Free Republic

ACLU Director of Communications Brandon Hensler says the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida received an early victory today when Senior Federal Judge Lacey A. Collier denied the ATF’s motions for summary judgment in Kilpatrick v. U.S. The ACLU filed the case on April 18, 2006, on behalf of Karen J. Kilpatrick, who claimed that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) violated her Free Speech rights. Kilpatrick was driving her blue van in Pensacola on April 19, 2004, with the slogans “Remember the Children of Waco” and “Boo ATF” written on some of the windows when she was...

In a split decision Thursday, the state Supreme Court rejected a plea by a Kent property owner seeking compensation for damage done during a drug raid. Affirming lower court decisions, five of the court's nine justices found the city of Kent was not required to pay $5,000 for damage to buildings owned by Leo Brutsche during a failed 2004 anti-methamphetamine operation. During the raid, narcotics officers used battering rams to knock down doors in buildings owned by Brutsche while searching for a meth lab they believed Brutsche's son to be operating on the property, according to court records. No drugs...

My name is Butch Housman. Months ago I wrote a letter to the editor of this newspaper. As a result, Federal Agent Thomas Chittum asked to move the trial of my friends Leonard and Tom Elliott to Frankfort and cited my letter as cause, claiming I had “polluted the jury pool.” I was named specifically before the court and was criticized for questioning both the mission of his agency, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives, and in particular his case against the Bacon Creek Gun Shop. I didn’t realize I was such an influential scribe. In light of...

Published on HamptonRoads.com | PilotOnline.com (http://hamptonroads.com) Man claims he broke into garage, was police informant CHESAPEAKE The case against accused cop killer Ryan Frederick relies partially on the accounts of burglars who may have been working as confidential police informants. A 21-year-old Chesapeake man said he and another informant broke into Frederick's garage in the Portlock section of the city in January to look for evidence of a marijuana-growing operation and told the police about what they found there. In an interview at the Chesapeake Correctional Center, Renaldo Turnbull Jr. told The Virginian-Pilot that he had been working with police...

A raid gone wrong: Time to rein in police SWAT teams Published: Friday, September 19, 2008 Marc Fisher The Press of Atlantic City 9/19/09 It's sad, of course, that Cheye Calvo's dogs were blown away, left for hours in two pools of blood on the floors of his living and dining rooms. It's unfortunate, to be sure, that Calvo's front door had to be burst open, that it was necessary to plant his mother-in-law on the floor, arms bound, a high-caliber weapon pointed at her head, or that his house had to be trashed, every drawer flipped over, his belongings...

...In February, the Florida Department of Education modified its standards to explicitly require, for the first time, the state’s public schools to teach evolution, calling it “the organizing principle of life science.” Spurred in part by legal rulings against school districts seeking to favor religious versions of natural history, over a dozen other states have also given more emphasis in recent years to what has long been the scientific consensus: that all of the diverse life forms on Earth descended from a common ancestor, through a process of mutation and natural selection, over billions of years. But in a nation...

Armed with a battering ram and shotguns, Buffalo police looking for heroin broke down the door and stormed the lower apartment of a West Side family of eight. The problem is that the Wednesday evening raid should have occurred at an apartment upstairs. And, that’s only the tip of the iceberg, according to Schavon Pennyamon, who lives at the mistakenly raided apartment on Sherwood Street with her husband, Terrell, and six children. Pennyamon alleges that after wrongly breaking into her apartment, police proceeded to strike her epileptic husband in the head with the butt end of a shotgun and point...

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - The violent assault on Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo’s home late last month was certainly not the first bungled raid by a government SWAT team, but the bad publicity it generated should make it the last time these trigger-happy squads target innocent civilians. Tracking a 32-pound package of marijuana that had been addressed to Calvo’s wife, Trinity Tomsic, Prince George’s sheriff’s deputies forcibly entered the mayor’s home on July 29 and killed his two dogs before handcuffing him and his mother-in-law. But like so many other SWAT team raids across the country, this one turned out...

Police said yesterday they have cleared Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo and his family of any wrongdoing in connection with a package of marijuana that police intercepted en route to his home, leading to a violent raid in which deputy sheriffs killed the family's two dogs. Prince George's County Police Chief Melvin C. High delivered the news in a telephone call Thursday to Calvo, saying police and State's Attorney Glenn F. Ivey determined that Calvo and his family were innocent victims caught up in a drug-smuggling ring. High exonerated the mayor and his family and expressed regret that they were...

4 gunmen bust doors, yell ‘FBI,’ loot home BY JACOB QUINN SANDERS ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE Two men kicked in the front door, splintering it near the bolt-lock. Two more kicked in a side door. All four had guns. It was 3 a.m. “FBI! FBI!” the men shouted, one pulling what looked like a badge out of his shirt before stuffing it back in. “Where’s your money?” Lloyd McCuien lay facedown on the living-room floor of his Pulaski County house — off Arkansas 365 outside Maumelle and within sight of Interstate 40 — surrounded by seven family members. “It took me about...

