Reasonable Grounds
Reporting from Beta Blogs.
‘A set of facts or circumstances, which if true, would lead an ordinary, prudent and cautious individual to have a strong belief and which exceeds mere suspicion’
So, then, how does that really define the phrase? After all, reasonable grounds is one of the main and important items in something like arresting a person, right? That’s still a very vague definition.
Well, let’s look at how to apply it.
You are a civilian, and you witness a man running out of a store, with merchandise. Someone else is chasing after that man, yelling out “Stop that man, he’s stolen something” (or some variation thereof).
This is giving you Reasonable Grounds to presume that he man is indeed a thief. As it happens, you may arrest under these circumstances, but what if you don’t hear anything of the sort?
Well, even if you’re a Loss Prevention Officer, Security Guard, or just generally an employee or owner of the store, you do not have the authority to arrest someone just because you see them acting suspicious (and that’s a good thing, because otherwise I might be in trouble - nothing more suspicious than a Fijian shirt in Winter). When a person starts leaving the store, however? Whole ‘nother ball game, that.
But what’s Reasonable Grounds for a Police Officer?
Well, that often involves acting on a tip-off, or just seeing a person being all sneaky or suchlike (why do they run? Why do they always run…). Remember, you can walk up to anybody as an Officer and ask who a person is. They don’t have to answer, but you (and here I expand the word ‘you’ to include those outside Law Enforcement), just like every other person in the world, have a right to ask. In fact, most folks don’t know that they don’t actually have any legal obligation to answer - at least, not within Canada. Nine times outta ten (or, to fit with tonight’s Repo trip, ten times outta nine), they will tell you anyway - or they’ll ask “do I have to tell you,” you will answer in the negative, and then they’ll tell you anyway.
But I digress.
To briefly cheat from my classes, what we’re looking for here is by far a lower standard of proof than what might be required for a prima facie case (’at first glance’ - yes, I took Latin for several years), let alone something as lofty as ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’.
It’s a little bit more than ‘mere suspicion’. Mere suspicion might be ‘Huh. He’s got an interesting walk’. More than mere suspicion might be ‘Huh. He’s got an interesting walk and that lady over there that he just bumped into is suddenly looking for her handbag’.
And therein lies the difference
(Repo! Also, happy More Joy Day!)
‘A set of facts or circumstances, which if true, would lead an ordinary, prudent and cautious individual to have a strong belief and which exceeds mere suspicion’
So, then, how does that really define the phrase? After all, reasonable grounds is one of the main and important items in something like arresting a person, right? That’s still a very vague definition.
Well, let’s look at how to apply it.
You are a civilian, and you witness a man running out of a store, with merchandise. Someone else is chasing after that man, yelling out “Stop that man, he’s stolen something” (or some variation thereof).
This is giving you Reasonable Grounds to presume that he man is indeed a thief. As it happens, you may arrest under these circumstances, but what if you don’t hear anything of the sort?
Well, even if you’re a Loss Prevention Officer, Security Guard, or just generally an employee or owner of the store, you do not have the authority to arrest someone just because you see them acting suspicious (and that’s a good thing, because otherwise I might be in trouble - nothing more suspicious than a Fijian shirt in Winter). When a person starts leaving the store, however? Whole ‘nother ball game, that.
But what’s Reasonable Grounds for a Police Officer?
Well, that often involves acting on a tip-off, or just seeing a person being all sneaky or suchlike (why do they run? Why do they always run…). Remember, you can walk up to anybody as an Officer and ask who a person is. They don’t have to answer, but you (and here I expand the word ‘you’ to include those outside Law Enforcement), just like every other person in the world, have a right to ask. In fact, most folks don’t know that they don’t actually have any legal obligation to answer - at least, not within Canada. Nine times outta ten (or, to fit with tonight’s Repo trip, ten times outta nine), they will tell you anyway - or they’ll ask “do I have to tell you,” you will answer in the negative, and then they’ll tell you anyway.
But I digress.
To briefly cheat from my classes, what we’re looking for here is by far a lower standard of proof than what might be required for a prima facie case (’at first glance’ - yes, I took Latin for several years), let alone something as lofty as ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’.
It’s a little bit more than ‘mere suspicion’. Mere suspicion might be ‘Huh. He’s got an interesting walk’. More than mere suspicion might be ‘Huh. He’s got an interesting walk and that lady over there that he just bumped into is suddenly looking for her handbag’.
And therein lies the difference
(Repo! Also, happy More Joy Day!)