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This article was nominated for deletion on 17 March 2012 (UTC). The result of the discussion was no consensus.

Help!

I created this page because I keep running into the alleged law quoted on various blogs and discussion groups, and when I went to Misplaced Pages to research it I found nothing. I am way over my head with anything legal, and really could use some help from someone with some expertise. --Guy Macon (talk) 13:17, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Hey there, this case seems to have carried a bit of an urban legend for a number of years now, the original quote is as follows: "The law does not allow a peace officer to use more force than is necessary to effect an arrest. . . . And if he does use such unnecessary force, he . . . may be lawfully resisted . . . If the officer is resisted before he has used needless force and violence, he may then press forward and overcome such resistance, even to the taking of the life of the person arrested, if absolutely necessary." Samuel Tarling (talk) 15:58, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Looking much better. I really appreciate the help. --Guy Macon (talk) 20:02, 19 February 2012 (UTC)

Google Scholar: How this document has been cited: --Guy Macon (talk) 23:15, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Welcome, Reddit!

I am the same Guy Macon who posted http://www.reddit.com/r/law/comments/q2h34/help_needed_with_legal_urban_myth/ on Reddit. I am hoping to get some help making this page better. I am pretty ignorant in the area of laws but I am an experienced Misplaced Pages editor and will be glad to help anyone who hasn't edited Misplaced Pages before. I have gathered together some links to the most important Misplaced Pages policies and guidelines on my Misplaced Pages user page: https://en.wikipedia.org/User:Guy_Macon Welcome, and thanks for helping! --Guy Macon (talk) 14:37, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

References

Personally I don't think citing a pastebin link counts as a reliable source of information. Samuel Tarling (talk) 21:29, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree, and I am working on getting a better source. The background of that document is this; I asked for help with this article on Reddit, and a student at a law school downloaded the case from behind a paywall and posted it to pastebin. The other lawyers and law students seem to accept it as genuine, so I am 99% sure it isn't a fake, but of course none of this is good enough for Misplaced Pages - we need a citation to a reliable source, not some anonymous Reddit posts and a pastebin upload. If possible, I would like a few days to get a better citation and then to upload it to Wikimedia commons (it is old enough to be public domain), but if you feel strongly about it, go ahead and delete it and I will put it back later when I get it properly sourced. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:22, 26 February 2012 (UTC)

Update: working on it. See Misplaced Pages:Help desk#Newbie file uploader questions. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:33, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Further efforts: Misplaced Pages talk:WikiProject Law#Plummer v. State (of_Indiana) --Guy Macon (talk) 23:10, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

..and more: Misplaced Pages:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard#Plummer v. State (of Indiana) --Guy Macon (talk) 23:43, 27 February 2012 (UTC)

Confusion

The article raises a misquote and then shoots it down. That's not the way to report a case. Is the motive here to discredit the misquote rather than report the case? WP cannot do that unless some RS brings it up. Durham correctly quotes Plummer but says nothing about the misquote.

Is the issue the level of force that may be resisted (too much force is illegal)? The lack of a warrant (no right to arrest)? The lack of announcement (struck from behind)? Those topics might be better handled at resisting arrest articles; certainly more sources would be available for a more general topic.

The case has many issues. The marshal struck first from behind. The marshal shot first. The marshal didn't have a warrant. It is doubted that marshal witnessed an act that gave him the authority to arrest for a misdemeanor; he may not have seen the acts; even if he saw the alleged acts, they weren't a misdemeanor that would allow him to arrest; a jury instruction required Plummer to prove his innocence. There's a lot of material in the opinion, and it is not simple. Some of those points turn on narrow issues of Indiana law.

Glrx (talk) 19:48, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

OK I took out the "raises a misquote and then shoots it down" portion. I found a bunch of sources discussing it being a misquote, but no reliable sources, just blogs and such, so out it goes until a reliable source is found.

I did find a contemporary news report in the Northeastern Reporter which had a summary written by the newspaper followed by printing the actual decision. I wrote a description of the case based upon that summary, and will expand it when I find sourcing.

I do have a question about secondary sources. Somehow it feels wrong to not use a description of the facts of the case by a judge in the text of the ruling and then to turn around and use a description of the facts of the case by a judge in the text of another ruling. This seems to go against the spirit of WP:RS; that second judge isn't really evaluating and reporting on the first case like a newspaper would. When the second judge talks about the legal issues in the first case, it feels like a proper secondary source, but not when he describes the facts of the case. Maybe this is just my inexperience working on law articles showing. --Guy Macon (talk) 22:45, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

Glrx is onto the real problem with this article. I take it that the issue here is that there is something of an urban legend/internet meme about the supposed right to forcibly resist a wrongful arrest that cites Plummer as precedent. Quite apart from whether or not there is any merit to the argument of those claiming such a right, there is the initial problem of whether there is any reliable, secondary source for the proposition that there is such an urban legend/internet meme about Plummer. The various blogs, noticeboards, talk pages and other SPS's cited right now don't qualify as reliable secondary sources. Essentially, we as editors are doing original research, saying "See, here are three, or ten, or a hundred posts all repeating this meme". What we need is someone else to do that research and publish it in a reliable sources: a book, a newspaper, a magazine article. That is what establishes not only that the meme is out there, but also that it is notable.

The next problem is that it also appears, for a variety of reasons, that the meme is a really bad piece of legal advice, and doesn't really understand what Plummer actually held, that it arises from some specific facts that would rarely occur and has been repeatedly distinguished, and that it is only binding precedent under the narrow facts of the casein Indiana. Again, we need reliable secondary sources that say that. We're in pretty good stead as to what Plummer actually holds, because there are secondary sources that discuss the case. Where we have a problem, however, is, as Glrx writes, we would need some sources that say that the meme is wrong because of these various things. We can't just juxtapose conflicting statements, "the meme says Plummer holds X" and "scholarly sources say Plummer holds Y."