I saw the local police are angry about the swat team going into the Mayors house. Not only are they Friends of the mayor, the local Police Chief said that if one of his guys had been driving by when 5 heavily armed men in plain clothes and masks were kicking in the Mayor’s front door, they would have been fired on them thinking they were terrorists attacking the mayor’s home. Besides the shooting of dogs for no reason, which is bad enough, why do they have masks over their faces? Bad guys were masks so they can’t be identified...

Berwyn Heights, Maryland Mayor Cheye Calvo on the police raid on his home earlier this month: "The reality is that this happens all the time in this country and disproportionally in Prince Georges county and most of the people to whom it happens don't have the community support and the platform to speak out. So I appreciate you paying attention to our condition but I hope you'll also give attention to those who may not have the same platform and voice that we have." -snip- Here are a few excerpts from Calvo's letter to the Justice Department requesting that investigation:...

The FBI has launched a review of the violent law enforcement raid of the home of Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo in Prince George's County last week that resulted in the deaths of the family's two dogs. The agency has begun "reviewing the events that occurred at Mr. Calvo's residence," said Richard J. Wolf, spokesman for the FBI in Baltimore, which has jurisdiction over federal civil rights investigations in Maryland. (snip) Courts across the country in recent years have ruled that it is almost always unacceptable for police to kill pets in the course of searching a home. Cases in...

Berwyn Heights' mayor is expected today to ask federal officials to investigate possible civil rights violations stemming from last week's raid of his Prince George's County home by police officers who shot and killed his two dogs, his attorney said. Mayor Cheye Calvo and his wife, Trinity Tomsic, will ask for a U.S. Department of Justice inquiry during a 2 p.m. news conference today outside their Berwyn Heights home, said Timothy Maloney, their attorney. "They're going to call for the Justice Department to come in," Maloney said. Calvo's home was raided by the county Sheriff's Office SWAT team and narcotics...

Guest Commentary by Laurie Roth This week I thought I would lose my mind when I heard of the horrifying decision by the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals against Agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Compean. So many of us who had followed this case for the last few years were hoping that once all the evidence had finally been heard, unlike with the first trial, that justice would be done. Wrong!! Justice was not done!!! You may recall in the first trial that the illegal alien, drug thug Osbaldo Aldrete-Davila, who brought 743 pounds of marijuana over our border was...

BATFE: Any Semi-Auto Can Be A Machine Gun by Larry Pratt On July 2 I went to jail. Happily for me, I left right away. Sadly for David Olofson and his family, he had to stay, and will have to stay for 30 months in the Federal Correctional Institute in Sandstone, Minnesota. Why is the federal government incarcerating an Army reservist from Berlin, Wisconsin who has 16 years of service, a mortgage, a wife and three kids? They convicted him for knowingly transferring an unregistered machine gun. Since the case was brought by the rogue agency -- the Bureau of...

An outspoken Long Island gun owner's home was raided by Nassau County detectives, who seized two dozen weapons he lawfully owns just one day after Rep. Carolyn McCarthy's office made a 911 call about him.

Police in St. Louis seized cars, then freely drove them for months at a time. Perk extended to troubled daughter of police chief. Cars seized from motorists are being used as the personal rides of police officers and their relatives in St. Louis, Missouri. St. Louis Post-Dispatch investigative reporters uncovered the scandal while tracking down how Aimie Mokwa, 33, daughter of Police Chief Joe Mokwa, ended up driving vehicles registered to St. Louis Metropolitan Towing and its subsidiaries. Like many cities across the nation, St. Louis has adopted an ordinance giving police officers the ability to grab automobiles from people...

The makers of a Channel 4 documentary which claimed that global warming is a swindle misrepresented the views of some of the world's leading climate scientists, the media watchdog is expected to rule next week. In a judgment at the end of a 15-month enquiry, Ofcom is expected to censure the channel over The Great Global Warming Swindle, broadcast in March last year. The film sparked outcry from environmentalists and led to a complaint from a group of senior scientists about apparent errors, distortions and misrepresentations. It is thought that complaints about privacy and fairness from the Government's former chief...

'The conviction of David Olofson is a gross miscarriage of justice' A Wisconsin man today surrendered to federal authorities to begin serving a 30-month prison term for having a broken rifle, prompting the Gun Owners of America to issue a warning about the owner's liability should any semi-automatic weapon ever misfire. "A gun that malfunctions is not a machine gun," Larry Pratt, executive director of GOA, said. "What the [federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives] has done in the [David] Olofson case has set a precedent that could make any of the millions of Americans that own semi-automatic...

