Police Errors

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Ayers Case

I do believe that the police did have probable cause to arrest Ayers, since he was picked from a photo line-up. Generally, eye-witness information that picks a person from a line-up is considered probable cause; they had no reason to believe that the witness could be wrong. On the other hand, I do not believe that they went about the right way to conduct the arrest. There has been much evidence to suggest that eye witness accounts are notoriously inaccurate. Despite having probable cause, I therefore believe they should have waited with the arrest and conducted further investigations first. They could have conducted surveillance of Ayers' movements to determine if he was involved in other criminal activity. While doing so, I would have also ensured that minimal harm come to innocent bystanders, in this case his fiancee and children. After conducting surveillance for several days, I would have gone to the home and conducted an interview with him and his fiancee.

During the interview, I would minimize danger to myself by asking a partner to accompany me. I would have done this in a very discreet way, and certainly not at 4am in the morning. Having found no other suspicious activity as a result of the surveillance, I would give Ayers the benefit of the doubt during the interview, explain the situation, and ask him for an alibi.

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If his answers were not completely satisfactory, I would have taken him to the police station, but not in such a way as to traumatize his family. If several of my partners have conducted interviews and found nothing suspicious, we would investigate any alibis Ayers presented. In this way, a full investigation would have been conducted without the traumatic effects listed in the article.

This is what I would have done before arresting him.

Hence, despite having probable cause, I believe that the police should have conducted a far more discreet investigation before arresting him. The devastation in his home is far worse than any potential danger he presented to the public.

Regarding such danger, if the police were to conduct surveillance activities, they would have been on the premises if Ayers had done anything illegal or dangerous. They could then have arrested him on site without traumatizing any of his family. Hence, even without immediate arrest, the danger could have been minimized in a far less traumatizing way. As….....

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