Finally, Glrx's suggestion that this material probably doesn't merit its own article, but belongs somewhere in an article on arrests, is probably a good one. Plummer has certainly been cited in a number of decisions and in a number of scholarly publications, but it is by no means a prominent case on the order of those that typically get Misplaced Pages articles like Brown v Board of Education or Sullivan v New York Times. Unless it is getting widespread coverage in the more general press and literature, rather than being relegated to the occasional footnote in a dusty old Criminal Law textbook, it probably doesn't meet the notability guidelines for its own article. You say you've found one article. That's a start, but may not be enough. Regardless. the case is most certainly notable enough, with plenty of reliable secondary sources, to merit a sentence or two in a more general article on arrests or resisting arrest. Fladrif (talk) 23:07, 28 February 2012 (UTC)

The Northeastern Reporter is not a newspaper. A reporter is a series of volumes that publish court cases; there are many reporters. You'll notice that Plummer has a citation 34 N.E. 968. That means volume 34, Northeastern Reporter, page 968. You'll notice that the Google link is also to volume 34 and page 968. It has 3 numbered headnotes, which are summaries of important legal conclusions in the opinion; it then publishes the court opinion verbatim. Glrx (talk) 16:21, 2 March 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Fladrif and Girx. I found about 30 Indiana cases, including Indiana Supreme Court and Appellate Court cases, citing Plummer. Plummer's legal premise seems to stand today. I searched for law review articles on Plummer and found none. The references listed do not appear to be reliable secondary sources. They are blogs and references whose authors I could not identify. Per WP:Notability, so far, Plummer does not seem to meet the notability requirement. I added a notability tag to the article.

The relevant notability policy sections I found include:

"Article and list topics must be notable, or "worthy of notice".

Misplaced Pages articles cover notable topics—those that have gained sufficiently significant attention by the world at large and over a period of time, and are not excluded for other reasons. We consider evidence from reliable independent sources such as published journals, books, and newspapers to gauge this attention. Notability does not directly affect the content of articles, but only whether the topic should have its own article.

If a topic has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject, it is presumed to satisfy the inclusion criteria for a stand-alone article or stand-alone list.

"Significant coverage" means that sources address the subject directly in detail, so no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than a trivial mention but it need not be the main topic of the source material.

"Reliable" means sources need editorial integrity to allow verifiable evaluation of notability, per the reliable source guideline. Sources may encompass published works in all forms and media, and in any language. Availability of secondary sources covering the subject is a good test for notability.

"Sources", for notability purposes, should be secondary sources, as those provide the most objective evidence of notability. The number and nature of reliable sources needed varies depending on the depth of coverage and quality of the sources. Multiple sources are generally expected. Sources are not required to be available online, and they are not required to be in English. Multiple publications from the same author or organization are usually regarded as a single source for the purposes of establishing notability."Coaster92 (talk) 05:23, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I consider that 30 citations to a case make it notable. They will normally not all of them discuss it to a substantial extent, but some of them will. A case that is a precedent in its subject is notable. DGG ( talk ) 03:10, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

I have been holding off on any efforts to improve the article other than searching for sources establishing notability (there are hundreds and hundreds of them -- this is quite widely misquoted -- and not a darn one is a reliable source). Do you think there is a reasonable chance that this might survive deletion, or would copyediting it just be a W.O.M.B.A.T (Waste Of Money, Brains And Time)? --Guy Macon (talk) 03:58, 3 March 2012 (UTC)

Expanded

I expanded the article. Hopefully this addresses some of the issues. I also went with the Bluebook citation form, as it is preferred for legal articles, see WP:MOSLAW. GregJackP Boomer! 02:03, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Great job. Your edits help a lot in clarifying both the case and its implications with respect to the apparently fabricated quotation. Jonesey95 (talk) 15:53, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

Thanks. I changed a minor point that you added. In the quotation, the original authors mis-cite the Bad Elk case by 1) using Bad Elk's full name and 2) then abbreviating United States to U.S. Proper citation in Misplaced Pages legal articles is to use Bluebook citation style for case names, see WP:MOSLAW. Bluebook (and ALWD, etc) all use the format "last name" v. "United States" in the text, and when footnotes are used, the rest of the cite is in the footnote (the XXX U.S. XXX (year)). If we need to, we can put a following the citation in the quotation, but I didn't think it was necessary at the time. Regards, GregJackP Boomer! 16:50, 12 January 2013 (UTC)

A person "may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest"?

"In fact, the opposite is true; all of the court cases that cite Plummer discuss the issue of defense against unlawful force—not defense against unlawful arrest, and most also note that a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest"

Wait, doesn't the Bad Elk v. United States say the exact opposite?

I'm also very curious as to why there's an external link to an external "Bad Elk" source, but no mention of Bad Elk in the actual article.

76.123.234.177 (talk) 18:34, 1 May 2015 (UTC)

First the easy part; I removed the external link and added a see also wikilink to Bad Elk v. United States, which cites the same external source. Good catch!

As for Bad Elk v. United States saying the exact opposite, please read Bad Elk v. United States#Internet meme and myths, which says:

The case has also been cited on various internet sites as giving citizens the authority to resist unlawful arrest. This claim is normally put forth in connection with a misquoted version of Plummer v. State. The most commonly quoted version is:

"Citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer's life if necessary.” Plummer v. State, 136 Ind. 306 . This premise was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case: John Bad Elk v. U.S., 177 U.S. 529. The Court stated: “Where the officer is killed in the course of the disorder which naturally accompanies an attempted arrest that is resisted, the law looks with very different eyes upon the transaction, when the officer had the right to make the arrest, from what it does if the officer had no right. What may be murder in the first case might be nothing more than manslaughter in the other, or the facts might show that no offense had been committed."

