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Md. Code, Public Safety § 13-702

This is the official text of Md. Code, Public Safety § 13-702, part of Maryland’s Code, Public Safety — governs police, fire, and emergency services.

Not legal advice. This page reproduces the official text of a government statute for reference only. Laws change, and how a statute applies depends on your specific facts. For advice about your situation, consult a licensed attorney in your state.

§13–702.

Official statutory text

(a) This section applies to the Maryland Defense Force and the National Guard.

(b) The Governor may order the militia into State active duty:

(1) in times of or on reasonable apprehension of imminent public crisis, disaster, rioting, catastrophe, insurrection, invasion, tumult, or breach of peace;

(2) when martial law is declared;

(3) to enforce the laws; or

(4) to carry on any function of the militia of the State.

(c) (1) To enforce the laws, a member of the militia in State active duty has all the authority of a peace or law enforcement officer.

(2) The authority of the member extends throughout the State during the State active duty.

(d) Whenever the militia is in State active duty, the ranking officer of the militia ordered into State active duty or that officer’s subordinates on State active duty shall:

(1) cooperate with local law enforcement authorities; or

(2) if the exigencies of the case require and subject only to order from the Governor:

(i) direct and control local law enforcement authorities and the Department of State Police; and

(ii) assume all the powers vested in these subordinated law enforcement authorities.

Status: in_force · Read it on the official government site

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About this page: Statute text is reproduced from official government publishers via the Open US Law dataset (Vaquill AI, snapshot v2026.08, CC BY 4.0). Primary legislative text like this is public domain under the government-edicts doctrine (Georgia v. Public.Resource.Org, 2020). We link every section back to its official source so you can verify it independently.