In this essay I would be answering the questions of whether officer jones had probable cause to arrest xaiver falsely and if officer smith used excessive force during the arrest. I will also be touching the legal standard for analyzing a false arrest and excessive force claim under the 4th Amendment in this essay.
False Arrest
False arrest is when a person says he/she was held against their will in custody without probable cause, or without a warrant. An arrest is subject to the Fourth Amendment constitutional requirement that it be reasonable under the circumstances. In order to be found guilty of false arrest, the officer must act beyond the reach of their powers. For example, if someone lied to the police in a statement and mentioned another person in that statement, telling the police that the person mentioned was guilty of a crime. If the police arrested…show more content… Therefore it was reasonable to believe Xavier was Dante. Xavier was wearing similar clothing had similar height and body build to Dante, and to top it all off he was running. This made Officer Jones believe he was the suspect he was chasing earlier.
I understand some people might say officer jones should have believed xavier when he said he didn’t do anything, there was no way officer jones would believe him. Lots of criminals would do the same thing. In order for xavier to sue officer jones for false arrest, he must find that his arrest was unreasonable.
A Judge presiding over this case should take a look at the case Brown v. New York, where the court came to this conclusion in regards to false arrest, “Nevertheless, we agree with the District Court that the false arrest claim was defeated by the officers' qualified immunity claim, although we reach that conclusion by a different route than that taken by the District