Charlotte DWI Lawyer and Winner of The Charlotte Observer’s 2013 Best Charlotte Lawyer Award Brad Smith of Arnold & Smith, PLLC answers the question: Should I talk to the police?
Question: "Should I talk to the police?"
Brad Smith:
The Fifth Amendment protects you against any sort of self-incrimination.
Should you talk to the police without a lawyer present, or without somebody there, present, to attest to what was said and what happened? And the answer is no.
Asking to have an attorney present before you agree to talk to law enforcement does not mean that you are guilty of something.
Because you exercise your constitutional right to have an attorney present doesn’t mean that you are basically insinuating, or that there is an insinuation that you are guilty of a criminal offense. It’s just protecting your rights.
Your right to remain silent is something that can never be used against you in a court room. So if you choose not to answer a police officer’s question, if you choose not to sit down with them without an attorney present and answer their questions, is that something that can be used in a courtroom in your trial? And it’s not.
Because, every person, every individual has the Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination so the constitution protects you against answering any questions that a police officer has.