I apologise that my post doesn't answer your question but I notice that it implies different judicial rules in different counties. This site is UK-based and all of our counties have common legislation (except that Scotland has different laws and Northern Ireland occasionally has minor legal differences).
So I'm guessing that you're in the US. In which case, you're far more likely to get an answer on a US website. I suggest trying one of these:
http://answers.yahoo.com
http://www.answerbag.com
I hope that this response doesn't appear unfriendly. We Brits are more than happy to answer questions from anywhere in the world about science, animals, relationships or anything else that doesn't depend upon location, but US laws are vastly different to those of the UK, so we're simply 'out of our depth' with questions like this one.
Chris
PS: If I've misunderstood your question and you're actually in the UK, please explain further as to what you mean.