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California Police Informant Tips can be Unreliable

By Walin & Klarich

What If The Police Used An Informant In My Case? What Can My Criminal Defense Attorney Do? Before a police officer can stop a person, they must have reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is occurring. One way in which police can get reasonable suspicion is through informants? tips. Sometimes, people will inform the police about suspected criminal activity. These tips must be sufficiently reliable in order for the police to have reasonable suspicion based upon them. In Florida v. J.L., the United States Supreme Court held that an anonymous tip saying that the defendant was in possession of a firearm was not sufficiently reliable. The tip provided no predictive information and therefore left the police without means to test the informant's knowledge or credibility...continue to full post

Full post as published by Southern California Criminal Defense Blog on April 13, 2009 (boomark / email).