Criminal Law and Procedure (NY Penal Law and CPL)
Criminal Law and Procedure tests the line between lawful street action and suppression. The lieutenant must supervise stops, arrests, searches, and interrogations so that officers can articulate facts, not conclusions.
New York framework
- People v. De Bour supplies four levels: request for information, common-law inquiry, forcible stop, and arrest. Each level needs corresponding facts.
- CPL 140.10 governs warrantless arrest authority; CPL 140.20 governs post-arrest processing.
- Penal Law Article 35 governs use of force, including deadly physical force.
- Miranda applies to custodial interrogation; custody and interrogation are separate questions.
- CPL 710 motions challenge suppression; the officer's contemporaneous documentation is the defense.
Supervisory review
Ask: What was the predicate? What was the scope? What changed? Was the search incident to arrest, consent, plain view, or exigency? Did the officer create the exigency?
Worked example: An officer stops a man based on an anonymous tip that he is carrying a gun. The officer immediately handcuffs and searches him, finding a firearm. The lieutenant should not approve the arrest merely because the gun is real. Under De Bour, a forcible stop requires reasonable suspicion, and the tip's reliability and corroboration matter. The lieutenant should review the DD5, the radio run, and the officer's specific observations, then consult the legal bureau or district attorney if the predicate is thin. The arrest may be lawful, but the supervisor must be able to articulate why.
Traps
- Equating a stop with an arrest.
- Approving a search because it produced evidence.
- Ignoring custodial interrogation before Miranda.
- Failing to separate the arrest decision from the use-of-force review.