In fact, the opposite is true—all of the cases that cite Plummer and most that cite Bad Elk discuss the issue as defense against unlawful force, and most of the cases note that a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest.

--Guy Macon (talk) 19:50, 1 May 2015 (UTC)

Regarding the "Internet Meme" Section

The section has a number of problems. In no particular order:

1. "Internet Meme" is not a good title for the section (it's not accurate or descriptive, and has minor negative connotations) - I'd recommend changing it "Misconceptions" instead.
2. The section cites three sources in one ref tag. The sources need to be pulled into separate, appropriately placed ref tags.
3. The section states that the quote given is a fabrication. Yet of the sources cited by the section (ignoring potential reliability issues for now), two claim it is correct.
4. The section states "This case is widely cited on the Internet in blogs and discussion groups", yet none of the sources support that statement.
5. While one of the sources does provide the direct quote, none of them provice any comment on how "common" it is for it to be quoted, while the section claims that the misquote is "The most commonly quoted version" - a very difficult claim to support
6. The following is stated by the section, but is entirely unsupported by the sources: "There are no known examples of the above quotation being accompanied by a reference giving the year, the court, the state, or a link to the exact wording. The quoted text is not found in the text of Plummer or in any other known ruling by any court." They are also very strong statement and very difficult to source
7. The sources that the section cites are terrible - the "Constitution Society" one appears to be some sort of right-wing political blog and the "Law Enforcement Today" one is an opinion piece from what appears to be some sort of guest-a-day police blog. The one from "The Blaze" is also an opinion piece, and while it at least cites a few sources, the one it uses regarding this decision is the aforementioned "Constitution Society".

In order for the section to be viable, it needs at the very least a major overhaul in content, sources, and structure.

But there's something of a bigger problem here - in order to make the section's point that this decision is frequently misquoted on the internet, we need to find a reliable source that states as such. Looking around a bit, I haven't been able to find anything sufficient.

Frankly, I recommend that we just scrap the whole section (and related portion of the lede, of course) and make clear in the article what the decision says in an absolute sense, rather than relative to what people think it says. That way we also make the key point of the section - to highlight that the decision is regarding defense against unlawful force, not unlawful arrest - in a neater, better flowing way.

Per WP:BOLD I will do so right after finishing writing this. If you object, please revert and reply to this section. Aero-Plex (talk) 19:37, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

1. "Internet Meme" is not a good title for the section (it's not accurate or descriptive, and has minor negative connotations) - I'd recommend changing it "Misconceptions" instead.

Except that it is an oft-cited meme.

2. The section cites three sources in one ref tag. The sources need to be pulled into separate, appropriately placed ref tags.

That's called a "string cite" and is common in cites using Bluebook as the reference style. They belong in one tag.

3. The section states that the quote given is a fabrication. Yet of the sources cited by the section (ignoring potential reliability issues for now), two claim it is correct.

I'll find other sources, but that is sort of the point, that the incorrect, fraudulent quote is cited by websites.

4. The section states "This case is widely cited on the Internet in blogs and discussion groups", yet none of the sources support that statement.

See above.

5. While one of the sources does provide the direct quote, none of them provice any comment on how "common" it is for it to be quoted, while the section claims that the misquote is "The most commonly quoted version" - a very difficult claim to support

See above.

6. The following is stated by the section, but is entirely unsupported by the sources: "There are no known examples of the above quotation being accompanied by a reference giving the year, the court, the state, or a link to the exact wording. The quoted text is not found in the text of Plummer or in any other known ruling by any court." They are also very strong statement and very difficult to source

That can be reworded.

7. The sources that the section cites are terrible - the "Constitution Society" one appears to be some sort of right-wing political blog and the "Law Enforcement Today" one is an opinion piece from what appears to be some sort of guest-a-day police blog. The one from "The Blaze" is also an opinion piece, and while it at least cites a few sources, the one it uses regarding this decision is the aforementioned "Constitution Society".

Which also show the meme aspect of the quote. GregJackP Boomer! 20:46, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

1. Could you explain what you mean by "oft-cited meme"? I don't understand what you're getting at. But either way, my objection stems from the fact that "Internet Meme" is a worse title than "Misconceptions" rather than being a bad title in an absolute sense.
2. My point was that a string cite is inappropriate in this case, not that string cites are bad in and of themselves (though I suppose my wording was unclear in this regard). My reasoning being that, since each of the sources is intended to support a different part of the section, it would be clearer to the reader if each of the sources were pulled into its own citation - that way, they can immediately see what each source is bringing to the article. The other option would be to put this information into the citation itself by adding in some parentheticals to that effect, but that just strikes me as being needlessly complex for the reader.
3. But citing sites that claim the quote is correct does not show that it is often claimed to be correct - you would need a source holding particularly that websites often claim it to be correct in order to do so. More generally, though, claiming that something is "widely" the case is generally not a good idea, and is even directly cautioned against in WP:WEASELWORDS
4. See above.
5. See above.
6. They can indeed be reworded, but without changing the underlying claims you just come back to the same problem. How would you suggest the sentences be reworded?
7. I don't follow. What do you mean by "meme aspect of the quote" and how do those sources show it? And are you saying that you think those to be reliable sources, or are you agreeing that they aren't?

Since you think that the section should remain in the article (going by your reversion of my removal), could you explain why it should remain in? Any number of things are often misquoted, badly explained, or outright lied about, yet having a section dedicated to that sort of thing is generally reserved for only the most extreme of cases, generally speaking.

Frankly, the whole section could be condensed down into a single sentence along the lines of, say, "Notably, the decision of this case concerns itself with the legality of defense against unlawful force, which is distinct from unlawful arrest."

