This summary is not the rule. The rule text controls.
When police arrest someone for a misdemeanor in Tennessee, they can sometimes give that person a citation instead of taking them straight to jail. A citation is like a ticket. It tells the person what they're charged with and when they need to show up in court. The rules for when police can use a citation instead of an arrest are set by Tennessee law, not by this specific court rule.
This rule also explains that anywhere else in the Tennessee Rules of Criminal Procedure mentions a "citation," it means this same kind of citation, the one issued under the law described above. This keeps things consistent so there's no confusion about what a citation means throughout the rest of the criminal procedure rules.
In short, this rule doesn't create new rights or procedures on its own. It just points to existing law for how citations work in misdemeanor cases, and it makes sure the word "citation" means the same thing every time it shows up in the rules.
