Michael Carter arrested and jailed for obstructing the legal process

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scriber1 said:
The police report is not certified fact. Given that, if Carter was observed by witnesses as resisting the commands of a police officer and the officer or officers charged him for that, witnesses will have to come forth and intent by Carter needs to be established by the City attorney. If no force unusual to an arrest was not made, the resisting charge should be dropped. Witnesses are his friends, one officer and maybe a by stander or two. While the behavior is unacceptable, this is a minor incident.
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I don't intend to start anything with this, but FWIW a police report generally is certified fact. An officer bases his/her reputation on the factuality of their reports, and the truth comes about one way or another regardless. If the report was found to contain fabrications, the validity of every report that officer writes for the rest of his/her life will be brought into question by any defense lawyer and no prosecuting attorney that will want to take any of the officer's arrests to court.

That being said, if it is likely that the reporting officer already has that kind of reputation, the charge will be dropped. I hate this whole situation, but I have a lot of faith in the police brotherhood. It's too bad that there are some bad apples that bring the whole profession into question.
 

Yup. Cops are out of control jerks until you or your family need one, or the arrested football player is a Badger or Hawkeye. The most important thing is that the Gophers are playing Illinois on Saturday and by God we are going to need Carter playing DB.

You guys who are already speculating that this arrest was unwarranted are being ridiculous. It may eventually turn out that you are right but you have no way of knowing that now unless you were actually there and witnessed what happened. So I recommend that you try to show a little bit of intelligence and reserve your judgment on this case until you actually find out what the facts are.
 

frozengopher said:
I don't intend to start anything with this, but FWIW a police report generally is certified fact. An officer bases his/her reputation on the factuality of their reports, and the truth comes about one way or another regardless. If the report was found to contain fabrications, the validity of every report that officer writes for the rest of his/her life will be brought into question by any defense lawyer and no prosecuting attorney that will want to take any of the officer's arrests to court.

That being said, if it is likely that the reporting officer already has that kind of reputation, the charge will be dropped. I hate this whole situation, but I have a lot of faith in the police brotherhood. It's too bad that there are some bad apples that bring the whole profession into question.
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yeah, there are definitely a few of them.
 

UpnorthGo4 said:
Yup. Cops are out of control jerks until you or your family need one, or the arrested football player is a Badger or Hawkeye. The most important thing is that the Gophers are playing Illinois on Saturday and by God we are going to need Carter playing DB.

You guys who are already speculating that this arrest was unwarranted are being ridiculous. It may eventually turn out that you are right but you have no way of knowing that now unless you were actually there and witnessed what happened. So I recommend that you try to show a little bit of intelligence and reserve your judgment on this case until you actually find out what the facts are.
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do you have the same advice for those who are (as is common with some on GH) already playing judge, jury & executioner?! :rolleyes:
 

Brew_recruit said:
why didn't the cops stop the people who walked away. Oh ya they were not black. I don't like turing this to a race thing, but that was the only difference between the 2 groups. Also so are the UMPD is going to go around and frisk people when ever they want now?
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#1: They did. "The cops interviewed the other two males". The Cops stopped and asked them what was going on. They (along with Watkins) didn't act like idiots, and it was over.

#2: How do you know the race of those two kids?

It all boils down to Carter behaving like a fool. Had he just cooperated and told his side of the story, I imagine the entire thing would have blown over without anyone being arrested. Look, I am not trying to argue that their aren't plenty of POS who are cops, but if the cops did not act (if it went down like the police report said) they would not have been doing their jobs.
 


Is it just me or does the word interview imply that the coppers believe that these guys did absolutely nothing which is highly doubtful. I may be reading too much into that but it is a quote from the police report or poor journalism.
 

Did the interview of the other two involve a pat down against a wall?
 


Brew_recruit said:
Also so are the UMPD is going to go around and frisk people when ever they want now?
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Everything I say is being said from a neutral standpoint with perspective. I'm educated and know a lot about police practice and behavior. Take it for what it's worth, it is not a personal statement.

The police can frisk whoever they want on an investigative stop (street interview - no arrest) if they feel that their safety is in question. It's called a Terry frisk, and it is strictly an unobtrusive search for dangerous weapons on an individual. There's a lot of info on the practice around the internet, and the case originated in Minnesota.

One explanation of the reasoning behind blacks being frisked more frequently compared to whites is because of the style of clothing that is culturally "in" for young blacks in the United States. You find a lot of them wearing extremely baggy clothing, where it is uncertain whether a bulge is just layered fabric or a potential weapon. Also, whites tend to be docile and cooperative around law enforcement. Blacks sometimes do not, and that kind of behavior could be explained originating from the time of our independence through the Equal Rights Amendment.

I don't have any facts or figures on resistance rates against police based on race, or any profiling statistics. Personally, I do know that the Minneapolis Police experienced an outbreak of racial profiling accusations over the past 10+ years by the public and a lot of time and money has been spent on preventing it from an administrative standpoint.

It's really easy to throw out the race card, but from a validity standpoint there has to be some substance to the arrest.
 



frozengopher said:
I don't intend to start anything with this, but FWIW a police report generally is certified fact. An officer bases his/her reputation on the factuality of their reports, and the truth comes about one way or another regardless. If the report was found to contain fabrications, the validity of every report that officer writes for the rest of his/her life will be brought into question by any defense lawyer and no prosecuting attorney that will want to take any of the officer's arrests to court.

