
Quoting
BOR
The officer's argument was the Plaintiff's/arrestees asserting a valid affimative defense at the time of investigation is not binding on them in determining whether to make and arrest. The Plaintiff's stated it was, the court agreed.
An affirmative defense is something usually brought up at trial. What you are discussing here is something that effectively removes probable cause. If there is no probable cause, then no arrest can lawfully be made.
Statutorily, the law only provided an affirmative defense, meaning per se in court, it did not say the officers were to consider it in the field, however, the court, citing Carroll, indicated the totality of the facts at the officer's hands were NOT sufficient to support PC and they should have known this, regardless of facial statutory language.
That's what i said. Probable cause for the arrest did not exist in that particular case.
Bottom line is, in the 6th Circuit, IF an officer knows of a valid affirmative defense to ANY alledged crime, they can not make an arrest and just let the defendant plead such in court. If they do, they may be subject to a civil rights lawsuit.
That's not quite what it said. Again, it effectively said if there is no probable cause, no arrest can be made. In the case cited the officwers apparently knew that there was no probable cause to make the arrest and made it anyway. This issue of an "affirmative defense" does not mean quite what you think it means, I think. It is not an issue generally applied in the field.
affirmative defense n. when a defendant files an answer, in addition to denying some or all of the allegations, he/she can state what are called "affirmative defenses." These defenses can contain allegations, take the initiative against statements of facts contrary to those stated in the original complaint against them, and include various defenses based on legal principles. Many of these defenses fall into the "boilerplate" (stated in routine, non-specific language) category, but one or more of the defenses may help the defendant.
An explanation for a defendant's actions that excuses or justifies his behavior. For example, acting in self-defense is a common affirmative defense to a charge of battery or homicide. Other affirmative defenses include insanity, duress and intoxication.
And there are many others that vary along the same theme.
If there si no probable cause, you cannot make a lawful arrest. It's that simple.
- carl