I'll await those sources, I suppose. Aero-Plex (talk) 22:00, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

Law Enforcement Today consists of articles submitted by law enforcement officers who must provide the editorial board a bio, including a professional and educational background. There are submission requirements, such as font, citation style, etc., and the proposed article is vetted by the editorial board before it is published. This particular author has presented over and over again on police issues, particularly PTSD/NAMI issues. He clearly states that it is a false quote. GregJackP Boomer! 21:14, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

I don't follow. That is indeed a guest-a-day blog - you don't need to have a different guest every day or have a single submission a day for that to be the case. Either way, I don't see how it is a reliable source - the guy's a police officer, not a lawyer, so WP:RS's exception for authors who are professionals in the field at hand doesn't apply. Aero-Plex (talk) 22:04, 5 May 2015 (UTC)

First, it's not a "guest-a-day" blog. It has a editorial board and it vets both the authors and their submissions. Second, a police officer isn't a professional? Interesting concept, since a profession requires prolonged training, formal qualifications, and continuing education; all of which police have. Third, your outlook on Bluebook cites is completely wrong. Every authority and reference that supports the argument (or sentence) goes into a single citation, with each reference separated by a semi-colon. See B2, Bluebook, 19th Ed., and R.1.1., Bluebook. The order of the authorities in the string cite is covered by R.1.4., parentheticals are covered by R.1.5., and so on. If you don't like string cites, then you can try to obtain consensus to change the citation style, but otherwise, we'll use Bluebook (see WP:CITEVAR). Finally, you need to get consensus to remove the material, as most of the discussion above has been on this very subject, and the material in the article represents the consensus of those discussions. GregJackP Boomer! 01:06, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

That it has an editorial board does not change the fact that its content does not come from members of its staff but rather external parties.

Of course a police officer is a professional. But a professional police officer is not a professional lawyer, which they would have to be for WP:RS's exception for blogs written by professionals to apply in this case - this is, after all, a matter of law rather than enforcement.

Note that nowhere have I claimed that it is a malformed citation. Yet bundling the three sources - without some sort of explication of their relation - in the manner that the article currently does makes it an unclear. So for instance, the following would be clearer:

Robert Cubby, Law Enforcement Today; The Right to Resist An Unlawful Arrest, Dec. 10, 2014 (claiming the following quote to be a fabrication); Jon Roland, Constitution Society; Your Right of Defense Against Unlawful Arrest, July 10, 1996 (using the following quote); Paul Markel, The Blaze; Do You Have the Right to Resist an Unlawful Arrest? May 9, 2014 (using the following quote).

Importantly, I am not changing the quoting style here - it would still be Bluebook to do something like this:

This case is widely cited on the Internet in blogs and discussion groups. The most commonly quoted version is:

“Citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer's life if necessary.”

The above quote is a fabrication. There are no known examples of the above quotation being accompanied by a reference giving the year, the court, the state, or a link to the exact wording. The quoted text is not found in the text of Plummer or in any other known ruling by any court. In fact, the opposite is true; all of the court cases that cite Plummer discuss the issue of defense against unlawful force—not defense against unlawful arrest, and most also note that a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest.

References

1. Paul Markel, The Blaze; Do You Have the Right to Resist an Unlawful Arrest? May 9, 2014.
2. Robert Cubby, Law Enforcement Today; The Right to Resist An Unlawful Arrest, Dec. 10, 2014;
3. Higgins, 73 F.3d 364 at *4; Wilson, 842 N.E.2d at 447; Andrew P. Wright, Resisting Unlawful Arrests: Inviting Anarchy or Protecting Individual Freedom? 46 Drake L. Rev. 383 (1997) (noting that as of publication, 36 of the 50 states prohibited resisting unlawful arrests).

In passing, I'd like to point out the large number of tags I added.

Now, I would like to point out an HTML comment I found in the page as I was writing this post, directly following "any other known ruling by any court." Specifically, this comment states:

verified by extensively searching various legal databases and search engines. Not sure how to cite "several Misplaced Pages editors looked really hard and found nothing"...

Which is obviously in violation of WP:RS, so I will be removing that section right after submitting this. Again, revert and comment if you object...

Either way, I did post a large response, addressing each one of your responses to my points directly - do you have any objections to anything in that post besides what we are discussing in this post chain, or are we otherwise in agreement? I especially would like to hear your response to the part of my post where I wrote:

Frankly, the whole section could be condensed down into a single sentence along the lines of, say, "Notably, the decision of this case concerns itself with the legality of defense against unlawful force, which is distinct from unlawful arrest."

Aero-Plex (talk) 02:02, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

OK, let me make this perfectly clear. If you take anything out without first gaining consensus, I will revert you like I just did. If it continues, I will take it to AN/I. I have pointed out that this was discussed above, that the material met with consensus, and if you want to change it, you need to get consensus to change it. You can't just make a unilateral decision to change it to the way you want it. If you had created some content or had more edits, I might give your opinion more consideration, but if you want to play with an article, try working on a stub somewhere. GregJackP Boomer! 03:05, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

The point of the WP:BOLD policy is to make obvious, easily-revertible changes and then discuss them. But in this case, I am very surprised you reverted - that comment I mentioned alone explains quite well why it shouldn't be in there - it's blatantly violating WP:RS.

Either way, you keep bringing up this idea of "consensus" that I've been ignoring up to this point, but since literally the only thing your post addressed was that, I suppose I have no choice. Simply put, the consensus above is that the section is to be deleted on account of lack of notability. I was trying to approach things in a more diplomatic manner, but if you really insist on relying strictly on preformed consensus to the point of threatening to bring AN/I into this, then I suppose my only option is to bend to your wishes and just delete the section outright. But again, I am honestly trying to be diplomatic and assume good faith here - so please extend me the same courtesy and actually address the points I am bringing up.