That being said, if it is likely that the reporting officer already has that kind of reputation, the charge will be dropped. I hate this whole situation, but I have a lot of faith in the police brotherhood. It's too bad that there are some bad apples that bring the whole profession into question.
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Your opinion that a police report is a certified fact is not true. While a police report usually carries a lot of weight, I know of no judge that looks at such reports as a certified fact. Police reports are the recollections of the officer, nothing more and nothing less.
 

WAGopher said:
Your opinion that a police report is a certified fact is not true. While a police report usually carries a lot of weight, I know of no judge that looks at such reports as a certified fact. Police reports are the recollections of the officer, nothing more and nothing less.
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I'll concede "certified," but recollection is fact, especially when your recollection hinges on whether or not a citizen's civil liberties are sometimes permanently taken away. A police report is used as evidence that, along with other evidence, accumulates to proof without a reasonable doubt. Sometimes a police report is all that there is to an arrest, and that often ends up with a conviction nonetheless.

Also, there are many of cases where a judge will look at a police report as "certified" fact. It depends on the reputation of the officer writing the report and who the judge is. A lot of leeway there.
 

Recollection is not a fact. I remember the Gophers winning the NC last year. They can be made up.
 




frozengopher said:
I'll concede "certified," but recollection is fact, especially when your recollection hinges on whether or not a citizen's civil liberties are sometimes permanently taken away. A police report is used as evidence that, along with other evidence, accumulates to proof without a reasonable doubt. Sometimes a police report is all that there is to an arrest, and that often ends up with a conviction nonetheless.

Also, there are many of cases where a judge will look at a police report as "certified" fact. It depends on the reputation of the officer writing the report and who the judge is. A lot of leeway there.
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You are correct that a police report is evidence, but on it's own it is not fact. A court decision will determine if any of the report can stand as factual. Certainly, the reputation of the officer is a factor in the judge's decision.
 

Recollection isn't necessarily fact. It's an impression.

But that's beside the point. Don't these kids have anything better to do?
 

Frod0 said:
Recollection is not a fact. I remember the Gophers winning the NC last year. They can be made up.
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Yes, but contrary to popular/ignorant belief, an officer of the law has a reputation outside of a message board to uphold.

I don't know why it's so hard to comprehend the implications of lying by a police officer. The truth comes out. Defense lawyers are not morons.
 

Oh, I forgot about reputations. Let the High School Law REIGN!
 

this thread was good before the mods combined the "carter" thread with the "don't blame carter" thread, and now it is fepic.
 



OK, so he was arrested at midnight. How fast did he get drunk? The game was over at 11? He got off the field, showered, dressed, met the media, then got his drink on? What the? I was barely on the highway by then?
 

I like how no one brings up the fact that the cop tried to throw him to the ground for no reason. What reason did he have to search him. I say cop loosely, because it is umpd.
 


gogusties said:
OK, so he was arrested at midnight. How fast did he get drunk? The game was over at 11? He got off the field, showered, dressed, met the media, then got his drink on? What the? I was barely on the highway by then?
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from the mpls star tribune story it sounded like this happened on sunday night and not saturday night.
 



If we didn't have a minor consumption charge this year, we might be the only NCAA Div 1 program without one. Rename this thread the overreaction thread. When we get to 10 minor consumption arrests, let me know. Ferentz' own son has two of them. And yes he is still on the team.
 

I got stopped by a UMPD officer on my bike last summer. Luckily, I didn't get a ticket, considering I had run a red light and was riding the wrong way down Washington Ave. Still, the officer was a total D-bag, and I had to do some world class azzkissing to avoid a $200 souvenir from the incident. Like I said way earlier in this thread, "obstructing justice" = this guy pizzed the cop off, but there wasn't anything really illegal to cite him for. Any competent defense attorney should be able to get the charges dropped, or at least plead down to something petty. That said, Carter should be riding pine for at least a week for being a D-azz and getting himself into this situation.
 

11 page thread for a misdemeanor which was probably nothing more than a college kid having fun and pissed off cop with an axe to grind...imagine if there was a real crime committed.
 

Yeah this whole thread has spiraled out of control pretty quickly. I cannot believe the negativity towards law enforcement on this board though. Yeah nobody likes a speeding ticket or an underage drinking ticket or whatever else they may get in trouble for. But why get angry over something that you put yourself in a position to suffer the possible consequences for?

In this case, we do not know what happened inside the pizza place prior to the cop observing Carter, Watkins, and the two other people. What he did see is Carter and Watkins appear to be attempting to provoke a fight. Why did the officer wait for additional units to arrive prior to contacting the two? It could be for a number of reasons. Perhaps the cop was a single person crew and believed the risk of confronting two intoxicated, confrontational parties by themself was a bad idea for safety reasons. Carter and Watkins were not actively beating the two other people and until that starts happening the officer does not need to rush in and provide immediate assistance. As for when the officers actually arrived, if Carter had just kept his cool I'm sure absolutely nothing would have happened. Instead he decided to apparently not listen to verbal commands, became confrontatational, and now must face the consequences of his poor decision. Believe me, cops aren't out to arrest the world. I don't know Minnesota law code as well as I used to but the incident that occurred outside the pizza place sounded very minor in nature before Carter apparently went a little too wild.

Being polite and following directions will go a long way in how the remainder of your usually brief encounter goes. Being argumentative does not help your cause. And actually fighting/resisting in a physical way definately means things are not going to go in your favor.
 

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