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Toddler critically injured by ‘flash bang’ during police search
www.ajc.com ^ | 5/29/14 | Alexis Stevens

Posted on 05/29/2014 5:26:52 PM PDT by armydawg505

A 19-month-old boy critically injured when a police device was tossed into his bed has a 50 percent chance of surviving, his parents said today. But a northeast Georgia sheriff defends the officers’ actions, calling it a tragic accident. “The last thing you want is law enforcement to injure someone innocent,” Habersham County Sheriff Joey Terrell told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “There was no malicious act performed. It was a terrible accident that was never supposed to happen.” Hours after a confidential informant said he bought methamphetamine from Wanis Thometheva at a Habersham County home late Tuesday, officers returned to the home to arrest him.

(Excerpt) Read more at ajc.com ...


TOPICS: Society
KEYWORDS: bootlicker; donutwatch; flashbang; georgia; policestate; toddler; tragic; tragicaccident; wenthomesafe; wod
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To: jimpick

This is so true yet they really are above the law themselves. This has been proven time and again lately:(


121 posted on 05/30/2014 5:20:59 AM PDT by kelly4c (http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/post?id=2900389%2C41#help)
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To: LevinFan

It happened a few months ago too? A baby girl got burned? I can’t say what I want to say:( I don’t know how it might be misconstrued by TPTB. Lord help us though.


122 posted on 05/30/2014 5:28:21 AM PDT by kelly4c (http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/post?id=2900389%2C41#help)
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To: kelly4c

” It happened a few months ago too? A
baby girl got burned? I can’t say what I
want to say:( I don’t know how it might be
misconstrued by TPTB. Lord help us
though.”

And the meth lab didn’t even exist.


123 posted on 05/30/2014 5:35:23 AM PDT by LevinFan
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To: Timber Rattler

Sweet, innocent little toddler with fresh beautiful skin that’s now scarred, likely for life, if he makes it:(


124 posted on 05/30/2014 5:38:55 AM PDT by kelly4c (http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/post?id=2900389%2C41#help)
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To: 48th SPS

Thank you, especially as a former LEO, for making the sense that so many don’t these days. I’m getting so sick of all their empty damn platitudes. Always covering each other’s butts. When something like this happens you’d think they might try and assure the public they are going to review, revamp their policies, methods, whatever to reduce risk of harm to innocents in the future.


125 posted on 05/30/2014 5:49:45 AM PDT by kelly4c (http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/post?id=2900389%2C41#help)
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To: armydawg505

...but, what law did the child break....? It was judged and prosecuted w/o a trial....!

That’s CRIMINAL....PERIOD...!


126 posted on 05/30/2014 5:52:43 AM PDT by swampfox101
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To: armydawg505

Even if we have to mutilate a million babies, it’s worth it if we can prevent even one idiot from putting unapproved substances in his body.


127 posted on 05/30/2014 5:58:16 AM PDT by Sloth (Rather than a lesser Evil, I voted for Goode.)
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To: Abathar

“”””If I can be charged with a crime that was done by accident so should the police. Two sets of laws are not acceptable.”
First off, I am not defending the cop here.

However, I would like to point out that my friends father admitted to the family shortly before his passing that he mistook an American patrol for enemy combatants on one of the islands during WWII and open fired, killing a brother marine and wounding another. It was termed “the fog of war” and he lived with that guilt his entire life, but was never charged as a crime. I bet this cop is torn up inside and will never forgive himself for doing this after seeing that baby in a pool of blood, but I think that the higher ups who expected him to do what he did and made it their SOP is really who should be held accountable.

Now granted in small town America it’s not a war zone, but in places like Detroit and Chicago it sure as hell isn’t like it was a while ago either.

30 years ago I was going to be a reserve police officer, my parents talked me out of it because it would conflict with our business. Now I wouldn’t be a cop and have to deal with the kind of people you have to day in and day out for all the tea in China. “””

The military and the police are two different things. In war you have people whose sole intent is to kill you. We don’t have this in the USA,. If we do, show me a case where the police are under constant attack.

