Being charged is enough to hold you for 3 days, as well as to put you on probation for a couple months afterwards, even if the charges are dropped. This happened to a friend of mine when he was frustrated with an inland border control roadblock and didn't want to answer the questioning officer. He did not resist, was not violent in any way. He simply politely declined to answer.

In the end it cost him over a grand to get his car back and to pay for drug tests required by the probation. Again, he was never actually charged with anything.

Policing in this nation is fundamentally broken. The bad cops know how to use the system to brutalize people without consequences, and the rest of the police close ranks and protect them while they do it.

In addition, for most people, if you miss work for 3 days without an explanation, you'll be fired. If you miss work for 3 days and tell your boss it was because you were arrested, you'll also likely be fired. You'll now also have to answer "YES" on job applications where they ask you whether you've been arrested for anything (even if eventually charges were dropped or you were found not guilty). As an innocent person, the mere brush with law enforcement can have long-standing negative effects on your life.

Yes, fantastic point. My friend was fortunate to own his own business, but he did miss some scheduled stuff and had to explain it to his customers.

If it's just your word against theirs, they might as well be. Everybody is against you except for your low-paid advocate (the public defender) who's working on 100 cases at the same time as they're working on yours. It's different for the wealthy.

Cops are not lawyers or judges, but cops can make your life hell totally legally. There are people who are forced to sign away their right to protest in order to be let out of jail for a charge that is totally dropped.