Good guys win.

There's no law about you stopping and talking to someone on the street.

[lestat]

hope he runs across the street and summons him for jaywalking. HAHAHAHAHAHA....at least you get a number. seriously though, i agree the fact he is known to you as a dealer, is acting in a manner consistent with a transaction, flees upon your approach, and a dropped bag is there (which hopefully yo can say wasn't there before) is enough to stop and question. but barring any other violations (like jaywalking :) ) or a something indicating he has a weapon, no collar. why anyone would lie over a POS drug collar, or any collar for that matter, is beyond me. plus as said before, some people are more than willing to incriminate themselves if you know how to talk to them (and i don't me in a threatening way). maybe he'll cop to having more drugs, a warrant, a gun, or some other contraband. (no officer, i don't have any drugs, the only thing i got is a little weed :) ) however, if in the end you have nothing , tomorrow is another day. stay safe.

[gaboy]

I don't think the original post was ment to see if we could gather info on how to make this a valid arrest. It was just to see if anyone would lie to make a case.

My answer would be no.

Remember guys if your ever caught lying under oath your career is over.

There's always next time. Besides take satifaction that when you dispose of the drugs, he's about to have a bad day.

[K9 Police]

I would hope everyone on my deparment would say no too.

K9

[996s]

Should be simple. If you cant pinpoint who it was then you cant do to much. Sometimes they win, sometimes they lose.
I wont arrest anyone or write a ticket to someone if I know it wont go through, now some peope sneak through something and get out of things. But for the most part if you know they wont go to jail, dont arrest them. I am not saying things are not worth fighting for. Or working hard to prove. But you have to be able to prove the person did what they did.

[try163]

gaboy,

you're right, the original post was not to see who could make this a valid arrest. In fact, everyone that posted all said the same thing, that if you didn't see it then you don't do it. Plain and simple. I and a couple others simply stated that there is more that you can do instead of just standing there looking at the bag of drugs on the ground. I think all of us are familiar with the difference between reasonable cause to detain someone and probable cause to lock them up. Conducting an investigation would be the right thing to do. If you can get him to incriminate himself fine, you have a nice arrest, if not then he walks. Not all investigations turn into arrests.


TRY163

[gaboy]

try 163,

I know but we just kind of got off on a tangent. You could always secure the bag and have it processed for fingerprints. If it came back to your drug dealer, get a warrant for his arrest.

You could canvase the area for businesses with cameras that were running which may have caught who really dropped the bag.

There's alot that you could do, however thats really not what the question was.

It was an ethics question and we just started losing sight of that. possibly because all the answers were so similar. Hey but thats a good thing.