Rights During DC Cocaine Searches
Understanding your rights can help you protect them. This is especially true when you are suspected of possessing cocaine or other illicit substances. Therefore, if you have any questions, it is important to speak with an attorney about your rights during a DC cocaine search.
The most important thing to remember is that, if you are searched, you have the right to request an experienced attorney be present before you answer any questions. The sooner you have an attorney on your side, the sooner they can work to protect your rights and fight any offense you may be accused of.
How Do DC Police Treat Searches?
Police officers in DC take cocaine offenses seriously and actively look for ways to search people, their vehicles, and their homes to find cocaine and other types of controlled substances. For example, when a person is the subject of a traffic stop, it is common for a police officer to try to search the individual’s car or ask them to step out of the car to search their person for cocaine or other controlled substances.
Police officers may be extremely aggressive in conducting these searches which is why it is important for a person to know their rights at a traffic stop. For example, if someone is driving and is subjected to a traffic stop, it is lawful at that point for police officers to ask the person to get out of the car. The police do not need a reason to ask a person to get out of the car in any traffic stop, including minor traffic violations such as speeding. However, although an individual has to get out of the car if asked, they need to give consent for the police to be able to search their person or of their vehicle.
Because of the aggressiveness with which police officers pursue drugs such as cocaine and try to conduct searches in normal traffic stops, it is important for individuals to understand their rights. An attorney can help explain a person’s rights during a DC cocaine search.
Rights During Cocaine Investigations
If someone believes they might be investigated, arrested, or prosecuted for possession, distribution, or possession with intent to distribute cocaine, it is important they know is their rights when they are stopped and searched by the police. If an individual is stopped by the police, the first question to ask is whether they are being detained. If they are being detained, they have the ability to decline searches, decline to answer any questions, and ask for a lawyer and may be given a lawyer at the time.
It is possible that the police may search the individual and search their car anyway, but as long as they make it clear they do not consent to any searches and decline to answer any questions without the presence of a lawyer, they have asserted their fundamental constitutional rights. Any search conducted after a person declines can later be challenged by a defense lawyer. Every person in that circumstance should assert their rights during a DC cocaine search regardless of what action the police may subsequently take.
Understand Your Rights During DC Cocaine Searches
When a police officer pulls you over, it is important to know and assert your rights. These rights include the right to a lawyer, the right to not consent to a search, and the right to remain silent. Although not giving consent to a search may not prevent you from being searched and detained, it can be used as a defense later on. To further understand your rights during a DC cocaine search, call a knowledgeable attorney for a free consultation.