Posted on 08/09/2008 5:36:06 AM PDT by Virginia Ridgerunner
“Less than a year ago, the same agency raided the wrong house and shot the homeowner’s dog. These a-holes are an “ accident” waiting to happen.”
I did not realize that it was the same agency. You would think the reporters would be asking about this in their questioning. I wonder what happened in this earlier investigation?
Maybe that’s why they shot the dogs, they once got bit trying?
I'm just curious as to how this Sheriff Jackson has remained in office for 19 years with so many big problems on his force and so many debacles on its recent record.
True, but this isn't a case where an apology is enough. Not even nearly.
Real criminals fight back.
From that statement it would have been OK to kill the mother-in-law also......how did i end up in this parallel universe.........
And I'm extremely upset that your officers shot a dog that was running away in the back
Civil rights? The Mayor is white. Civil rights do not apply here.
I agree, but the settlement will come out of the several thousand dollars that I pay in PG County taxes each year. I would ordinarily be glad to take that bullet for the cause, but when does it stop?
"At that point, they see you, you don't see them, and you don't know where they are. . . . That's dangerous," the homeowner said. "You really don't have time to deal with that gunman, you really don't have time to deal with that person. You have to secure and go."
"It is unfortunate that those deputies were killed," he said. "That would be the case whether it was the Sheriff's intruders or anyone else's intruders. A loss of life is always unfortunate. That is not our goal."
I hope that the couple and the wife’s mother are not looking for a big bucks settlement, which penalizes the taxpayer, but to file criminal civil rights charges against the officers participating in the raid and those who authorized it.
The JBTs have to be personally liable or they will not stop.
>”At that point, they see you, you don’t see them, and you don’t know where they are. . . . That’s dangerous,” Jackson said. “You really don’t have time to deal with that dog, you really don’t have time to deal with that person. You have to secure and go.
“It is unfortunate that those dogs were killed,” he said. “That would be the case whether it was the mayor’s house or anyone else’s house. A loss of life is always unfortunate. That is not our goal.”<
Which is it, buffoon? You don’t have time to deal with a pet Lab, so you shoot it, or a loss of life is unfortunate?
If this Mensa candidate stays in office, no resident of PG or their pet will ever be safe.
Oh, no, they weren't caught up in a drug-smuggling ring, they were caught up in out of control LEO situation. The time has come to call a halt to swat teams except in cases of terrorism. They knew where these drugs had gone, they could have arrested the Mayor anytime without a break in of his house.
Jackson reiterated his explanation that it was a scream by Calvo's mother-in-law, Georgia Porter, who saw officers running toward the house, that changed the calculation of officers conducting the raid.
As far as this idiotic statement goes, what does this guy think she should have done, say "Look son there are a bunch of armed men running toward the house, what do you suppose they want?".
To bad she didn't have an AK47 handy, she could have just shot them full of holes, and they would have deserved it. I guess they forget that Americans have the right to shoot armed people storming their house especially when the armed a**hats don't identify themselves.
Out of control! We all need to stop this crap NOw and stop the militarization of our police forces.
Big time BUMP!
The problem is the tactical nature of the "raids".
There is no way in a democratic society we should have police forces behaving like this.
The problem seems to have started in LA in the late '70s or early '80s. Gang bangers had crack houses that were essentially fortresses. The cops would show up, bang on the door. The gang bangers wouldn't answer, the cops would kick the door and since it was about two inches or reinforced steel nothing would happen. Bottom line is it would take about 10 minutes for the cops to get into the crack house, by which time all of the evidence would go down the cloaca. No arrests would be made, liberal judges and the press would question the probable cause for the warrant and everybody except the drug dealers would go away unhappy.
The chief Gates of the LAPD said screw it and went out and got himself an armored car and had a 20 foot battering ram mounted on the front. This solved the entry problem but it had some limitations. First, you needed a good run at the door with the ram, second, it was expensive and third, it was a bit conspicuous - drug dealers tended to see it coming.
The ultimate solution seems to have been the "tactical raid". Lots of well armed cops with hand held battering rams would show up at odd hours and just start yelling and smashing in the door. This generally got the cops in the door before the drugs where all flushed and it made for great TV.
The problem is, it relies heavily on the element of surprise which has lead to several tragedies over the years.
The only solution I can see is for law enforcement to change the way they deal with barricade situations.
The courts need to loosen up on probable cause. If police serve a search warrant and no contraband is found, too bad they flushed it. No expensive trial, no expensive incarceration and the perps are out the cost of the drugs.
Agencies should place more emphasis on buy/bust operations and less on forced entry.
Agencies need to remove the emphasis on the big, photogenic, drug bust. If you catch a dealer with a marketable quantity of drugs it should not make any difference if it's ten grams or 200 kilos. Courts should treat them the same and put the perps away for a long time.
Eliminate "no knock" warrants in cases where someone's life is not suspected to be in immediate danger. Implement a 60 second rule, allowing the home owner a full minute to secure their pets and get to the door before they break it down. If the perps flush the drugs, good, let them. It cuts into their margins.
One word about dogs; I love dogs and I agree that what happened in this case was tragic and unnecessary. But if I were a cop and some drug dealer's pit bull was coming at me that sucker would be real dead real fast.
There is a lot of wisdom contained in this short, phrase, not even a sentence. Well said.
Secondly, these yahoos never checked whose house they were raiding. They delivered that package and waited for it to be taken inside. The mayor came back from walking his Labs, not pit bulls, and took the package inside never knowing what it was. The original article stated that the 4 yr old Lab was running AWAY from them when it was shot. They handcuffed Granny and laid her down next to the 7 yr old dead Lab.
They were alerted to the package by Arizona and it never occured to them that this was a setup situation where someone snatches the package off the porch? Freepers know that's a ploy, they didn't?!
There was EVERYTHING wrong with this raid by overzealous yahoo Leos.
Take heart. Maybe they won’t be able to afford paramilitary swat teams anymore, making all citizens and their fluffy pets safer. :/
Thanks for sharing, but that is completely off the point and irrelevant.
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