Legal Question in Criminal Law in Mississippi

Re: dropping charges

These are "State" (or City) charges to pursue, not "your charges" and the Deputy can cause a Subpoena to be issued to you to testify about the event and the admissions made by the culprit. In every case the State (or the City when it occurs within a Municipality) pushes the charges. We usually encounter this situation with respect to "Domestic Violence" charges where an offended spouse (usually the wife/girlfriend)asks the Prosecutor to drop the matter. Prosecutors almost universally ignore this plea and continue to pursue the matters for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that the offending party may have threatened to repeat the beating if she did not tell the Prosecutor to stop the proceedings.

You cannot control, nor should you, the institution of criminal process. If you do so and then decide to "settle the dispute" by receiving some type of compensation for dropping the charges it is evident that you brought the charges not to bring the offender to justice but to collect a debt owed to the business by the culprit arising out of his shoplifting or theft/embezzlement of the goods. You can be sued for this activity if you are not very careful. One cannot threaten criminal prosecution to collect a civil debt, even on a "bad check". I always recommend to my clients to file a lawsuit, even if it has to be filed in the Small Claim Court (i.e., Justice Court) and THEN file the criminal charges. Once the debt is collected you are free to tell the prosecutor that you have no interest in pursuit of the offender for the criminal matter but you CANNOT and NEVER SHOULD CONDITION DISMISSAL on receipt of some funds or some other compensation. This activity is called "malicious prosecution" in some instances and in most others it is known as "abuse of process" and the offender can sue you and your company for this activity. You should immediately consult your favorite qualified attorney to protect yourself from possible exposure to a huge lawsuit in this matter.