Summary
In Ohio v. Anderson, 46 Ohio St.2d 219, decided by the Supreme Court of Ohio on May 12, 1976, the Court held that a police officer who had pursued a traffic offender outside of the city limits had the right to arrest an intruder who attempted to interfere with the traffic arrest.
Summary of this case from City v. WasonOpinion
No. 75-887
Decided May 12, 1976.
Criminal law — Obstructing official business and resisting arrest — R.C. 2921.31 and 2921.33 — Violations established, when — Interference with valid policeman-arrestee relationship.
APPEAL from the Court of Appeals for Butler County.
On April 21, 1974, at approximately 2:30 a.m., patrolman William Barnickel of the city of Hamilton police department observed a black Ford being operated at over 80 miles per hour within the city limits. With officer Barnickel in pursuit, the auto headed south on Hamilton-Cleves Road (State Route 128), made a u-turn, headed north on Route 128, and then turned right on Flamingo Drive into Sharon Park, which is just outside the Hamilton city limits, and stopped in front of the residence of Thomas M. Anderson, the passenger in the Ford and appellant herein.
The driver, Gary Hubbard, alighted from his car to speak with the policeman, and officer Barnickel describes the events which followed:
"As I was talking to Mr. Hubbard and advising him what I was going to cite him for and what I was going to do, Mr. Anderson came up and said that I had no jurisdiction because I was out of the city of Hamilton, and he kept telling his buddy to not let me do this to him and that, that I had no right. I told Mr. Anderson to go back to his car, that I didn't want no trouble. He kept on, and he kept on, and he said, you have no right; and at this time, Mr. Hubbard, he started getting a little huffy. I took Mr. Hubbard back to the cruiser; I sat in the cruiser: Mr. Hubbard sat on the passenger's side. I was filling out the citation for unsafe vehicle, and Mr. Anderson came up, stuck his head in the window, kept telling me that I had no right to do this and I had no right to cite the man because I was out of the city. I advised him again that the violation was observed in the city of Hamilton, and I could chase him anywhere I wanted to. He kept on; I told him to go back to the car; he refused; kept on; I got out of the police cruiser; I said you're under arrest for obstructing a police officer in line of his duty; he said I'm not going with you because you're out of the city of Hamilton. I told him he was under arrest; he said I'm not going with you, you have no right to arrest me. I went to reach for him and he shoved me; I went to reach for him again and he shoved me again, at which time a scuffle ensued. We both got down on the ground and he was hitting me and I struck him and I finally subdued him."
Anderson was charged with and pleaded "not guilty" to assault (R.C. 2903.13), obstructing official business (R.C. 2921.31) and resisting arrest (R.C. 2921.33). The trial court found Anderson guilty of the latter two counts and merged the first count into the last count.
The Court of Appeals affirmed that judgment after rejecting Anderson's assignments of error, which read:
"1. A municipal police officer has no right to make an arrest for a misdemeanor committed outside of the territory limits of the municipality for which the officer serves without a warrant.
"2. The judgment is against the manifest weight of the evidence and contrary to law."
This court allowed a motion to certify the record.
Mr. Gerald L. Pater, prosecuting attorney, for appellee.
Messrs. Holbrock, Jonson, Bressler Houser and Mr. H.J. Bressler, for appellant.
Although some authority exists to support appellant's proposition that a municipal police officer lacks authority outside of the municipality which he serves to make a warrantless arrest for the commission of a misdemeanor, this court has had no occasion to decide that question.
In obiter dicta, the opinion in Fairborn v. Munkus (1971), 28 Ohio St.2d 207, 209, reads: "The general common-law rule is that the power of a municipal police officer is limited to the boundaries of his municipality, and that he may not, even with a warrant, make an arrest outside his territory for a misdemeanor." See, also, State v. Vanbarg (1975), 44 Ohio Misc. 11; State v. Elder (1953), 67 Ohio Law Abs. 385; Opinions of Attorney General (1974), No. 74-094. But, cf., R.C. 737.19, which authorizes a village marshal to "pursue and arrest any person fleeing from justice in any part of the state," and R.C. 2935.30, which gives a municipal police officer "of another state" certain arrest powers when in "fresh pursuit" of a person believed to have committed a felony.
The question will remain open however because appellant has not presented it in a posture susceptible to adjudication.
Appellant's motion for dismissal was overruled by the court upon a holding that officer Barnickel's attempted arrest of Hubbard was lawful. The Court of Appeals agreed that "the arrest of Hubbard in St. Clair Township was a legal arrest."
The court states:
"The officer was in pursuit; the officer had a right to make the arrest after he was pursuing him [Hubbard] for offenses which occurred within the city of Hamilton. And it's my opinion that anyone obstructing that arrest under the state law, the officer would, also, be entitled to arrest him. * * *
"* * *
"Well, I'm going to hold * * * [where] a police officer is lawfully chasing a person for an offense which occurred in his community that if at the end of the chase someone tries to interfere with him arresting that man, he is violating the law. And I hold that."
Appellant has not directly appealed or challenged those findings, but argues, in effect, that once officer Barnickel was outside of the city of Hamilton he ceased to be a policeman with respect to Anderson. Such argument fails to recognize that the offenses for which Anderson was charged and convicted arose out of Anderson's interference with a concededly valid policeman-arrestee relationship.
The record adequately establishes a violation of R.C. 2921.31, that appellant obstructed official business, and of R.C. 2921.33, that appellant did "interfere with a lawful arrest of himself or another."
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is affirmed.
Judgment affirmed.
O'NEILL, C.J., HERBERT, STERN and W. BROWN, JJ., concur.
CELEBREZZE, J., concurs in the judgment.
CORRIGAN and P. BROWN, JJ., dissent.
Absent statutory authorization, an arrest without a warrant for the commission of a misdemeanor, committed in his presence but not within the municipal limits which he serves, cannot be made by a police officer outside the corporate boundaries of the municipality which he serves.