Odds are Very Good that You'll Be Arrested

By Stephen Bucaro

Eventually you'll yell at your spouse, play a prank on someone, cause a disturbance in public, drink alcohol in public, fail to renew your vehicle license on time, you or your child carry a prescription medication without a proper label, make a mark on public property, cross in the middle of the street, argue with a cop, just stand there (loiter), or do one of tens of thousands of things that can get you arrested.

Why would a cop make an arrest for any of these petty offenses? They claim that they no longer use the quota system, and they don't. Now, instead of being required to meet a quota, they just issue as many tickets and make as many arrests as they can. They use a points system. Tickets are worth one point, misdemeanor arrests are worth two points, and felony arrests are worth three points.

How does a police department know which cops are the good ones? How do they know which cop to give the biggest raise and which cop to give a promotion? They use the points system. The cops with the highest points get the biggest raises and promotions, and they get more points for making an arrest than for issuing a ticket. So a cop wants to make as many arrests as they possibly can.

• A felony arrest can be made based solely on the testimony of a credible witness.

In late February 2008, the Pew Center on the States reported that about 2.3 million Americans are incarcerated in state and federal prisons. More than 1 in 100 American adults are behind bars at this moment. The U.S. has more people in prison than any other nation, including communist China (with 1.5 million people behind bars) and china has four times the population as the United States.

The criminal justice system is a giant welfare system for cops, guards, clerks, bailiffs, judges, lawyers, probation officers, social workers. They need to arrest you to keep getting a paycheck. It costs U.S. taxpayers $25,000-$30,000 per year to incarcerate each American. And all arrests are logged into the FBI's NCIC (National Crime Information Center) computers.

Once your arrest record is in the NCIC computers, even if the prosecutor declines the case, even if your case is dismissed, even you're found innocent or acquitted - you've got an arrest record - and this arrest record will NEVER go away. It will stay with you and follow you for the rest of your life. One in seven Americans has an arrest record, that's over 30 million Americans walking around with an arrest record.

• Even if your arrest is ordered to be expunged by a judge, your arrest record still remains in the NCIC computers. State and local courts can't remove it because they lack jurisdiction over the federal government.

Once your arrest record is in the NCIC computers, it's available to government agencies, schools and universities, credit scoring agencies, mortgage lenders, land lords, employers, and anyone else who does a background check. There are more than 30 companies that make your arrest record available online.

Having an arrest record in the NCIC computers can ruin your life. Most employers would rather NOT hire someone with an arrest record, even if the case was dismissed or you were found innocent. Most employee manuals state that getting arrested is grounds for immediate dismissal, even before you go to trial.

Dale Carson was a Miami cop who set records for felony arrests. He then became an FBI agent and an instructor at the FBI academy. He is currently a criminal defense attorney in Florida. His book tells you everything you need to know about how cops operate, the little things that can get you arrested, and what you need to do to arrest-proof yourself.