I think you're exaggerating. Errors happen all the time but fortunately it is usually easy to sort them out. E.g. I know that in my town (about 10k people) there's another person with an identical first & last name. I learned about him because I once received a reminder that was meant for him.If a person is being arrested (not just questioned) under a false cause, there has been a breakdown in the system.
I suppose that also varies a lot depending on which country you live in. Here in Germany almost everyone has a 'defense insurance' to cover the costs of a lawyer and court fees. Apparently, according to the comments on www.leo.org (my favorite dictionary), this concept doesn't even exist in the US. Colour me surprised!We hear the phrase "let me talk to my lawyer", but the reality, most of us don't have a lawyer's name or number on the tip of our tongues or in our contact list.
It's true that I actually had the 'detain and question' scenario in mind, though, not an actual arrest. I'm not sure it changes much, except I'd be very curious what would warrant an arrest.
In recent cop shows I've seen (ex. Castle), it's been pointed out within the show that generally, the person who asks for a lawyer is the guilty one.
So remaining silent or asking for a lawyer falls into the realm of running away. It makes you look guilty, despite actually being innocent.
The logic of "only a guilty person has something to hide" prevails behind this attitude, and as a result standing for your rights only makes you look more guilty.
One possible ridiculous solution to this is to implement an eye for an eye policy. Cops have the right to search, detain, etc. But if they are wrong, then their house gets ransacked, they get strip searched, bubba'd, anything that happened to you during the course of being investigated/detained as an
innocent.
If searching wasn't "free" cops would better guage their need to do it.
Of course, then bad cops would simply come prepared with some plantable evidence for just in case times they search and find nothing.