RPM, I'm not trying to be disrespectful when I say this but I hate that BS everyone says....."It's a free country. You are violating my Constitutional Rights!" This is the greatest country on the Planet! I truely believe that and do everything in my power to protect a persons civil rights.
What I read out of that article was a young man's bruised ego. "How dare they stop me and acuse me of stealing!" First of all, I'll be the first to day I don't know anything of Ohio's criminal law. But the police officer did have the right to stop and question the man. A call for service by the business warranted a threshold inquiry.
Let me put it this way, sombody breaks into your house or car and take a baseball cap out that you had. You call the police and they show up. You point out somebody walking down the street wearing a baseball cap just like you had. The police officer then says to you, "So, its a very popular cap" and walks away without talking to the person. Wouldn't you be saying "WTF"?
What happened to Mr. Righi was he first questioned the police officers authority. The police officer had the right to ask for identification. That means name, date of birth, and address. Where is all that information conveniently found? On a driver's license. Failure to provide this information will result in a person being arrested. To a civilian that sounds pretty harsh. Put yourself in the police officer's shoes for a few minutes. He/she is conducting an investigation and wants to complete it as quickly and thouroghly as possible.
Miranda Rights. This always gets me too. People watch too much TV. Miranda is used only during an interrogation. What that means is if I'm going to question you about a crime that you may be involved in, I need to advise you of your rights. Thats where Miranda comes in. I do not have to advise anyone of their rights when they get arrested. Note that Miranda doesn't apply to booking questions though.
As far as who was right in this incident, I wasn't there. There are always two sides to a story and so far I've only heard Mr. Righi's side. I'm sure the arresting officer would have a different version.
Let me put this question out there as well. You go out to buy some beer. To buy beer, the clerk says they need to see some identification. What would you had over? A birth certificate? Driver's license? State Id card? Isn't the clerk violation your right of privacy as well?
All of those questions are hypothetical though. You want the beer, you show your identification. Same thing applied to Mr. Righi. He just chose to argue with the wrong person.
Again, I don't mean to disrespect anyone. I just think the jury is still out on this one.
Obie
