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Peace officer authority and jurisdiction

Summary of the topic

This topic answers three questions: who is a peace officer, what is a peace officer for, and where may a peace officer act. Article 2A.001 of the Code of Criminal Procedure is the list. A person is a peace officer because the person holds one of the offices or commissions it names, not because the person holds a license. The first three entries are sheriffs and their deputies, constables and their deputies, and municipal marshals and police officers, and each of those entries requires a permanent peace officer license issued under Chapter 1701 of the Occupations Code.

Article 2A.002 deals with federal criminal investigators. They are not peace officers, but they have the powers of arrest, search and seizure under Texas law for felony offenses.

Article 2A.051 sets the general powers and duties, all of them tied to the officer's jurisdiction. They include preserving the peace by lawful means, preventing or suppressing crime without a warrant where the Code allows it, executing lawful process from a magistrate or court, giving notice to a magistrate of offenses committed in the jurisdiction, and arresting an offender without a warrant when the law authorizes it.

Article 14.03(d) is the general out-of-jurisdiction rule. Outside their jurisdiction, any peace officer may arrest without a warrant a person who commits a felony, an offense under Penal Code Chapter 42 or 49, or a breach of the peace in the officer's presence or view. The officer must notify a law enforcement agency that has jurisdiction where the arrest was made as soon as practicable, and that agency takes custody of the person.

Article 14.03(g) widens the rule for licensed sheriffs, deputies, constables and prosecutor investigators, who may arrest outside their jurisdiction for any offense committed in their presence or view, other than a violation of the Transportation Code rules of the road. A licensed municipal officer has the same power, but may arrest for a rules-of-the-road violation only if it is committed in the county or counties where the employing municipality is located.

Chapter 1701 of the Occupations Code is the other half. The Texas Commission on Law Enforcement issues the license, and section 1701.301 forbids appointing or employing an unlicensed person as an officer. The agency appoints, the commission licenses, and neither alone makes a peace officer.

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