Josh Raykin had never spent even a night away from his parents. That is, until Arapahoe County snatched the 8-year-old from his home after an abuse allegation that social workers dragged their feet investigating. The ordeal began while Josh was playing outside one day before dinner in April. A neighbor knocked on the door to tell his dad that police had come to take Josh away. The strawberry-blond kid with pale blue eyes was born in 1999 after Michael and Melanie Raykin tried for 15 years to conceive. Michael, a courier, and Melanie, a hairstylist, work extra hours to send...

The question isn't whether a Pembroke Pines police officer was justified in fatally shooting Vincent Hodgkiss in his home early Thursday morning, or whether illegal drug activity was taking place there. The real question is this: Was a paramilitary-style dawn raid the best way to go about serving a drug-related search warrant?

Authorities say it's the biggest pot bust in Cocke County in the last five years, maybe more. Around 10 a.m. Monday, helicopter pilots spotted hundreds of thousands of marijuana plants growing in the Cherokee National Forest in Cocke County. They alerted officers on the ground, and the crew trekked more than a mile into the forest from Interstate 40, where they came upon what they call a DTO, or drug trafficking organization. "They just live in it, move in, grow, and that's all they're there to do is grow marijuana," Special Agent Jason Poore said of the growers. Poore is...

HUDSON - For years, marksmen have used a technique called bump firing: shooting a semiautomatic rifle from the hip and allowing the weapon's recoil to pull the trigger. With the assault-weapons ban keeping most fully automatic weapons out of their hands, it was one of the few ways for enthusiasts to enjoy the thrill of firing a machine gun. Bill Akins found a way to simulate that action by inventing a device that mechanized the recoil resistance of a semiautomatic rifle to fire more rapid, and accurate, bursts of bullets. The Hudson man spent nearly a decade designing the Akins...

Awakened before dawn by police officers who battered down the door to his home, Basil Parasiris said he acted in self-defence when he shot at a stranger at his bedroom door. A jury agreed yesterday, acquitting the Montreal-area businessman of first-degree murder in the shooting death of Constable Daniel Tessier, a father of two. The verdict was the latest slap in this case for the Laval police. The trial had revealed that the force's search warrant relied on dubious evidence and didn't allow a night-time raid; that officers didn't properly check whether Mr. Parasiris owned guns; and that they fired...

OCEANSIDE: Woman shot by cop charged with child endangerment Investigation into officer is continuing Rachel Leann Silva was charged Monday with felony child endangerment and misdemeanor drunken driving in an alleged road rage dispute with an off-duty policeman, who shot the woman and her 8-year-old son. Silva's "erratic and aggressive" driving and actions during the March 15 confrontation put her son in danger, according to a declaration seeking a warrant for Silva's arrest that was filed by the attorney general's office in Superior Court on Monday. Witnesses reportedly said she tailgated and pursued the off-duty officer during the clash, revving...

An immigrant couple, here legally, and their U.S.-born son have joined a statewide lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security after their Paterson home was raided last month by federal agents looking for illegal immigrants. Walter Chavez and his wife, Ana Galindo, said Thursday that on April 2, agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE, forced their way into their home, pointing guns at Galindo and their child. "It was a nightmare for our family, and continues to be even today," said Galindo, 42. "The very worst part of it all was when an agent, who screamed at me...

WEAPONS OF CHOICE 30 months in jail for broken gun Judge hands down penalty for misfire from 20-year-old rifle A federal judge has ordered a 30-month prison sentence for a man whose rifle misfired, letting loose three shots at a firing range, prompting 2nd Amendment supporters to warn their constituents how easily they, too, can become a "gun felon." "It didn't matter the rifle in question had not been intentionally modified for select fire, or that it did not have an M16 bolt carrier or sear, that it did not show any signs of machining or drilling, or that that...

OPA-LOCKA, Fla. -- Federal agents on the hunt for criminals on Thursday raided the wrong house while searching for drugs. Police and federal agents raided 50 marijuana grow houses around Florida on Thursday, calling it "Operation D-Day." They seized $7 million worth of pot plants, but they also kicked in the door of Noel Llorente's Opa-locka home and found nothing but bewildered homeowners. "I was frightened for my husband because they threw him on the ground," Llorente's wife said. "I was scared. Llorente said he was just leaving for work when unmarked cars pulled up, Drug Enforcement Administration agents jumped...

Brooklyn Park police were looking for a meth lab, but they found a fish tank and the chemicals needed to maintain it. And a few hours later, when the city sent a contractor to fix the door the police had smashed open Monday afternoon, it was obvious the city was trying to fix a mistake. It happened while Kathy Adams was sleeping. "And the next thing I know, a police officer is trying to get me out bed," she said. Adams, a 54-year-old former nurse who said she suffers from a bad back caused by a patient who attacked her...

