Resisting Has to Involve Use of Force or Violence
Video Transcribed: Hi, I’m Stuart Ericson, an attorney in Wagoner County, and today we’re going to talk about resisting an officer, and resisting arrest.
It is a misdemeanor and carries a punishment of up to one year in county jail and fines. The elements, first of all, it’s found in Title 21 of the Oklahoma law, section 268 is resisting. And the elements are a knowing, purposeful use of force or violence to resist a police officer in the performance of their duties.
So a knowing use of force to prevent them from performing their duties. Usually, this arises in a resisting arrest, where you’re being placed under arrest and the officer say, is trying to handcuff a person and they push, kick, shove, or fight the officer to try to prevent themselves from being handcuffed. That is obviously would be a resisting arrest type of situation, because you are using force or violence to try to resist having the handcuffs placed on your wrists.
As with everything, everything is facts driven. You’d have to look in, is it a lawful arrest? An unlawful arrest? What are those facts? Did you know it was a police officer or not? Just everything in the law is fact-driven, so it’s always wise to hire a defense attorney if you’re charged, get all the police reports, and see what the state of Oklahoma is actually alleging. And then I would talk to you, my client, and see what the facts are and if there are any other witnesses to this before deciding anything. That is the wise course of action.
So anyway, that is in a nutshell what resisting an officer is in the state of Oklahoma. So if you have any questions about that, reach out to me, Oklahoma misdemeanor defense lawyer Stuart Ericson, at wagnerlawyer.com.
