Often, police can charge civilians with disorderly conduct to initiate an arrest, but in some instances, a police officer is making an arrest illegally. They could be committing a civil rights violation by arresting you, and you could have the right to fight their charge and win.
That’s why in our article, we will go over what police misconduct is, how often disorderly conduct is misused by the police, and what you can do if you fall victim to such a violation. It’s vital that you know what your rights are and how you can use them to defend yourself in such situations.
There is no universal definition of what police misconduct is as it differs from state to state and can take many forms and be a violation of several different laws. This means that, unfortunately, there is no one-size-fits-all-example.
That being said, the most common type of police misconduct is a violation of your legal rights. Here are some examples:
If you happen to fall victim to any of the violations mentioned above, you should contact a lawyer immediately.
Disorderly conduct is a common term often used to refer to any action considered an intentional disturbance of public peace. However, if you look at what the law defines as disorderly conduct, you will see that it varies from state to state, as we mentioned previously.
In order to protect yourself from being unfairly charged with disorderly conduct, the first thing you need to know is what falls under this term in your state and town. Typically, the most common actions that get charged with this violation are:
However, specific laws sometimes define actions such as “playing music loudly” or “making loud noises” to be disorderly conduct. That’s why it’s vital that you know what falls under that category for the place you live in. That being said, because of the loosely defined term “disorderly conduct,” many police officers, unfortunately, use this charge to arrest any civilian that is challenging their authority or “annoying” them in any way.
To not get falsely charged or arrested, you must know what behavior police officers define disorderly conduct to be according to the law. Let’s help by giving you a few examples.
If you are arguing with a police officer in a normal tone of voice, that’s not considered disorderly conduct; however, threatening a police officer or engaging in a physical altercation with them is. Additionally, suppose you fail to comply with a police order to move away from a public area. In that case, that’s also not generally defined as disorderly conduct unless the officer issued this order because he couldn’t control a large crowd of people.
To put it simply, if you’re not doing any action that’s considered to be disorderly conduct by the laws in your state and you’re not being intentionally rude or physical with police officers. You cannot be arrested for disorderly conduct.
Do you think that the police officers acted unprofessionally and illegally in your case? If you do, the first thing you need to do is contact a lawyer at the H Law Group. You will have to explain your case to an attorney, and from there, they will be able to determine whether you’re a victim of police misconduct.
If you didn’t violate the law or cause a public disturbance of peace, it’s likely that your charge was illegal, and you will be able to fight and overturn it. Along with that, most police departments don’t want to receive bad publicity and are willing to negotiate settlements if your case is valid.
