Detention And Arrest

The criminal justice system aims to maintain a balance between the individual interest of private citizens to carry on their lives free from state interference, and the communal interest in maintaining a safe society. These two goals come into conflict with each other most visibly when agents of the state physically take control of private citizens -- that is, when they exercise their powers to detain or to arrest. The book focuses on "street-level" encounters: detentions and arrests that occur in the course of investigating crime and laying charges. The authors explore the initial interaction between agents of the state or others authorized to detain and arrest, and the private citizens whose liberty is interfered with. It is at that point that the balance between societal safety and individual liberty is most keenly in play. This second edition has been updated to incorporate significant changes which have taken place with regard to statutory powers (the new citizen's arrest power and others), to common law powers (powers of detention, safety searches, search incident to arrest, etc.) and to Charter rights (freedom from arbitrary detention, right to counsel, and so on).

Annotation The criminal justice system aims to maintain a balance between the individual interest of private citizens to carry on their lives free from state interference, and the communal interest in maintaining a safe society. These two goals come into conflict with each other most visibly when agents of the state physically take control of private citizens-that is, when they exercise their powers to detain or to arrest.

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Detention before trial has been one of the most neglected areas in the whole administration of criminal justice. In the past, attention has been focussed almost exclusively on detention after trial (i.e. sentencing), which touches the lives of significantly fewer persons than detention before trial. There has been no previous examination in Canada of the utility or effectiveness of its operation. This study will fill an important need by documenting statistically the extent and nature of custody before trial in the Toronto Magistrates' Courts, where the overwhelming majority of citizens charged with criminal offences in the Toronto area are tried. Although the study is primarily directed at practices before trial in Toronto, many of these practices can be found in other cities throughout North America. Specific areas of importance which were investigated here include the use of the summons; the extent to which accused persons are detained in custody both before and after the first court appearance; bail-setting practices and the ability to raise bail; the activities of professional bondsmen; the enforcement of penalties for absconding; and the relationship between custody and the outcome of the trial. Much of the presentation of the data is descriptive, but attempts are made throughout the study to prove statistically the existence of casual relationships. The result is a work which brings together in lucid and scholarly form important evidence which will be valuable to lawyers and all who are professionally concerned with social problems, and of interest to everyone with a regard for the administration of justice.

A just, fair, reasonable, and purposeful exercise of arrest and detention powers by the State is both in the interest of the individual and the society at large. However, very often individual rights are impinged by arbitrary and illegal exercise of State power to arrest and detain. The book studies issues pertaining to arrest and detention, comprehensively, critically, and analytically, in the light of the Indian Constitution. It points out that the arrest and detention provisions in the legal system of India, by and large, have remained the same as inherited from the imperial British era. Despite constitutional prescriptions and judicial pronouncements over several decades, there has been no noteworthy change that would bring the law in tune with the constitutional emphasis on right to life and personal liberty as well as other human rights. To capture the complexity of the issue, the volume analyses constitutional provisions, statutory law, pertinent judgments, case law, reports of various committees, and recommendations of experts in the field. Exploring lacunae in the present legal scenario, the book stresses on the need for organizational and attitudinal changes in the State instrumentalities for successfully balancing the need to maintain law and order and human rights imperatives. Emphasizing that it is the poor who often suffer the most, the author further advocates inclusion of the developments in the field of jurisprudence, behavioural sciences, technology, and management to deal with crime and criminality.

Organizations acting on behalf of society are expected to act fairly, explaining themselves and their procedures. For the police, explanation is routine and repetitive. It's also very powerful. This book provides an unusual opportunity to see different speakers and writers explaining the same texts in their own words in British police stations.