It is no excuse for the police not to know if the person being sought was or was not there. Just like our court system is set up so that it is better to let a criminal go than imprison a innocent person so should be the reasoning with this. IE it is better to let one criminal go than hurt a innocent. This fact is lost with the current police forces in many cities. True police work is set on protecting the innocent people dictating that you know who is present when you attack to protect the people you are charged with protecting. There is no excuse to break the door down without doing proper investigation first.

This case just shows that the police force here was more concerned with protecting their officers than protecting the people they claim to be protecting.


128 posted on 05/30/2014 6:22:57 AM PDT by jimpick
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To: 48th SPS

“The last thing you want is law enforcement to injure someone innocent,”

That’s not a true statement from the Sheriff. If the “last” thing you want is to injure somebody innocent your policy would not include no-knock raids unless imminent danger to an innocent was evident.

A truer statement from the Sheriff would be something like this:

“While we don’t want to hurt innocent people while conducting our business, we feel the occasional death or injury of the innocent is acceptable collateral damage while we do what we do.”


129 posted on 05/30/2014 6:38:20 AM PDT by DariusBane (Liberty and Risk. Flip sides of the same coin. So how much risk will YOU accept? Vive Deco et Vives)
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To: GrootheWanderer

“The article says they cops didn’t know any children were in the house. It also says the man they were trying to arrest was not there. They arrested him later, at another house.

They clearly did not do any surveillance of the place. None. Nada. Zip.”

That’s the most outrageous part, they storm a place with a no knock arrest warrant and they don’t even make the minimal amount effort it takes to know whether the guy was home? What if they’d stormed the place and there were 4-5 armed guys there? Would they even have known?


130 posted on 05/30/2014 6:47:10 AM PDT by Blackyce (French President Jacques Chirac: "As far as I'm concerned, war always means failure.")
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To: Abathar

The one point you are missing in holding the individual officer accountable for implementing the DPT SOP is this:

Nobody was ever forced to be a cop. Never. It is a voluntary act to go to cop school. I have always wondered how they find people willing to do the job, but they always find people who will do it.

Now me, I could not get up every day, put on a uniform and spend my days and nights harassing Grandma for a burned out turn signal, or in this case doing no-knock raids. I couldn’t do it. No way. I couldn’t hide behind a billboard on a Saturday afternoon and make traffic stops on people going to little league games for “improper left turns” or whatever they can dream up. I couldn’t do it.

I couldn’t work a highway interdiction task force and seize vehicles and cash without recourse on the flimsy premise that if you carry cash you are guilty of running drugs. I couldn’t do the job. But plenty of people will do the job.

They should be confronted personally for their choices. Cops don’t like that and hide behind departmental policy. I know, because I have had the conversation. It takes balls to confront a cop personally and it is dangerous. They get angry.

But cops choose to be cops. Cops choose to do the job.


131 posted on 05/30/2014 7:01:28 AM PDT by DariusBane (Liberty and Risk. Flip sides of the same coin. So how much risk will YOU accept? Vive Deco et Vives)
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To: Doomonyou
There was no malicious act performed.
Right. Dumping a flash bang in a crib is not malicious, just an accident.

A parent who stored similar explosives in their infant's room would likely have CPS take the child away and get charged with negligence.

132 posted on 05/30/2014 7:17:01 AM PDT by Teacher317 (We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men)
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To: armydawg505

The bottom line is that if government were yet bound by the Constitution, we would have NO war on some drugs, as government would KNOW that it has ZERO business “protecting us from ourselves”! There is no possible justification for jailing people whose sole “crime” is to ingest something some bluenose doesn’t like. None whatsoever. Contrary to popular belief, drug users do NOT “damage society”; they only damage themselves and possibly, nay, probably hurt their families. Any actual CRIMINAL acts they might commit while under the influence are already covered.

I have absolutely no use for ANYONE who advocates such activities, ESPECIALLY one who has sworn an oath to PROTECT our Constitution and the Republic. You are NOT protecting, you are SHREDDING the Constitution and, as far as I am concerned, you belong in the prison cell right next to Obummer and his merry band of slimeballs.


