Let’s see if I understand this situation correctly.
CMPD apprehends a man that a woman IDs as having groped her. The woman indicates she does not wish to press charges against him. CMPD turns man loose. End of interaction.
At no point during the time this man — described as Hispanic and in his mid-20s — is in custody does CMPD ask for his ID. We do not know how long the man was in custody and we have to infer that CMPD did not ask for ID in as much as police did not get it.
Now if you roll through a stop sign, police will ask for ID and run it. Yet here is a man accused of a sexual offense in broad daylight and — nada?
Call me crazy — ok, crazzzzeeee — but it sure sounds like CMPD went out of its way not to ask this guy for ID knowing that he might well not have any, triggering a serious of events which would result in 287g process down at the Mecklenburg County jail.
Stay tuned.
Update: Aha. This WBTV adds the crucial detail that CMPD never had the guy in custody — a not small point that the UPoR/WCNC account utterly and completely skipped over. Turns out the “custody” CMPD Sgt. Bob Cooke was referring to was the “custody” of two Harris Teeter employees who escorted the guy from their store. Now this situation makes tons more sense.
