Capt. Sandra Tong: Police Beat

Private person's arrest

Occasionally members of our community, either in a public capacity or as an employee/proprietor, are asked by the police department if they are willing to sign for a "citizen's" or "private person's" arrest.

The most common response to that question is, "Why do I have to sign something?" or "Will I have to go to court?" Let me try to explain as succinctly as possible what all this means.

The California Penal Code dictates to law enforcement officers what actions they can lawfully take under certain conditions. When someone violates a statute that is not a felony, the police, with certain specific exceptions, are restricted in what actions they can take without the assistance of the victim or a witness to the offense/crime.

Notwithstanding felony offenses, the Penal Code permits officers to make arrests for misdemeanors and infractions only when they are committed in the officers presence - again, there are limited and specific exceptions to this rule - or when the victim and/or witness is willing to make a private person's arrest.

Therefore, when you are the victim of a public offense that is not a felony or one that falls within the exceptions provided by law, the responding officer will ask you to sign a private person's arrest form. In essence, you, as the victim or witness, are exercising the right provided to you by the Penal Code to make an arrest. We do the rest.

The responding officer will accept your private person's arrest form, determine the appropriate charge(s), if any, and either issue a "notice to appear" (citation) for court or book the person into jail, depending on other factors, such as the type of crime, the likelihood of it continuing, the ability of the person to care for him or herself, etc., and finally write the police report.

The responsibility of the person making the arrest sometimes ends there. If the case proceeds through the District Attorney's office, in the case of misdemeanors (infractions are handled differently), and eventually ends up in a jury trial, the victim and/or witness may be called to testify. Most incidences of private person arrests do not, however, end up in a jury trial. There are numerous ways the District Attorney's office can handle misdemeanor offenses.

This is an extremely brief overview of the process, which, obviously, does not include the myriad possibilities of circumstances we encounter every day. The law is much less restrictive for police and private persons when the offense in question is a felony as long as there are sufficient and demonstrable facts to support the arrest.

The next Community/Police Forum will be held Tuesday, May 18, at 7 p.m., in the community room at the Richmond Police Station. Guest speakers will discuss "emergency preparedness." Representatives from the Office of Emergency Services, Neighborhood Emergency Response Teams and the Department of Health will detail plans for preparing for and dealing with earthquakes and other potentially catastrophic disasters.