Have you ever been arrested?

Clarky

Nikko said:

Not a pleasant experience being handcuffed and stuffed into the back of a Police car. Thankfully its never happened since.

I was spared the whole handcuffs thing
I think it was because when I was arrested I was calm and cooperative
It seemed to me that resisting against half a dozen police would be pointless and wouldn't make things any better for me..
that evening I'd just been in a fight [which I didn't start btw] and I didn't want to make things worse
I spent a night in the cells.. which is a fkn dreadful experience.. the boredom is right off the scale
I wasn't prosecuted and let go the next afternoon
I hope I never get to go through that again.. it's really not nice

Fatfingers

I was in 2008. I was living with a woman I now recognise as having psychopathic tendencies. In plain speak, she's a loon. She was also violent, and hit me several times during the six years I was with her (I know, why didn't I leave? Three years of therapy later I know the answer to that, but that's another story).

Anyway, it seems that having spent all my money she'd decided it was time to move on, so a few weeks before the evening of my arrest, she went to the police and told them she was in a violent relationship. This was true – she just omitted to tell them that she was the violent party.

On the evening in question I could tell she was looking for a fight but I didn't want to know, so refused to bite. She got increasingly angry and ended up taking the four cans of beer I'd just come back from the shop with and pouring them down the sink, one by one. In the end I tried to stop her, the can ripped and cut my hand. She screamed, hit me and called the police.

I was arrested, stuck in a cell and at first I said I didn't need a lawyer - naively believing that being totally innocent was enough to get me out of there. However, an hour later - this was about 8-30pmish - I asked to see one.

It's a long story but the cops 'forgot' to get me one till 8am the next morning. Within 10 minutes of seeing her I was released without charge. And told I couldn't go home as there was a good chance she'd accuse me again, at which point the police would have to arrest me again. So having spent a night in a police cell, I was no effectively homeless too. With an 8-year-old daughter.

Before they stuck me in the cell they took my belt, shoes and watch. There was no natural light in the cell so I had absolutely no idea what the time was. All in all it was a thoroughly unpleasant experience. Oh - and they took a sample of my DNA too. I remember them asking me if I'd consent to it and I initially refused. The copper said, 'if you don't we'll just restrain you and take one anyway.' I asked him whether he'd ever read 1984. He looked at me blankly. 

After officially complaining I got a written apology from the police for their failure to provide a lawyer within a reasonable timeframe, but the arrest would still happen today. Basically, if a woman accuses a bloke of violence the police arrest the bloke on the basis that if they don't, he might kill her.

It's a good game played slowly, as my Dad used to say.

menamestom

No.  I had a couple of cautions as a teenager but no arrest.  I did once get stopped and searched with a group of people on Snake Pass.  A copper was convinced I had drugs and searched my bag in the boot of the car.  When he put his hand in the front pocket I confessed to having a small amount of weed and gave it him.  He thanked me for my honesty and threw it in the bushes at the side of the road and then let us on our way.  Fortunately he didn't feel the bag in the front pocket, his fingers must have been close, but I was lucky, had he touched them I would most certainly been arrested. 

Snap

no, and don't plan to either. Not big not clever. Not something I want to have on my life roster really. Just realised, I came very near to it in Moscow a couple of years ago. HOw I avoided it, I don't really know, but getting into a tangle with Russian police was bleeding scary.

Fatfingers

I wasn't planning to, I can assure you. And I don't think it was big or clever. As I said, it was thoroughly unpleasant.

dogload

Major criminal, me!
I got picked up after jumping the police-patrolled Metro barrier in a fit of drunken exuberance having dodged the fare. And I would've gotten away with it, were it not for the fact that I suddenly remembered I was with the then-girlfriend and another couple. Oops!
So, ended up getting lifted and carted off, pockets emptied, shoelaces removed and popped into a cell where I fell asleep. Meanwhile upstairs my friends were pleading my good character and I was released a short while later. Got a finger-wagging from the cops and a serious bollocking from my mates and a super-serious bollocking from the GF. Even more so when I said I'd fallen asleep.

Tuscan777

I haven't but the previous drummer in my band had. He spent 18 months in prison for fraud related charges and went inside whilst I was in the band with him.

The most bizarre part for me was that he was clearly guitly (CCTV footage etc) but others in the band decided we should cover him via deps until he was released when he promptly re-joined.

It was a strange thing, I have always been a normal, law-abiding chap, but something really stuck in my throat about playing with a convicted criminal. I still can't put my finger on it, maybe I was just a pious twit!

Nikko

dogload said:

Major criminal, me!
I got picked up after jumping the police-patrolled Metro barrier in a fit of drunken exuberance having dodged the fare. And I would've gotten away with it, if it wasn't for those meddling kids!
So, ended up getting lifted and carted off, pockets emptied, shoelaces removed and popped into a cell where I fell asleep. Meanwhile upstairs my friends were pleading my good character and I was released a short while later. Got a finger-wagging from the cops and a serious bollocking from my mates and a super-serious bollocking from the GF. Even more so when I said I'd fallen asleep.

