Legal Question in Criminal Law in Michigan

For information about Michigan criminal offenses, go to:

www.AggressiveCriminalDefense.com

If this happened in the course of an office investigating a violation of the motor vehicle code, and the person gave false information about identification when the person had a legal obligation to do so (such as the driver, or a passenger being ticketed for No Seat Belt), then MCL 257.324 may have been violated. This carries up to 90 days jail and/or $100 fine.

In other situations where the motor vehicle code is not being investigated, it's harder to answer your question because there may not be a legal obligation to give police information then. But, it is possible that the person could be charged with common law Obstruction of Justice, which is a felony carrying up to 5 years in prison and/or $10,000 fine. It's also possible that a charge of "Resisting/Obstructing/Hindering a Police Officer" could be charged (a 2 yr and/or $2,000 fine felony), but some cases have said that R&O applies to physical interference, not "verbally throwing a monkey wrench into the investigation".

The better solution is to either tell the police only the truth, or not talk to police at all.