What Are Citizen’s Arrests—and Do They Ever Result in Justice?

Citizen’s arrests have become a controversial statute in recent years, especially with regard to their legal definition and how they vary across the United States. Known in pop culture as the humorous subject of an Andy Griffith Show episode, citizen’s arrests have led to a wide spectrum of outcomes in real life, causing states to wrangle with the ramifications of this unique law.

Legally, the definition of a citizen’s arrest is straightforward.

“A citizen’s arrest occurs when an ordinary citizen detains a person in the belief they have committed a crime,” Christopher Slobogin, a professor of law at Vanderbilt University, tells A&E Crime + Investigation.

Aliza Hochman Bloom, an assistant professor of law at Northeastern University, adds to A&E Crime + Investigation that a citizen’s arrest can occur “when police are not immediately available, [and] a citizen can use force.”

Though the broad meaning of citizen’s arrests is clear, its specificities vary nationwide.

“Some states, like Texas, only allow someone to make a citizen’s arrest for crimes ‘committed in his presence,’ [while] other states, like California, allow citizen’s arrests for felonies committed outside of the arresting party's presence,” Seth Stoughton, a law professor at the University of South Carolina, tells A&E Crime + Investigation.

Stoughton also says that in some parts of the country, an arrest must take place in the county in which the crime occurred, potentially causing more confusion and uncertainty.

Citizen’s arrests date back several centuries, originating across the pond in a time before organized police forces. The English Statute of Winchester in 1285 introduced the concept by allowing any public citizen to detain a person they saw to have committed a felony.

“This was important because there were no police departments until the 1830s,” Stoughton notes.

Due to the United States being an English colony, it adopted this unique practice when it became an independent nation. As a result, citizen’s arrests empowered regular individuals to pursue justice in several ways. However, the laws of long ago can sometimes prove hard to warrant a citizen’s arrest in the modern era of police departments and countless laws.

Slobogin clarifies that only a handful of felonies existed up until approximately 100 years ago, whereas now the law contains dozens of crimes that could constitute someone’s arrest. He also explains that citizen’s arrests have historically highlighted inequality in the United States.

“Originally, the only group of people who could make citizen's arrests were white men, and prior to the Civil War that legal authority was used to terrorize enslaved and free Black communities. During Jim Crow and into the 1900s, vigilantes used citizen's arrest laws to justify, among other things, kidnappings and lynchings.”

Citizen’s arrests can take several forms and lead to many different outcomes, from a shopkeeper detaining a shoplifter until authorities arrive, to a police officer pursuing a known criminal without a warrant whilst outside his jurisdiction. Both are examples of legal acts of citizen’s arrests, which are often coupled with the varied self-defense laws that exist across America.

“Where citizen’s arrests are allowed will have to do with [states’] concealed carry rules [and] the concept of ‘stand your ground,’” Hochman Bloom says. As an example, she points to Florida, which “has a very strong Stand Your Ground statute, which allows citizens to use force in the defense of self, others or property.”

Slobogin explains how a similar statute in Georgia led to the citizen’s arrest that resulted in Ahmaud Arbery’s murder in 2020: “Arbery, a Black man, was seen entering a house under construction. Three white men decided to arrest him for trespass. One pointed a gun at Arbery, who tried to wrestle it away. Arbery was shot and killed.”

He goes on to explain that the attempted arrest and ensuing pursuit of Arbery was arguably illegal, because trespass is not a felony. In the end, a jury determined that this specific case displayed a disproportionate amount of force that did not match the alleged “crime.”

Arbery’s death is one of many that shows the potentially lethal side to citizen’s arrests—and the headache this practice can cause for actual law enforcement officers. While police officers receive considerable training in criminal law, most private citizens never learn anything formally about such topics.

“Officers now have to figure out not just whether the detained person committed a crime, but also whether the detaining person committed a crime,” Stoughton says.

Because of several recent tragedies involving citizen’s arrests, some states, like Georgia, have repealed their laws. Others, like Utah, have similarly chosen to amend the wording of their laws. But the consensus is that, while the extent and individual rules of citizen’s arrests may change, as a practice they will likely still exist in some form.

“If a person has clearly committed a serious crime, is about to escape, the police cannot be contacted in time and the arrest can be made without the use of deadly force, a citizen’s arrest should be permissible,” Slobogin says. Though he warns that anyone who attempts a citizen’s arrest should know they could be held criminally liable if the perceived criminal is harmed in the act of apprehension or, worse, actually turns out to be innocent.

Regarding their ironically double-edged nature, Stoughton admits that citizen’s arrests can both empower a public citizenry that seeks justice while undermining the pursuit of that exact justice.

“While I am generally comfortable with what we might call specialized citizen’s arrest laws, more generalized citizen’s arrest laws can create perverse incentives and some really bad outcomes,” he says.

Hochman Bloom offers another viewpoint: “States have a really difficult time regulating police use of discretion and authority and violence. So, we should probably be focusing and narrowing on that, not expanding authority.”