Word: misdemeanor
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...pleaded guilty to misdemeanor ethics violations committed while serving as corrections commissioner; Kerik admitted accepting $165,000 in renovations to his Bronx apartment from a company accused of having ties to organized crime that sought city business. He paid $221,000 in fines, and under orders from Mayor Mike Bloomberg, his name was removed from the Bernard B. Kerik Complex, a Manhattan jail, which reverted to its original name, the Manhattan Detention Complex...
When Laurie, a 20-something saleswoman in Tampa, Fla., got pulled over this summer for a minor traffic violation, she (and the police officer) discovered that her driver's license had expired. She was arrested for that misdemeanor, was released and dutifully got her license renewed the next...
Among the many gray areas and judgment calls in law enforcement, disorderly conduct is one of the fuzziest. Just ask Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., arrested July 16 after yelling accusations of racism at an officer responding to a reported break-in at his home. Statutes outlining the misdemeanor are designed to help police maintain authority, and they are broadly worded; deciding what constitutes disorderly conduct is typically at an officer's discretion...
...enforcement, there are few situations that are clear-cut, and disorderly conduct is one of the fuzziest. As Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. now knows all too well, the misdemeanor charge can be used to corral people who are simply uncooperative or rude. State statutes are designed to help police officers maintain authority, and they are so broadly worded that divining what constitutes disorderly conduct is left up to the discretion of individual officers. "It's probably the most abused statute in America," says Eugene O'Donnell, a professor of law and police studies at John Jay College...
...many vacant storefronts lining Center Avenue. They said they were afraid they might be picked up by the police and tossed in jail. They laughed with some relief when reminded that the closest lockup, Big Horn County Jail, was now so overcrowded that it was turning away misdemeanor offenders...