5 Tricky Questions Cops Ask and How to Answer Them Effectively

If you’re ever pulled over by police, it’s impor­tant to know what to expect and how to han­dle the sit­u­a­tion. The first thing that comes to mind for most peo­ple is prob­a­bly “Am I going to get arrest­ed?” But before you can answer that ques­tion, there are some oth­er things you need to consider:

What kind of crime did I com­mit?
How much does it cost if I’m con­vict­ed of this crime?
Will my insur­ance rates go up if I’m con­vict­ed of this crime?
These are all ques­tions that will help deter­mine whether or not it’s worth fight­ing your tick­et in court (or even pay­ing it). The last thing any­one wants is a crim­i­nal record or high­er insur­ance pre­mi­ums because they did­n’t know how much trou­ble they were get­ting them­selves into when they got pulled over by police officers!

Ques­tion 1: Have You Been Drinking?

Have you been drink­ing?
This is a tricky ques­tion because it’s not ille­gal to drink alco­hol. How­ev­er, if you answer “yes” and the cop believes that your abil­i­ty to dri­ve safe­ly is impaired by your con­sump­tion of alco­hol, then he or she can arrest you for drunk dri­ving. If you answer “no” and then fail the breath­a­lyz­er test (or any oth­er test), then the cop will prob­a­bly arrest you any­way. So what do we do?
The best thing to do when asked this ques­tion is remain silent until an attor­ney has been con­sult­ed and advice giv­en on how best to pro­ceed in answer­ing ques­tions from police offi­cers with­out incrim­i­nat­ing your­self or mak­ing things worse for your­self by say­ing some­thing stu­pid like “I only had one beer.”

Ques­tion 2: Where Were You Going?

This is a tricky ques­tion because it can be used to trick you into incrim­i­nat­ing your­self. For exam­ple, if you were dri­ving over the speed lim­it and get pulled over by police, they might ask “Where were you going?” If you say some­thing like “I was just run­ning some errands,” then they might ask what those errands were and where they took place. This will lead them down the road toward find­ing out that you were speed­ing and break­ing oth­er traf­fic laws along the way (and pos­si­bly even get­ting arrest­ed).
So how should we answer this ques­tion? It depends on your sit­u­a­tion: if there’s noth­ing ille­gal about where we’re going or why we’re going there (like pick­ing up gro­ceries), then we should sim­ply say so–but only after mak­ing sure not to give any oth­er infor­ma­tion about our destination!

Ques­tion 3: What Were You Doing There?

This is a tricky ques­tion, because you don’t want to give away too much infor­ma­tion. If the cop asks you what were you doing there, he’s try­ing to fig­ure out if there was any­thing ille­gal going on in that loca­tion or if there was some­thing sus­pi­cious about your pres­ence there. You should answer this ques­tion by say­ing some­thing like “I don’t know,” or “I just hap­pened to be pass­ing by.” Don’t say any­thing else unless they ask anoth­er ques­tion like “Why did you stop?”

Ques­tion 4: Do You Have Any Drugs or Weapons?
This ques­tion is tricky because the police offi­cer has no legal right to search your car with­out a war­rant. The only way for him or her to legal­ly do so is if he has prob­a­ble cause, which means that he thinks you have drugs or weapons in the vehi­cle. If you answer this ques­tion wrong and say “no,” then it can be used against you lat­er when they try to search your car with­out prob­a­ble cause (and there­fore ille­gal­ly).
If, how­ev­er, you answer this ques­tion cor­rect­ly by say­ing “yes” and show them that there are no drugs or weapons in the vehicle–and if they don’t find any dur­ing their search–then there will be no prob­lem at all!

Ques­tion 5: What’s Your Name?

“What’s your name?“
This is a tricky ques­tion because it can lead to you giv­ing away infor­ma­tion that could be used against you. For exam­ple, if the police ask for your name and date of birth and then run a back­ground check on those details, they may find out that there’s an out­stand­ing war­rant for your arrest or some oth­er inci­dent in which law enforce­ment has been involved with your iden­ti­ty. If this hap­pens, the police will have prob­a­ble cause for arrest­ing you imme­di­ate­ly with­out hav­ing to go through any oth­er steps or pro­ce­dures first (such as ask­ing if they can search).
So how do we avoid this? The best way is not respond­ing at all–just stay silent until they ask some­thing else! If they keep press­ing and ask­ing why aren’t answer­ing them, just say “I’m exer­cis­ing my right not to speak.”

Con­clu­sion

If you’re ever in a sit­u­a­tion where police are ask­ing ques­tions, it’s impor­tant to know your rights. You have the right to remain silent and refuse to answer any ques­tions asked of you by law enforce­ment offi­cers. If an offi­cer asks if they can search or seize some­thing from you, say “No.” If they ask for per­mis­sion to enter your home or vehi­cle and look around, say “No.“
If an offi­cer begins ques­tion­ing you about some­thing that hap­pened in the past (i.e., if they ask what hap­pened at a par­ty last night), tell them that because this is an ongo­ing inves­ti­ga­tion into crim­i­nal activ­i­ty being con­duct­ed by police offi­cers who are not cur­rent­ly present dur­ing this con­ver­sa­tion with me today (name­ly: myself), I would pre­fer not dis­cussing such mat­ters until after those offi­cers arrive so that I may speak direct­ly with them instead of hav­ing my words relayed through anoth­er per­son who may mis­char­ac­ter­ize what I am say­ing due sim­ply because he does not have all rel­e­vant facts regard­ing our encounter here today before him yet; there­fore I respect­ful­ly decline answer­ing any fur­ther ques­tions until such time as those detec­tives arrive so we can pro­ceed with­out any fur­ther delay.”