Legal Question in Criminal Law in California

Re: Can I be arrested for a warrent that was never mailed to me?

Arrest warrants are always executed in person and are never mailed beforehand. Because arrests are often urgent matters of public safety, it would make no sense to require the police to wait a few days for the postal service to deliver a warrant before they could make an arrest. Besides, many defendants would go into hiding if they knew ahead of time that the police would be coming for them.

For the same reasons, it is also quite normal for police to put a suspect in jail even if he only learned of the accusation when he was arrested. There is nothing "extreme" about it.

Granted, the officer should not have put you in jail and did so only because he misread the warrant. It sounds like this was an honest mistake and it also sounds like the officer recognized his error and released you after only a short time. Such things happen, unfortunately, and there isn't much you can do about it.

Re: Can I be arrested for a warrent that was never mailed to me?

Thank you for your posting. If you have an arrest warrant, especially a felony warrant, you can be arrested anytime, anyplace. To be booked and released, you have to technically be taken into custody (meaning arrested), and then released after your fingerprints, photo, and other data is taken from you and entered into the state database.

Regarding the detective reading the wrong code section, only what the prosecutor (District or City Attorney) files against you is what is important. The detective, while a witness, is not the one bringing the charges -- the prosecutor is, and what charges they bring control, not what the detective read to you.

I hope that this information helps, but if you want more information, have further questions, or feel that you need legal representation, please feel free to email me directly at [email protected]. It's my pleasure to assist you in any way that I can.