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Nonna68

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Hi, do you have any knowlage of juvenile law? My 15 year old is being charged with bogus burglary charges. He (wrongly) snuck out of the house one night with a freind that was spending the night to go see a girl. Up the block from the girls house a police officer stopped them, searched, questioned and took them into custody stating that there have been several unlocked cars ib town burglarized etc.. they had the kids out there ( and us parents waiting in police station ) for about 2 - 3 hours.. they knocked on every door on the street, woke people up at 2 am asking them if there was anything missing out of thier cars ... everyone said no .. nothing was missing. Now even though the kids had nothing but pocket change on them, and all of the residents in the earea said nothing was missing .... they are still being charged with burglary. They said that the change "could have been taken from any car..." it's all ridiculous . They were brought in,. booked , fingerprinted. The Officers wouldnt let us see them ... wouldnt let the boys talk to or see us , infact they told my son we didnt want to talk to him ( untrue) there were not read their rights.. were not aloud to call or see or speak to parents,, (even though my son repeatedly asked for us to be present) My son has never EVER been in trouble before ... he plays football and other sports , but bucause of all of this is not allowed to participate in ANY co-corricular activities for 10 weeks (school zero tolerance police says any student with pending charges with law enforcement cannot participate... no such thing as guilty until proven innocent in this town) What can happen here ... can they actually charge or find him guilty of something like this ... with no evidence, just the word of a cop with atitude?
 
If there is no proof then the case will never go to court. Chances are there is something, even if it is weak.

I would recommend you speak to an attorney who can then obtain the police reports. There may be a witness or a "confession" that you are not aware of.

- Carl
 
Actually, I have the police report ... it says there was nothing found to be missing, it lists everything the kids had in their pockets, there was no confession... the only thing that was said by the boys was the reason they were on that block, they told them the girls name , and showed tried to show the police txt messages back and forth with the girl to prove what they were saying was true .. the officer wouldnt look at the txt messages or call or go talk to the girl to even see if they were telling the truth. The Officer said nothing has to be missing for it to be burglary... the vehichle only has to be entered. If anything was missing they would have added a charge of theft of movable property. Unlike with an adult, where there would have to be proof or witnesses etc... with a juvenile all there has to be is "suspicion" of a crime. And according to the officer, and her poloce report... because it was that time in the "AM" they were in her words "Clearly doing something wrong"
It may not go to court, but the charges are there ... it may get dropped down to the JCC (Juvenile Conference Committee)... But the question is ... how could a police officer do this , and get away with it.? If you knew how many times this particular officer changed her story the got they got arrested alone you would choke !! The boys were seperated the entire time...not one chance to make up a story etc.. yet their storys of everything that went on were identical and have not changed .. .the officer however couldn't decide what story to stick with ... and by the time i got the police report it was yet again, completely differernt. I by no means have anything against police ... Im a cops daughter...and a cops grandaughter. I now live in a small town ( not where my family were cops) and It's ridiculous what some of these small town cops with nothing better to do with their time do to these kids. My son is not the first .. nor will he be the last im willing to bet to have trouble like this in this town. I do have an attorney for my son... whom I have 110% faith in to make this go away... it's just so frustrating to have to deal with all of this.
 
There may have been justification for a detention or an arrest, I cannot possibly say. But the late hour coupled with a crime that had been alleged may be sufficient to constitute probable cause for an arrest. There may have also been a curfew violation here as well.

Please note that the probable cause for an arrest is significantly less than that necessary for a conviction.

If you feel that the arrest exceeded the officer's lawful authority, you are free to hire an attorney to make a claim and a suit against the city.

But, one has to ask ... just how late was it that they were contacted? And why were they out?

- Carl
 
By the way ... about 3 weeks after my son was arrested for this ,It was in the local paper police log that a guy (in the same town) about 23 years old was arrested for some other reason... while they were arresting this guy they foung several credit cards and other items on him that were reported stolen out of unlocked vehichles in town... he then confessed to burglarizing several cars ... and they wound up recovering over $3000 worth of stuff from this guy . HE WAS CHARGED WITH CRIMINAL MISCHEIF !!
Yet two kids who were no where near any cars, had nothing on them .. never ran , by the way, from the police..infact they walked right up to the patrol car when it stopped... ARE BEING CHARGED WITH BURGLARY !
Even if it does get dropped .. or sent to the JCC I still have to spend alot of $$ on a lawyer .. that I shouldn't have to spend at all.
This officer has a real attitude problem ... even the way the parents were treated my her, you would have thought we were all murderers or something ..she is young, a new cop, and also the first and only female cop on an all male force, she has a chip on her shoulder and something to prove.. and being that there has been an on going problem in this town with unlocked cars being burglarized.. she wanted to bring someone in .. and it seems it didn't matter who, or whether or not they did anything wrong. The boys just being out at that time wdnt have been was reason enough to her.
Im looking into wether or not I can file a complaint against the arresting officer for several reasons besides false arrest ... she denied these kids their basic civil rights ... she gave them less rights then a slug would have. Not to mention the law states that a minor has the right to havea parent presant during questioning , the police are not obligated to inform the child of this right, however if the child asks for it THEY HAVE TO ALLOW IT ... my son asked repeatedly and was denied... I understand the police have a job to do and I respect that .. but my taxes pay her salary and I would expect her to atleast attempt to do her job correctly , and LEGALLY !
 
no one alleged there was a crime... just the opposite ... all of the residents of the area were questioned and all said there cars were not touched, and nothing was missing ... all these boys were doing was walking down a street.. thats it .. no cars were opened , damaged, anything ... it was only that they were out late and thats all . If I could show you the police report you'd laugh .... im sure any half way decent attorney will chew this up and spit it out .
 
sorry .. it was about 1:30 am ...and they snuck out to go see a girl (15 & 16) year old hormonal boys ... they were txting back and forth with the girls ,... and snuck out to go see the girls.. who only live a couple of blocks away. They were wrong for being out , but that's all these kids are guilty of
 
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