‘Welfare Check’ on Couple Sleeping in Car Ends in Arrest

Cops get a call: two people are sleeping in a parked car in Lakeland, Florida. The caller requests a welfare check. No crime was even suspected. Cops arrive and confirm, yep, just a young couple and their cat, sleeping in their car. But instead of letting them go back to sleep, or even asking them to leave, the cops start barking commands at them, demanding ID. Knowing that they had done nothing wrong, the couple does not want to be detained and interrogated by these officers. So they assert their constitutional rights and they ask questions. But the officers mock them and curse at them, and they detain them anyways, and even arrest the husband, just because they got a call  – even though that call didn’t allege any criminal suspicion. Who was right here? Did they have to ID? Or should they have been left alone, or allowed to leave?

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