Recently passed state legislation has limited the Jacksonville Police Department\u2019s authority to make arrests in part of the city, leading to a temporary workaround with the Onslow County Sheriff\u2019s Office.<\/p>\n
A provision in House Bill 116, which became law Aug. 6, limits Jacksonville police officers\u2019 authority to arrest people in a small geographic area of the city, Jacksonville Police interim chief Ashley Weaver said Monday.<\/p>\n
The Jacksonville Police Department and Onslow County Sheriff’s Office have procedures in place to cover arresting authority until the N.C. General Assembly can correct the issue, Weaver said.<\/p>\n
The city became aware of the jurisdictional issue shortly after the bill passed, Weaver said. City officials, the city attorney, Jacksonville Police Department, the Onslow County Sheriff\u2019s Office and the District Attorney\u2019s Office then developed a plan for the sheriff\u2019s office to assist JPD with arrests when necessary.<\/p>\n
As a result, a written mutual aid agreement between JPD and the Onslow County Sheriff\u2019s Office deputizes Jacksonville police officers to act with the same powers available to a sheriff\u2019s deputy, Weaver said.<\/p>\n
Weaver said the bill\u2019s provision does not affect whether a crime occurred, whether probable cause exists or whether evidence supports a criminal charge.<\/p>\n
On Sept. 8, Councilwoman Cindy Edwards and Councilman Michael Yaniero held a media briefing in front of the former Onslow County Courthouse in Jacksonville. They said they were speaking as private citizens and not on behalf of the city or Jacksonville City Council.<\/p>\n
At that event, Edwards said HB 116 is also the legislation that removed Jacksonville\u2019s extraterritorial jurisdiction, or ETJ, and annexed portions of Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune and Marine Corps Air Station New River into the city.<\/p>\n
The legislation restricts JPD\u2019s authority to areas north of N.C. 24. The affected area includes part of downtown Jacksonville, including\u00a0Jacksonville City Hall, and areas that are within the city limits but located south of N.C. 24, Edwards said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf it’s a strict legal interpretation, anything south of highway 24. Highway 24 has two pieces. There’s the bypass that pretty much goes south of the city, and then there’s highway 24 proper that bisects the bottom of the city off,\u201d Edwards said.<\/p>\n
Yaniero said the Jacksonville Police Department is within the affected area.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat this bill did is, a section of the city, it removed that ability for them to be a police officer,\u201d Yaniero said.<\/p>\n
Edwards and Yaniero described the changes as an unintended consequence of the bill\u2019s language.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happened with this bill is the way it was written. A lot of the lawyers that have looked at it have said, you know, this is an impact with the police department,\u201d Yaniero said.<\/p>\n
Weaver said city leaders have been informed that the N.C. General Assembly plans to correct the language when the legislature returns in November.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Recently passed state legislation has limited the Jacksonville Police Department\u2019s authority to make arrests in part of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":407985,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[116,118,117,634],"class_list":["post-407984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-local"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=407984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/407985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=407984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=407984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=407984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}