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One thing it doesn't clear up for me is whether you can invoke the fifth amendment even in cases where there is not a specific crime you might incriminate yours
by hamburglar 11y ago
One thing it doesn't clear up for me is whether you can invoke the fifth amendment even in cases where there is not a specific crime you might incriminate yourself with. "Could your answer make it look like you committed a crime?" Considering that I have been advised that anything I say may be used against me, I would think that the answer to this question is inherently yes, even if I can't actually imagine how it might be used to incriminate me. Can I invoke the fifth simply on the principle of playing it extremely safe?
- nabla9 11y agoYou spotted the weak link in this flowchart: "Could YOUR answer (or silence) be used to make it look like YOU committed a CRIME". There is no way to know. When cop comes and casually talks to you, he may not even consider you a suspect until later. If you follow the watertight route, you may never talk to police: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wXkI4t7nuc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wXkI4t7nuc You must have constant adversary attitude towards police asking questions in every situation. In practice people never do that and usually nothing bad happens, but still... It's part of the good police work to be casual and make people feel that people are jerks if they don't cooperate.