Aero-Plex (talk) 05:04, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

Go ahead, I have no problem taking it up. You obviously misread the consensus above. You have @Guy Macon: who believes that the material should be in the article. You have @Jonesey95: comments in support. You have @DGG: stating that the case is notable. I know how to create content, and how to deal with those that merely snipe at content creators. So go ahead and do what you think is going to get you somewhere. I stand in awe of your 1 article created and your 75+/- edits. GregJackP Boomer! 05:35, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

An internet meme exists, and it does falsely quote this case. I could list a hundred blogs, Youtube comments, USENET posts, tweets, etc. that make the claim, and I am 95% sure that it has been on flyers passed out at occupy protests and tea party protests (now there are two groups that don't agree on much!) but have not been able to find a RS for that claim yet. Many people come to this page after reading the false claims somewhere, and we should provide answers to those readers.

Yes, it is difficult to establish from reliable sources that this case is widely cited on the Internet in blogs and discussion groups, but I believe that the current set of citations establish that and are reliable for the specific purpose of determining whether this case is widely cited on the Internet in blogs and discussion groups. --Guy Macon (talk) 06:16, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

They are not sufficient for that purpose. They do establish that it is misquoted on the Internet (though solely in a logical sense and not in a sufficient-for-Misplaced Pages sense - we'd need secondary sources for that instead of the primary sources we currently have), but not that it is widely so. Aero-Plex (talk) 15:43, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

And on the other hand, you have @Glrx:, @Fladrif:, and @Coaster92: taking the opposite position - and more importantly, they bring up a number of reasons why that never get refuted.

To be perfectly frank, you clearly don't "know how to create content" as well as you claim to, seeing as how you've been outright ignoring almost all of the points I've been bringing up. I ask again - please argue in good faith rather than bad - it makes the content creation process far more enjoyable for all involved. Aero-Plex (talk) 15:43, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

ROTFL. Yeah, that's why I have created 3 Featured Articles, all of which will have been on the Misplaced Pages Main Page by the end of this month. That's why I'm one of 175 editors who have earned the Four Award; one of 154 editors who have been awarded the Triple Crown more than once; and one of only 5 editors who have earned a Valiant Return Triple Crown. Content is not created by those who nitpick and stay on the sidelines, it is created by those who actually research and write. When you do some of that, then I may consider your input to be relevant, but for now, it's not. GregJackP Boomer! 22:55, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

I'm not sure what relevance any of this has - what matters is that here and now you are acting in bad faith, claiming nonexistent consensus, and refusing to address the points I have been bringing up. You could be the Queen of England and it still wouldn't change that. Aero-Plex (talk) 00:33, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

• No, I've addressed them. You just don't hear the reasons, likely due to your lack of experience in content creation. GregJackP Boomer! 01:15, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

• The vase is of course notable as a precedent, and it has been supported by the 7th circuit as recently as 1995. The internet meme is curious in using the case for exactly what the 7th circuit said it did not support--it supported the use of excessive force in a lawful arrest, but it is irrelevant to the use of force in an unlawful arrest. I would have expected there to be some discussion of this. DGG ( talk ) 14:38, 6 May 2015 (UTC)
  • It is all well and good that the misquotes are curious, but that does not mean that they are notable, at least not in the sense of WP:NOTABLE. Aero-Plex (talk) 15:43, 6 May 2015 (UTC)

• Since we are not talking about creating a separate article on the misquotes, they do not have to meet the notability standard. Nowhere does Misplaced Pages require a section of an article to separately meet the notability standard. A content creator would know that. GregJackP Boomer! 22:55, 6 May 2015 (UTC)
  • Of course parts of articles do not have to meet the WP:NOTABLE standard in and of themselves - that would be ridiculous. But that doesn't change the fact that the misquotes make up most of the article's notability. Examining the article's citations, almost all of them are primary sources, one of them is apparently not even published, two of them are Google searches, most of what's left has serious reliability concerns, and one I cannot comment on because it is behind a paywall. To be blunt about it, the entire article has serious problems with notability to the point that, absent discovery of reliable secondary sources on the topic, the only course of action I can recommend would be to delete it outright. This is not ideal, obviously - articles should, wherever possible, be improved instead of deleted. But the lack of notability of the article combined with neither of us having been able to present usable sources means that at some point one has to write the article off as a loss, perhaps coming back to it down the road in hopes of the case being more notable. Aero-Plex (talk) 00:33, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

• OK, done talking with you. Try going to the WP:TEAHOUSE or find a mentor somewhere. Have them explain WP:NNC to you, as you clearly don't have a clue as to notability within an article. Second, the case is notable, as are almost all cases from the highest court within a jurisdiction. It is cited in several works, such as Brill's Cyclopedia, Lawyer's Reports Annotated (LRA), Wharton's Homicide, Wharton's Criminal Law, etc. You don't understand what an "unpublished table decision" means. Hell, there is an entire series of "unpublished" opinions—which are published in West's Federal Appendix Reporter. In the law, "unpublished" means it has less value as a precedent than a "published" opinion, not that is is printed and distributed as a published document. You have to have WP:COMPETENCE, which you clearly do not have as to legal articles. This type of question on notability has been answered time after time after time on the various boards. Drop the stick and walk away. GregJackP Boomer! 01:15, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

• Aero-Plex, I wrote an essay on this situation. Please read WP:1AM. --Guy Macon (talk) 10:05, 7 May 2015 (UTC)