133 posted on 05/30/2014 7:23:07 AM PDT by dcwusmc (A FREE People have no sovereign save Almighty GOD!!! III OK We are EVERYWHERE!!!)
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To: armydawg505

The bottom line is that if government were yet bound by the Constitution, we would have NO war on some drugs, as government would KNOW that it has ZERO business “protecting us from ourselves”! There is no possible justification for jailing people whose sole “crime” is to ingest something some bluenose doesn’t like. None whatsoever. Contrary to popular belief, drug users do NOT “damage society”; they only damage themselves and possibly, nay, probably hurt their families. Any actual CRIMINAL acts they might commit while under the influence are already covered.

I have absolutely no use for ANYONE who advocates such activities, ESPECIALLY one who has sworn an oath to PROTECT our Constitution and the Republic. You are NOT protecting, you are SHREDDING the Constitution and, as far as I am concerned, you belong in the prison cell right next to Obummer and his merry band of slimeballs.


134 posted on 05/30/2014 7:23:27 AM PDT by dcwusmc (A FREE People have no sovereign save Almighty GOD!!! III OK We are EVERYWHERE!!!)
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To: DariusBane

” “The last thing you want is law
enforcement to injure someone innocent,””

Flat out lie. Nothing but soothing words. If it were true, they would have taken the risks upon themselves, and flash bangs wouldn’t be in the armory.

What people are forgetting is this isn’t just about a harmed child. Anyone and anything could have been burned by this. It is no more acceptable if this had been a 30yo man or woman. It is just more sensational. This probably happens far more frequently than we know. We only hear about this one because of the baby.
This device is not safe in a civilian world.


135 posted on 05/30/2014 7:28:53 AM PDT by LevinFan
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To: armydawg505
A 19-month-old boy critically injured when a police device was tossed into his bed has a 50 percent chance of surviving [...] a confidential informant said he bought methamphetamine

The War on Drugs is for the children.

136 posted on 05/30/2014 8:14:46 AM PDT by ConservingFreedom (A goverrnment strong enough to impose your standards is strong enough to ban them.)
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To: Teacher317
A parent who stored similar explosives in their infant's room...

Anyone, parent or not a parent, who stored similar explosives without a "destructive device" permit from the ATF would be looking at years in the graybar hotel and a six-figure fine.

137 posted on 05/30/2014 5:24:22 PM PDT by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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To: Abathar
Blah blah blah fog of war blah blah blah...

Cops ARE NOT MILITARY. There is no comparison.
138 posted on 05/30/2014 10:58:32 PM PDT by Half Vast Conspiracy (Settled science.)
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To: Altariel

Sheriff Terrell says the suspects are dangerous drug dealers who are known to be armed. Hence, the SWAT team, the no-knock raid and the flash grenade. I’ve yet to see any indication that drugs were found, which usually (but not always) means that the police didn’t find any. Frequently in cases where a raid goes wrong, police tend to be quick to point out what they found to justify their actions. (The police did apparently make an arrest.)
[...]
Here’s the problem: If your drug cops conduct a raid that ends up putting a child in the hospital with critical burns, and they did nothing that violates your department’s policy, then there’s something wrong with your policy.
[...]
There are some very limited circumstances where flashbangs may be appropriate in domestic policing, such as when a fugitive has barricaded himself in a building, or during a hostage situation where lives are at immediate risk. Using them for drug raids is reckless, dangerous, and unnecessarily jeopardizes the safety and constitutional rights of citizens in the name of preventing other citizens from getting high.

Of course, that’s also a pretty good description of the drug war in general.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2014/05/30/georgia-toddler-critically-injured-by-polices-flash-grenade/


139 posted on 05/31/2014 8:23:24 AM PDT by Altariel ("Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!")
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To: Altariel

Drug task force that burned a toddler this week also killed an innocent pastor in 2009

http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-watch/wp/2014/05/30/drug-task-force-that-burned-a-toddler-this-week-also-killed-an-innocent-pastor-in-2009/


140 posted on 05/31/2014 11:08:31 AM PDT by Altariel ("Curse your sudden but inevitable betrayal!")
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