Re: 6 Guns Confiscated
Posted: Tue Apr 28, 2009 9:50 pm
Sounds like a really lousy situation... hope everything turns out for the best for your family.
One note about them not reading your mom her rights. The Miranda warning is only required when someone is: (a) detained and (b) questioned by police.
They can question you without having to inform you of your rights unless you are being detained/arrested. They can arrest/detain you without ever reading you your rights as long as they don't interrogate you.
In this case, it sounds like she was questioned before she was arrested/detained... so they would not have needed to read her rights then. And after she was arrested, they wouldn't need to question her, since she had already told them what they were interested in.
As the ol' spiel goes... anything you say can and will be used against you... and they don't need to warn you about that if they aren't specifically asking you questions, while you are being detained.
Again, hope it all gets worked out. Sounds like the gun confiscation was bogus... but probably not unlawful since your step-dad (I think that's the relation.. apologies if I got it wrong) voluntarily surrendered them. I would hope that in his position I would have told them that they needed a warrant if they wanted to go in my gun safe... but for us law abiding types, it's a natural inclination for us to comply with authority - especially in a stressful situation... so I can certainly understand why he complied.
Best wishes for a good resolution of the situation.
One note about them not reading your mom her rights. The Miranda warning is only required when someone is: (a) detained and (b) questioned by police.
They can question you without having to inform you of your rights unless you are being detained/arrested. They can arrest/detain you without ever reading you your rights as long as they don't interrogate you.
In this case, it sounds like she was questioned before she was arrested/detained... so they would not have needed to read her rights then. And after she was arrested, they wouldn't need to question her, since she had already told them what they were interested in.
As the ol' spiel goes... anything you say can and will be used against you... and they don't need to warn you about that if they aren't specifically asking you questions, while you are being detained.
Again, hope it all gets worked out. Sounds like the gun confiscation was bogus... but probably not unlawful since your step-dad (I think that's the relation.. apologies if I got it wrong) voluntarily surrendered them. I would hope that in his position I would have told them that they needed a warrant if they wanted to go in my gun safe... but for us law abiding types, it's a natural inclination for us to comply with authority - especially in a stressful situation... so I can certainly understand why he complied.
Best wishes for a good resolution of the situation.