Legal Question in Civil Rights Law in Alabama

Wrongly accused of doing a gas drive-off

I bought gas at a store , paid for it and left i traveled about 14 miles to the next town and was stopped by the police and told that the clerk said i did a gas drive off . I was advised i would be arrested and my licensed suspended for stealing gas , the police advised me of this , i explained i had paid for my gas i was made to drive the 14 miles back to the store and there were lots of people in the store and when the police followed me in the store the clerk said she had made a mistake and that i had paid for my gas. Her mistake caused me to go 28 miles out of my way plus i was so humiliated and embarrassed. Can i file any kind of civil suit against this store for wrongly accusing me and causing me so much humiliation and embarrassment. Everytime i think of how i was done by the police and the store it upsets me , i have cried and been upset since it happened. She should have known for sure before she accused me, I have never been in anykind of trouble with the law and they tried to make me look like a thief.


Asked on 6/04/03, 5:40 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
Regina Mullen Legal Data Services, PLC

Re: Wrongly accused of doing a gas drive-off

The police are allowed to make reasonable "mistakes." If they forced you to drive back to the store, that's certainly a deprivation of freedom, but that's not the end of the story, because they were entitled to rely upon the store clerks description.

Citizens are allowed to report crimes that may be in error. You haven't given any other explanation for the error except that it was an error, so I don't sense any infringement on a protected right, even if all they had to do was check the security camera first. No court would require them to do that, I suspect.

However, since you were only made to drive 28 miles out of your way, and the matter resolved itself, I hate to say it, but there's little room for arguing liability here.

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Answered on 6/07/03, 4:49 pm


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