Arbitrary break

• I totally agree with the objections here.
  • This is pure WP:OR: "There are no known examples of the above quotation being accompanied by a reference giving the year, the court, the state, or a link to the exact wording. The quoted text is not found in the text of Plummer or in any other known ruling by any court. (with its note: verified by extensively searching various legal databases and search engines. Not sure how to cite "several Misplaced Pages editors looked really hard and found nothing""
  • This: "In fact, the opposite is true; all of the court cases that cite Plummer discuss the issue of defense against unlawful force—not defense against unlawful arrest, and most also note that a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest." is not supported by its sources (Higgins, 73 F.3d 364 at *4; Wilson, 842 N.E.2d at 447; Andrew P. Wright, Resisting Unlawful Arrests: Inviting Anarchy or Protecting Individual Freedom? 46 Drake L. Rev. 383 (1997) (noting that as of publication, 36 of the 50 states prohibited resisting unlawful arrests)). Jytdog (talk) 18:35, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

• I reverted. The first portion, "In fact, the opposite is true;" was left out, but the remainder of the sentence was restored and each reference supports the assertions at the location cited. If you disagree, please point out what part of the reference that you have a problem with and we can discuss it. GregJackP Boomer! 20:31, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

please tell me exactly where the statement "All of the court cases that cite Plummer discuss the issue of defense against unlawful force—not defense against unlawful arrest, and most also note that a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest." is supported by a reference. I read them carefully this is unsourced WP:OR. And i mean tell me exactly where that is supported. Jytdog (talk) 20:36, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

You looked at Higgins? Can you tell me what it says at the beginning of page *4? I don't answer to you, and while I'm willing to discuss things, I would suggest that you take a little more courteous tone rather than to instruct me to tell meexactly where that is supported. GregJackP Boomer! 21:25, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

I would suggest that you do not revert a deletion of content that violates policy before it is discussed on the Talk page. By Higgins I assume you mean this. There is no pagination in html. Paragraph 22 is the only paragraph that mentions Plummer. It does not support: "All of the court cases that cite Plummer discuss the issue of defense against unlawful force—not defense against unlawful arrest, and most also note that a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest." " So again where is there support for the text you added back after i deleted it?. Jytdog (talk) 00:40, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

I would suggest that you do not think that you are god who can determine, all by yourself, what does and what does not violate policy. It is merely your opinion, which thus far, I am not overly impressed with. If you want the material removed, get consensus. That's what Misplaced Pages works with, not demands from a single editor. As far as reverting your changes? It's called WP:BRD. As to the rest of it, if you created content, your opinion might actually mean something. By yourself, without consensus, not so much. GregJackP Boomer! 01:19, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Please discuss content, not contributor. Thanks. If you are not going to let my changes stand, you have to discuss them. So please reply to the points I raised. Let's do just one. What source supports: "All of the court cases that cite Plummer discuss the issue of defense against unlawful force—not defense against unlawful arrest, and most also note that a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest."? Jytdog (talk) 05:18, 17 May 2015 (UTC)

Sourcing

This article is being discussed at Misplaced Pages:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 190#Google search result as a direct source. --Guy Macon (talk) 17:02, 16 May 2015 (UTC)

Bad Elk v. United States

The "Internet Meme" section refers to the Supreme Court case Bad Elk v. United States so I think that should be mentioned instead. 104.34.250.89 (talk) 02:36, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

I expanded the section with a fuller quote. --Guy Macon (talk) 07:57, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

Internet meme section

Pretty much the only reason any reader would land on this page is because there are a lot of internet sources (none of them reliable, most of them very heavily read) that make the claim

"Citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer's life if necessary." Plummer v. State, 136 Ind. 306 . This premise was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case: John Bad Elk v. U.S., 177 U.S. 529. The Court stated: "Where the officer is killed in the course of the disorder which naturally accompanies an attempted arrest that is resisted, the law looks with very different eyes upon the transaction, when the officer had the right to make the arrest, from what it does if the officer had no right. What may be murder in the first case might be nothing more than manslaughter in the other, or the facts might show that no offense had been committed.

You can find thousands of such pages by doing a Google search on .

Another editor who I highly respect and nearly always agree with recently removed the quote from our Plummer v. State article and our Bad Elk v. United States article. These sections have been unchanged since we came to a consensus in 2015.

I would like to open a discussion as to whether to remove this material. If we cannot reach an agreement I will post an RfC.

I would suggest that we discuss this at the Plummer v. State talk page and not the Bad Elk v. United States talk page in order to avoid duplication.

@JzG, GregJackP, and Glrx: --Guy Macon (talk) 15:20, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

I don't have a problem with including the statement, but it needs to be sourced to reliable independent secondary sources, not incredibly unreliable primary ones. Guy (Help!) 16:26, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

I reverted the deletions. The sections were included by consensus, he'll need to get consensus to remove it. GregJackP Boomer! 16:43, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

I understand the agument about sourcing. The question is, how should we handle the legal equivalent of pseudoscience? (Pseudolaw?) without mentioning that it exaists or who is speading it? There are a huge number of internet sources that make false claims about this law. Those false claims are most likely the cause of 90-99% of the visitors to the page. Alas, the sources are unreliable (if they were reliable they wouldn't be telling fibs about what the laws say) and very few other sources have covered the topic (these sites put out dozens of batshit crazy articles every day and nobody has the time or inclination to attempt to refute such a flood of bullshit). So what do we do? How do we properly answer the main question that most visitors to this page have? --Guy Macon (talk) 16:47, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

That is a fair question. Freemen on the land may have some useful pointers, since that is a well known pseudolegal defense. I think we manage that without a single primary lunatic source. As a matter of policy, Misplaced Pages does not cover something unless reliable independent secondary sources cover it. Unreliable primary sources implies WP:OR and also violates WP:NPOV. We have deleted many articles on cranks and nonsense widely supported by mad sources like whale.to but not addressed by the reality-based community. Guy (Help!) 20:07, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

