Mr. Bookman May Come A-Knockin’

 The “library police” are not just on the T.V. show Seinfeld, where Mr. Bookman, the library detective, comes knocking at Jerry Seinfeld’s door.  They are also right here at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law Library.

The next time the door alarm goes off as you walk out of the Law Library, don’t be surprised if you look behind you and see a library employee gaining chase and asking you to stop.

But don’t panic.  Most of the alarms at the Law Library end up being false.  If someone is truly trying to take materials from the Law Library, it is within the right of a library employee in Ohio to detain someone they suspect of stealing materials from the Library.  The Ohio Revised Code Section 2935.041(B) states that an “agent of a library” may “detain a person in a reasonable manner for a reasonable length of time” if the “agent has probable cause to believe that the person has “exerted control over the property without consent”.  Several other states, such as Connecticut, and Iowa have similar laws on their books as well.

A library employee cannot go too far, such as searching your property or, perhaps, pinning you to the ground.  In O.R.C. Section 2935.041(E), library employees cannot “search the person being detained without the person’s consent”, or “use undue restraint upon the person being detained”.   So we won’t be doing any of that to you, unless you want us to.  According to O.R.C. Section 2935.041(C)(2), a library employee can even “cause an arrest to be made” by a police officer.

So, even though the new copy of “Evidence: Examples and Explanations” might help you to ace your next exam, it’s probably not worth the risk of being arrested by trying to take the book out of the Law Library.  The Law Library is open many hours, and you can avoid a visit by Mr. Bookman, by just reading the book for as long as we are open or by checking it out at the circulation desk and taking it home with you.