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The study appears to be using "arrested" to mean "convicted of a crime for which the person could have been arrested (taken in to police custody)"? Example: I have never been arrested/taken in to police custody but, I was convicted of providing alcohol to minors at a college party and, had I not willingly taken the citation from the officer or, had I been belligerent and uncooperative, I could have been arrested. Technically, you could argue while the officer was issuing me the citation I was under some sort of arrest, but that does not comport with either the legal notion of being under arrest or what most people think of as being under arrest.* Given the journal, that seems like an odd error to make. I could have that wrong, but it would make sense given that article specifically mentions truancy and underage drinking, two charges which seldom result in arrest. Maybe that makes the statistic a little less shocking to those surprised by the number? Again, I certainly could be wrong, but it really would be surprising if the 40% refers to people actually having been read Miranda rights, hand cuffed, placed in a police car, etcetera. Even for other common crimes for that age group, like possession (generally marijuana), usually a citation is issued and the drugs are seized but no arrest is made. This is all said from the perspective of a judicial clerk in Portland, Oregon, who works a lot with the dockets related to citations related to minor misdemeanor offenses. Perhaps it is different in other states. Anecdotally: almost everyone I know well has been convicted of a misdemeanor of some sort for which they could have been arrested but only one person I know has ever been taken in to police custody. * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrest#United_States_2 |
No, it uses it to mean arrested.
> Example: I have never been arrested/taken in to police custody but, I was convicted of providing alcohol to minors at a college party and, had I not willingly taken the citation from the officer or, had I been belligerent and uncooperative, I could have been arrested.
Legally, a citation issued for a crime is a non-custodial arrest. [1]
> Technically, you could argue while the officer was issuing me the citation I was under some sort of arrest, but that does not comport with either the legal notion of being under arrest or what most people think of as being under arrest.
No, it comports quite exactly with the legal notion of arrest, which can either be non-custodial (the type you report having experienced) or custodial (the type which tends to involve handcuffs.) To the extent the Wikipedia article you cite is inconsistent with that (and you seem to have linked to an irrelevant section of the article, though I do so material earlier which, though it is inaccurate, supports your presentation), it is simply wrong.
[1] See, e.g., http://www.waprosecutors.org/manuals/search/May%202012%20%20.... @ p. 252: "A non-custodial arrest occurs where the defendant is issued a citation for a criminal offense at the scene of a stop."