You reverted Infowars back in as a source? Seriously? Wow. Guy (Help!) 20:00, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

What is the problem with sourcing inforwars for a claim that infowars said X? --Guy Macon (talk) 20:48, 12 April 2017 (UTC)

• Delete the entire section about the Internet meme. I don't see any reliable independent secondary sources for any of it. FYI, N o l o.com has a reasonable, likely accurate article on the subject that comes up as the third Google result from . For some reason, which I have yet to understand, we blacklisted that source and are allowing WP:OR with junk sources instead such as this ? (the first one to come up on the Google search.) --David Tornheim (talk) 05:45, 13 April 2017 (UTC)

• Comment. I take the original motivation for the WP article being there's bad legal advice about resisting arrest on the internet (true), and that WP should make some effort to correct that bad advice (not WP's charter). The article was all about the meme and not about the case. WP should not be in the position of offering its own legal advice to counter somebody else's legal advice. Editors are not here to right great wrongs.

The article got more meat and described the issues in the case rather than just the meme. The meme section is the remnant of the original motivation.

Cubby is offline now, but here's the archive.org copy. Cubby claims:

This statement led to much discussion in social media. The publication The Blaze cited an Indiana Supreme Court decision (Plummer v. State, 135 Ind 308 34 N.E. 968 (1893)) to support their contention that “citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer’s life if necessary.��? Please note that The Blaze is a right-wing publication. One would tend to think that the likes of Al Sharpton would agree with this.

This argument has been refuted elsewhere, stating that nowhere in the original document did the Supreme Court of Indiana make that claim or use those words. The contention voiced by Commissioner Bratton still seems credible.

If Cubby is an RS, then at least the first part of the removed quotation could come in, and Cubby supports the statement that the phrase does not appear in the text of the Indiana opinion (something that I would say also falls under WP:CALC).

I'm not in the Cubby is an RS camp, and I'm not sure the bogus quotation meets WP:DUE. Cubby is a retired police captain from New Jersey. Maybe if the Blaze is an RS then Cubby can be brought in to refute it. The WP cited Blaze article, however, is advocating moderation by the police rather than encouraging protesters to resist arrest and/or kill policemen. (Maybe there's another Blaze article.)

I'm not sure where "This argument has been refuted elsewhere" happened. Maybe that was in a reliable source.

In any event, there are not a lot of RS out there about either side of this issue. That's bad news for WP:DUE. Cubby's "much discussion in social media" is not "much discussion in reliable sources."

Glrx (talk) 00:06, 15 April 2017 (UTC)

• Comment. I reverted the deletion of the sources, again, until some sort of consensus appears on this page. It has been there for several years, and this discussion has only been for 4 days so far, and no clear consensus to delete yet exists. The material was included by consensus, so you really need the same to remove it. GregJackP Boomer! 01:25, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

• Above reference was made to pseudoscience. The way we handle that, is by citing actual RS that discuss the pseudoscience; we don't cite the unreliable sources that are spewing the pseudoscience themselves. (we never cite Mercola or NaturalNews for example). If there are not RS discussing X, we don't discuss it at all. In the realm of health, we are fortunate that there are some people like David Gorski who regularly criticize/debunk crackpottery about health, and we can cite what he and similar folks produce. All of that is completely in-line with the policies and guidelines including WP:PSCI and WP:FRINGEN. Is there really nobody in the legal profession who debunks this kind of stuff? No legal article that has commented on the internet malarky? Really? Jytdog (talk) 01:42, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

• No there is no "skeptics" division of law. It's called UPL or Unauthorized Practice of Law as part of Legal ethics (<-- there's an article that needs way more attention than this one!). I believe the Bar associations typically deal with it. In Ohio the Ohio Supreme Court deals with it. .Perhaps you can find some exciting cases for your amusement there. This one talking about realtors and UPL should qualify as WP:RS, but not for this article, which just sounds like an unnotable myth. --David Tornheim (talk) 09:11, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

If such a source addresses this that would be great. That is the place to look, not for the people spewing the FRINGE. Jytdog (talk) 23:46, 18 April 2017 (UTC)

• Comment. I reverted the deletion of the sources, again, until some sort of consensus appears on this page. GregJackP Boomer! 18:19, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

• Keep. This is a clear case of giving bureaucracy priority over the needs of the reader. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:26, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

• WARNING ABOUT EDIT WARRING. This material has been in the article for years, and that status quo should remain until there is a clear consensus for removal. The very next person to remove it will be reported at ANI for edit warring. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:26, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

• GregJackP you have said many times that you are a practicing lawyer. So what solid secondary sources within the legal profession discuss the internet meme and provide its claims so we can quote them ? Jytdog (talk) 18:44, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

GregJackP will you respond? thx Jytdog (talk) 19:13, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

• OK, So GregJackP provided the kind of ref I was asking for above, which says that the passage is oft misquoted and misused, so I did this. The bad sources are gone, the content is sourced to reliable secondary sources to show that is deserves WEIGHT. I think we are good now. Jytdog (talk) 22:11, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

moved here; under discussion above

Internet meme

Plummer v. State is cited in Internet blogs and discussion groups but often misquoted.

"Citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer's life if necessary." Plummer v. State, 136 Ind. 306 . This premise was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States in the case: John Bad Elk v. U.S., 177 U.S. 529. The Court stated: "Where the officer is killed in the course of the disorder which naturally accompanies an attempted arrest that is resisted, the law looks with very different eyes upon the transaction, when the officer had the right to make the arrest, from what it does if the officer had no right. What may be murder in the first case might be nothing more than manslaughter in the other, or the facts might show that no offense had been committed."

