Local defense attorneys spoke to roughly 120 high school students Wednesday about their Miranda rights, along with what to do — and what they’re legally not allowed to do — when in police custody.
Amanda Meadows, president of the Lowndes County Bar Association and a local defense attorney, has seen many people serve jail time for crimes they didn’t commit simply by not knowing what not to say to police. For National Law Week and since May 6 marks the fiftieth anniversary of Miranda vs. Arizona, Meadows and several other local legal experts reached out to high school principals in the area and offered to come talk to students about Miranda rights and other legal topics.
New Hope High School principal Matt Smith responded enthusiastically to Meadows’ offer. It’s important to have local professionals in to speak to students about what they do, he said, and it’s particularly helpful in the era of the Ferguson riots and other criminal rights controversies that students understand their rights.
“Adults make the assumption that kids know (their rights),” he said. “And they don’t always know.”
Meadows and youth court public defender David Owen both spoke to the 11th graders in U.S. history classes at the school. Between the two of them, they spoke to three different classes with, Meadows estimated, about 40 kids each.
In the lectures, they explained about how legal rights developed in the United States, beginning with the Bill of Rights and getting into specific Supreme Court cases such as Brown v. State of Mississippi, Gideon v. Wainwright and of course Miranda v. Arizona.
Owens and Meadows explained to the students what these court rulings meant for them — how people in custody don’t have to incriminate themselves to police, how a confession obtained in police custody can be thrown out if the police haven’t read suspects their “Miranda Rights” and what constitutes police custody.
They explained to the students that even 16 — and 17-year-old kids can be charged as adults if the crimes are serious enough, but that they can ask their parents be present if they end up in police custody. And people in police custody should always ask for a lawyer, Meadows said.
They also talked to students about things like being careful who they spend time with and watching what they put on social media. Meadows told the students stories of people she has defended who look guilty of crimes they didn’t commit because they loaned their friends a gun that was used in a murder or because they posted pictures of themselves on Facebook flashing gang signs.
That’s why it’s important for teenagers to know about the legal system and how it works, Meadows said.
“They don’t think of the far-reaching implications of doing stupid stuff,” she said.
The students asked questions ranging from whether or not it is legal to film police to whether or not police with a warrant searching for one thing could make an arrest if they found something else illegal.
Students Cheyanne Allred and Meredith Woolbright said that before Meadows’ talk they knew a little about their Miranda rights.
“I was familiar with the gist of it because of our government class and crime shows,” Allred said.
But neither had known many of the details that Meadows got into. Allred was interested in how police obtained warrants and hadn’t realized that they don’t always need much evidence to go to a judge. Woolbright hadn’t known that defense attorneys don’t get to argue before Grand Juries.
Meadows also urged the students to register to vote when they turn 18 and added that registering will also make them eligible for jury duty, which will teach them more about the legal process. Voting and becoming an active citizen will also give them more opportunities to change the system if they dislike something about it, she said.
“If all of us hold the system accountable, it can only get better,” she said.
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