NC man in jail a week for mistaken identity

[Liberal_in_LA]

NC man in jail a week for mistaken identity

GREENSBORO, N.C. -- Authorities say a 44-year-old North Carolina man spent a week in jail because he has the same name as a suspect 23 years younger.

The News & Record of Greensboro reported Saturday that Jesse Ray Hardy Jr. of Greenville was arrested Monday, then taken to jail 160 miles away to face charges of resisting an officer, breaking and entering and failing to yield to a pedestrian.

Court officials say the real suspect shares the same name and hometown, but is not related.

The mix-up wasn't realized until Friday, despite court appearances in both Pitt and Guilford counties.

Judge Susan Bray apologized to Hardy as she worked to get him released.

But he didn't have a way home.

Bray, prosecutors, defense attorneys and bailiffs collected $58 to buy Hardy lunch and a bus ticket back home.

http://www1.whdh.com/news/articles/bizarre/BO126654/
I hope he contacts an attorney and gets more than $58 for his week in jail.

[vadawg]

1. wonder why he didnt say anyting, believe it or not its something that gets checked big time

if someone says they are not the person, and believe it or not its pretty common for people to be held on warrants for people with similar names etc. I think there is more to this story than we are getting here....

on edit i will add i know of one inmate who was happy to sit in our jail when he said he was here by mistake, and funnily enough he was, we were holding him for another county and they had messed up the paperwork, he should have been released a week before and collected a nice lump sum, so it will be interesting to find out the whole story..

[JonLP24]

3. They probably didn't believe him

It wouldn't be the first time LE didn't believe a potential suspect. Besides there is no link to read more. :shrug:

[vadawg]

5. yup thing is if a suspect in the jail says you have the wrong guy, then it starts a process

questions start to get asked, im intrigued to find out if he told anyone or if he just decided to stay and collect a payday..

[kestrel91316]

9. He still deserves compensation. It's not HIS job to make sure the

LE crowd doesn't fuck up. It's THEIR job not to fuck up in the first place, and then detect said fuckups promptly and correct them.

[vadawg]

10. nope if he was asked questions like is this your social and DOB and he answered positive

then the fault is his, this happens a lot more than you realise and has been through court a lot too, i have personally seen two cases like this, one the guy won because he actually tried to fix it, the other the guy sat inthe jail waiting on his payday, unfortunately for him he signed the paperwork so he was saying he was the guy, and then he got charges of falsifying a public record.. but in this case we need more details...

[kestrel91316]

14. Oh, certainly, if he overtly misled anyone then he's partly to blame.

I thought people got fingerprinted enough these days that that couldn't even happen. My prints are on file because of my profession. I guess everybody else's aren't, lol.

[vadawg]

16. yup one of the reasons we print people is to avoid mistakes

but it can still happen, i dont know their booking procedures but im intrigued as to whether he told them, because the age difference is something that would send flags up normally if he did say someting...

[Zix]

11. Well, I think the point is...

If he didn't say anything... they can't reasonably be accused of having fucked up...

Mind you, we don't know whether he did or not.

[kestrel91316]

15. Sure they can. They should be able to tell an 18 yr olf from a 40-something.

I know I can.

[vadawg]

17. are you sure, i deal with people a lot, addicts and homeless who when i do paperwork

i list their age 20 to 40 because its so hard to ascertain the age, there are a lot of people out there who have aged real fast...

[Fumesucker]

13. Civilians don't generally know that..

Unless this guy already has a criminal record it would be unlikely IMO that he deliberately shut up other than to keep from getting his ass beat.

No, I know that doesn't happen in every single jurisdiction but it's a possibility you have to take into account if you're arrested.

[Zix]

18. Surely any reasonable person would make the assumption that the cops actually want the right guy?

Its the assumption I'd make.

[Fumesucker]

25. No, the assumption I would make is that if I were to protest too vigorously..

The cops would take steps to punish my protests.

Again, not all cops but a high enough percentage that I would not create too much grief for them because you never know.

[Liberal_in_LA]

6. ooops. link added

[Gman2]

12. Well, as Barbara Bush said, most of these people are on public assistance, so

this whole superdome thingie is better than home. Hey, you, stop bleeding over there.

[jwirr]

21. My SIL had his VA pension stopped because he was supposed to

be in prison in Arizona. It has taken him over a year to convince them it was not him nor was it his social security number that was in prison. Given that many of those things are easily checked on the computer it is really a crime against the innocent.

[Iggo]

22. Yep. I almost went to jail last night for having the same name...

...as someone else, spelled slightly differently.

[vadawg]

23. notice the almost part, the system works it just sometimes needs a kick in the pants

from someone who sees it going wrong..

[Iggo]

24. It's not the system I'm worries about.

It's the individuals and groups of indoviduals working the system.

I could just as easily be sitting in jail right now waiting to see a judge on Monday.

[malaise]

2. Sue them

and collect.

[LuvNewcastle]

4. I hope he does too.

Stories like this make me glad I have an unusual name.

[Libertas1776]

7. What kind of two bit pony show

are these people running here. Well, it was in NC. Is there any chance this was the "sound" police work of Mayberry Sheriff's Dept? Did Aunt Bee make him the lunch?

Well then it looks like Sheriff Taylor and Deputy Fife are going to be up to there noses in litigation.

[Old Codger]

8. they should have

Hired a limo to get him home after treating him to one hell of a meal...

[KatyaR]

19. My boss went to a leadership workshop with police and fire this week

and told me a story about a local woman who spent 45 days in jail because she didn't have a reflector on her bicycle. Hand to God, FORTY-FIVE DAYS. How the hell she stayed there so long, I'll never know.

Unbelievable . . . .

[vadawg]

20. i think you will find that it wasnt mistaken identity, she obviously was sentenced by a judge

no idea if the reflector was teh only charge, was she drunk at the time etc etc..