The above Plummer v. State quotation is a fabrication because the quoted text does not appear in the text of the Plummer opinion. Modern sources describe Plummer and Bad Elk as applying when there is an unlawful use of force rather than when there is an unlawful arrest; under contemporary law in the majority of U.S. jurisdictions, a person may not use force to resist an unlawful arrest.

References

1. Robery Cubby, The Right to Resist An Unlawful Arrest, Law Enforcement Today (Dec. 10, 2014); Paul Markel, Do You Have the Right to Resist an Unlawful Arrest? The Blaze (May 9, 2014); Jon Roland, Your Right of Defense Against Unlawful Arrest, Constitution.org (July 10, 1996, as modified as of May 6, 2015); Google, Search:"Your Right of Defense Against Unlawful Arrest" (May 6, 2015); Google, Search:"citizens may resist unlawful arrest to the point of taking an arresting officer’s life if necessary" (May 6, 2015);
2. Your Right of Defense Against Unlawful Arrest, Rayservers (Jan. 2, 2010, 1:00 PM); Protesters Have the Right to Protest … and to Resist Unlawful Arrest, Infowars.com (Nov. 13, 2011, 7:52 AM); Your Right of Defense Against Unlawful Arrest, Freedom-school.com (Dec. 12, 2012, 12:26 PM).
3. Cubby.
4. Wright at 387-88 (covering the common law rule, but noting that as of publication, 36 of the 50 states prohibited resisting unlawful arrests); see generally Miller, at 953 (only 13 states allow resistance to an unlawful arrest).

-- Jytdog (talk) 01:36, 17 April 2017 (UTC)

• WARNING ABOUT EDIT WARRING. This material has been in the article for years, and that status quo should remain until there is a clear consensus for removal. The very next person to remove it will be reported at ANI for edit warring. --Guy Macon (talk) 18:26, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Well yes to the first part. Local consensus doesn't override policies and guidelines, and the defending-this-content-to-the-death edit warring is not OK. I just reported GregJackP who has gone over 3RR. Jytdog (talk) 18:42, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

You are aware that 3RR refers to a 24-hour period? Because your referral just got closed as no violation. Get consensus, and then remove it. Ask for an RfC. Do it properly, by seeking consensus. GregJackP Boomer! 19:10, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Please do not wait for the other person to start the RfC—one of you just do it. El_C 19:19, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

User:El_C We don't need an RfC necessarily. The question is about sourcing - the content above is sourced from a google search (and searches are not reliable sources per RS) and from infowars - a primary source the use of which is SYN here. If we can find a reliable source that discusses the meme we could resolve this. What GregJackP is doing here is just is using litigator tactics to keep this bad content instead of using his expertise and access to legal refs to resolve it. Jytdog (talk) 19:22, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Infowars is a problematic source, GregJackP. Maybe try to find a reliable source for a better citation. El_C 19:37, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

@El C:, as I stated at the EWN, I don't have a problem with Infowars being removed. That's not what they're doing, they're blanking the entire section. Now one of Jytdogs buddies, whose has never edited here before, showed up to delete the same section. GregJackP Boomer! 19:46, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

• New references. See the following for what the case actually says:

• Jan Arno Hessbruegge, Human Rights and Personal Self-Defense in International Law 302 (2016).
• Rollins M. Perkins, The Tennessee Law of Arrest, 2 Vand. L. Rev. 509, 657 (1948-1949).

Cubby remains a source for the error in the meme. GregJackP Boomer! 19:52, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

The lack of independent sources shows there is a WEIGHT problem. The content appears to be WP:TRIVIA. QuackGuru (talk) 19:58, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

WP:WEIGHT clearly says "If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents" Alex Jones (radio host) meets the requirements of being a prominent adherent. --Guy Macon (talk) 21:49, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Guy Macon you are commended for not joining in the edit war. El_C 22:28, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

If the passage has been in the article for years, you could have waited a few days for the discussion to resolve, Jytdogs and QuackGuru. You two did not have to edit war to, aggressively, get the new-removed version up while the discussion is still ongoing. El_C 22:06, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Continuing to add unreliable sources such as blogs does not meet Misplaced Pages standard for reliable sources. We can clear the unreliable sources and may keep a shortened version. The version with the blog does not pass Misplaced Pages's rules. QuackGuru (talk) 22:16, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

That is besides the point. What's a few more days in the context of years? You may be right on the content (I really don't know—I haven't read the article closely), but you two are wrong on the impatience front. The bad blood between GregJackP and Jytdogs sure doesn't help. El_C 22:28, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

The point is there should not continue to be tolerance for unreliable sources after it was pointed out they are unreliable. QuackGuru (talk) 22:32, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Which is why I added additional refs. Simple Justice is a reliable source, widely read in the legal community, and is at least as reliable as Patently-O, if not more so. You may want to ask JYTDog about his use of legal blogs as references in legal articles before you arbitrarily decide that one is not reliable. Greenfield's blog has been cited by federal and state courts across the country (including state Supreme Courts), was recognized as a Top 100 legal blog by the American Bar Association from its first Top 100 list until 2012, when it was placed in the ABA blog Hall of Fame, right next to the entry for SCOTUSBlog. GregJackP Boomer! 22:39, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

Also, just to let you know, at 2:00 PM tomorrow (local time), I'll revert the last change back to the long-term version, and I'll continue to do so until you get consensus to remove the material. GregJackP Boomer! 22:43, 19 April 2017 (UTC)

• All unassessed articles
• Start-Class law articles
• Low-importance law articles
• WikiProject Law articles
• Unassessed Law enforcement articles
• Unknown-importance Law enforcement articles
• WikiProject Law Enforcement articles
• Start-Class United States articles
• Low-importance United States articles
• Start-Class United States articles of Low-importance
• Start-Class Indiana articles
• Low-importance Indiana articles
• WikiProject Indiana articles
• WikiProject United States articles