Opinion ID: 1655478
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The lawfulness of the initial arrest

Text: ¶ 11. The first motion to suppress claimed that the initial arrest was unlawful, and as such, all evidence collected afterward should be excluded. As evidence of the arrest's unlawfulness, Jones points to the fact that all misdemeanor charges stemming from the initial arrest were later dismissed by the Justice Court of Hinds County. The dismissals were not allowed to be entered into evidence at trial, and Jones claims this also constitutes reversible error. ¶ 12. Jones cites Pollard v. State, 233 So.2d 792 (Miss.1970), as authority for his position that the initial arrest was unlawful. Pollard was convicted of assault with a deadly weapon stemming from a chase and shootout with an off-duty police officer. Id. at 793. However, the conviction was later overturned when it was determined that the officer did not have sufficient probable cause to approach the subject's vehicle when initiating the arrest. Id. We concluded that any evidence of resisting the unlawful arrest should be excluded. Id. However, Pollard is not analogous to the present case because in Pollard the officer initiated the contact and in the case at bar Jones initiated the contact and asked Newman to approach the truck. More germane to the case at bar is Terry v. State, 252 Miss. 479, 173 So.2d 889 (1965). In that case, officers initiated an arrest with no evidence of a crime. The sheriff had no right to arrest defendant unless it was evident to him at the time that some breach of the peace was being threatened or a crime was being committed in his presence. Terry, 173 So.2d at 891. The threshold question is whether Newman had probable cause to initiate an arrest. No one from the convenience store asked that Jones be removed. A determination of when the arrest began controls the outcome on this issue. From the evidence, it appears as though Deputy Newman tried to initiate an arrest before a crime had been committed by asking Jones to get out of his vehicle merely because Jones would not leave the convenience store. ¶ 13. The only acts Jones engaged in before the arrest, according to the record, which could possibly have warranted an arrest consisted of his profane remarks. There is no evidence in the record that would suggest that Jones could have initially been arrested for anything other than the verbally accusatory and profane remarks. The evidence suggests that Newman did not see the guns or inquire about the guns until after Newman told Jones he was under arrest. This situation forces this Court to consider the type of profanity which would warrant an arrest. Miss.Code Ann. § 97-29-47 (2000) proscribes the use of profanity in a public place. We have not had an opportunity to interpret the statute; however, the Mississippi Court of Appeals has recently had an occasion to define what it believes the use of profanity sufficient to warrant an arrest entails. ¶ 14. In Brendle v. City of Houston, 759 So.2d 1274 (Miss.Ct.App. 2000), Brendle was convicted of public profanity under Miss.Code. Ann. § 97-29-47 and resisting arrest. The Court of Appeals noted that it has been over 70 years since this Court has addressed the issue of what constitutes profanity and that we have not had an opportunity to interpret Mississippi's profanity statute. The Court of Appeals relied on other jurisdictions and the United State Supreme Court opinion of Cohen v. California 403 U.S. 15, 91 S.Ct. 1780, 29 L.Ed.2d 284 (1971), in overturning Brendle's conviction. The Court of Appeals found that Brendle did not use fighting words that would incite violence and therefore his subsequent arrest was not lawful. 759 So.2d at 1284. However, this Court is now reluctant to adopt the reasoning of the Court of Appeals under these facts, and finds the reasoning in Terry v. State to be dispositive of this issue. Based upon a careful review of the record, this Court finds that Deputy Newman, did not have sufficient evidence to believe that a breach of the peace was being threatened or a crime was about to be committed. Accordingly, all evidence of acts of resisting the unlawful arrest should be excluded.