FTFY

lasermonkey

I was arrested many years ago, as someone I was with had a bit of pot on him, though the rest of us didn't. Ended up down the local nick for four hours and was asked a lot of questions before I was released without charge.
I was somewhat shocked by how much they knew about me: where I went and who my friends were. Back in the early/mid 80s, anyone in my town who looked a little different was stopped and searched. I had a fabulously spiky barnet at the time, so I used to get searched every time I went into town. During the questioning, one of the CID guys mentioned that I looked familiar. When I replied that I wasn't surprised, seeing as they stopped and searched me every time I left my house, he said he'd see to it that it wouldn't happen again. I was only stopped and searched on one more occasion after that.

axisus

I stole a pencil from my job once, but I got away with it. I do worry when a police car follows me though

fretmeister

As a teenager I was once spoken to very harshly by a German Policeman.

He was massive. Bike cop, all the leathers, gun, etc etc. I was a skinny 14 year old.

Apparently I should not have been loudly humming *THAT* tune while standing on the Möhne dam.

TheBlueWolf

I've been arrested more times than I've had hot dinners and been to prison twice. I'm not proud of that either, I was an idiot.

speshul91

A few arrests and an 8 month stretch at her majestys pleasure. 

lloyd

A few times, mostly for acting the cock while young(ish) and drunk and drug offences.

Avoided any kind of trouble for around 8 years now-I'm 35, which gives me some hope that I'm "growing up"

ronnyb

I've been arrested quite a few times but only in training exercises! Since then I've been the 'arrester' more times than I can remember.

mgaw

I have been arrested about 200 times in the last 8 years all by the same policewoman...always happens at night always the same, she comes upto me, no matter how well behved i have been.  Gives me a stern talking to, cuffs me then takes my clothes off ready for the cells.......i then get dragged away protesting loudly whilst she slowly sheds her uniform....f##kin police harassment if you ask me

ronnyb

ronnyb said:

I've been arrested quite a few times but only in training exercises! Since then I've been the 'arrester' more times than I can remember.

I should add that contrary to what a lot of people think I never got a buzz out of arresting anybody, it was just a job that paid the mortgage. I genuinely felt sorry for a lot of them who were probably decent people who had made one mistake in life. That is apart from the bad uns who deserved all they got. 

TheOtherDennis

Yes, once.

When I was growing up in Scotland, we used to get the train into Glasgow. We'd sometimes buy tickets, sometimes not - the ticket collectors at Queen St station had a thing going where you'd say "Charing Cross" (the station before Queen St) and give him 10p, and that'd be it. All the ticket collectors would put the money into a big pot, at the end of the week, they'd divvy the total up evenly between all the collectors.

So, I come down to England to college, naively try the same thing, instantly get my collar felt, fined what was then a colossal £25 and a conviction for fraud that I had to declare on insurance and other docs for 10 years.

Only ever been stopped for speeding since, and only convicted of that once (two awareness classes, though, which I don't think is too bad for over half a million miles in 28 years).

With apologies to @ronnyb, cos I know not all cops are like this, but this one most assuredly was...

Me and the OH were in Wales on holiday in 1995, and got a bit lost. Whilst arguing about where we were and where we were actually going (as opposed to where we thought we were going), the OH suddenly yells "Stop!!" I look up and see a cop by the other side of the road holding his hands up. It seems whilst arguing, we'd missed a 30 sign about fifty yards back. There was a national speed limit sign about 100 yards further on, and about 4 houses between the two. Apparently, it was an infamous hunting spot for the local traffic plod.

So I stop, obviously. As he's crossing the road with the gun, I can see the readout on the back saying 45.8 (it was dead easy to read upside down). I now know I'm bang to rights and haven't a leg to stand on. He says, all patronisingly charmless copper, "Excuse me sir, do you know what speed you were doing there?" I reply, er, something approaching 45.8 mph? "Jesus wept, how the hell did you know that?!"

I just rolled my eyes, and get out, as instructed, and get the lecture. "Yes I know, but I don't normally speed, I'm not like that, we missed the sign because we're lost and were looking elsewhere etc etc" but got the pointless bollocks "Ah yes but if you had have been going that fast...." But I wasn't. "Yes but if you had..." But I wasn't. "Yes but if you had..." I just sighed. He then said "Do you have anything else to say?" I was so hacked off with the pompous little shit I couldn't stop myself. As deadpan as I could manage, in a completely flat, emotionless voice I said "Erm, you'll never take me alive you bastard? No? How about it's a fair cop I'll come quietly? Don't like that either? Erm...I'll get you for this you slag? No, ah well, in that case, nope, nothing else to add, officer."

He just looked at me. I held out my hand for the ticket, said "Can I go now then?" He turned around and walked off, so I did too.

octatonic

TheOtherDennis said:

I was so hacked off with the pompous little shit I couldn't stop myself. As deadpan as I could manage, in a completely flat, emotionless voice I said "Erm, you'll never take me alive you bastard? No? How about it's a fair cop I'll come quietly? Don't like that either? Erm...I'll get you for this you slag? No, ah well, in that case, nope, nothing else to add, officer."

He just looked at me. I held out my hand for the ticket, said "Can I go now then?" He turned around and walked off, so I did too.

LOL.
You'd be tased if you said that stuff now.

marcus449

My lawyers told me to be particularly suspicious about threads like these.