MIAMI -- Officers from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives barged into a South Florida home Wednesday only to discover they had the wrong address. The ATF agents were supposed to conduct a raid at a home in the 2600 block of Northwest 49th Terrace in northwest Miami-Dade County, but they were off by one block. They entered a house on Northwest 49th Street instead. A mother and her 2-year-old boy were among the innocent people inside the home when the agents came in

COLUMBIA, S.C. - A state trooper is seen kicking a suspect in the head multiple times after a high-speed interstate chase in the latest in a string of alarming Highway Patrol videos. In two other videos, a trooper punches a suspect several times in the face after a pursuit and a different officer appears to hit a suspect with the barrel of a shotgun during a traffic stop. The Department of Public Safety released the videos, recorded in 2006, on Monday following media requests. They are the latest to surface showing troopers acting aggressively toward suspects. Highway Patrol Col. Russell...

A 23-year Atlanta Police Department veteran pleaded guilty on Monday to conspiring to violate civil rights by searching a private residence without a warrant, federal prosecutors said. Wilbert Stallings, 44, of Conyers, a sergeant in the department's narcotics unit, faces up to 10 years in prison and up to $250,000 in fines. A sentencing date wasn't immediately set.

Boston police officials, surprised by intense opposition from residents, have significantly scaled back and delayed the start of a program that would allow officers to go into people's homes and search for guns without a warrant. The program, dubbed Safe Homes, was supposed to start in December, but has been delayed at least three times because of misgivings in the community. March 1 was the latest missed start date.

The Metropolitan Police Department yesterday moved cautiously into its program to ask to search homes in the District for illegal guns while civil rights activists knocked on doors and used bullhorns to keep residents from participating. "We shouldn't make the next casualty of street violence cherished civil rights," said Johnny Barnes, director of American Civil Liberties Union of the National Capital Area. "We're very uncomfortable with police randomly banging on doors without probable cause asking for access." The department initiated its program by distributing literature at police stations and Boys and Girls Clubs to gauge public interest. It plans to...

Boston police officials, surprised by intense opposition from residents, have significantly scaled back and delayed the start of a program that would allow officers to go into people's homes and search for guns without a warrant. The program, dubbed Safe Homes, was supposed to start in December, but has been delayed at least three times because of misgivings in the community. March 1 was the latest missed start date. One community group has been circulating a petition against the plan. Police officials trying to assuage residents' fears have been drowned out by criticism at some meetings with residents and elected...

WASHINGTON -- A crackdown on guns is meeting some resistance in the District. Police are asking residents to submit to voluntary searches in exchange for amnesty under the District's gun ban. They passed out fliers requesting cooperation on Monday. The program will begin in a couple of weeks in the Washington Highlands neighborhood of southeast Washington and will later expand to other neighborhoods. Officers will go door to door asking residents for permission to search their homes. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said the "safe homes initiative" is aimed at residents who want to cooperate with police. She gave the...

The current leadership of the Washington, DC Metropolitan Police Department is an exercise in political correctness that will likely become a national laughingstock. The hopes of beleaguered citizens of the District of Columbia were dashed at the appointment of Cathy Lanier to become chief of police following the departure of Charles Ramsey, derisively known at "Chief Wiggums". Ramsey presided over the crime wave on the National Mall and could not find the body of missing intern Chandra Levy for nearly two years until a man walking his dog in Rock Creek Park discovered a leg bone. Ramsey has moved on...

WASHINGTON -- A crackdown on guns is under way in the District. Police are asking residents to submit to voluntary searches in exchange for amnesty under the District's gun ban. The program is starting in the Washington Highlands neighborhood of Southeast Washington on Monday and will later expand to other neighborhoods. Officers will go door to door asking residents for permission to search their homes. Police Chief Cathy L. Lanier said the "safe homes initiative" is aimed at residents who want to cooperate with police. She gave the example of parents or grandparents who know or suspect their children have...

Imagine you're home alone. It's 8 p.m. You work an early shift and need to be out the door before sunrise, so you're already in bed. Your nerves are a bit frazzled, because earlier in the week someone broke into your home. Oddly, they didn't take anything; they just rifled through your belongings. But the violation weighs on your mind. At about the time you drift off, you're awakened by fierce barking from your two large dogs. You hear someone crashing into your front door, as if he's trying to separate it from its hinges. You grab the gun you...

Somebody sent me an email mentioning the ATF ordering Leatherman tools engraved with "Always Think Forfeiture". I followed the link to the original message thread at www.subguns.com.The thread includes a link to the Federal Business Opportunities website, where you can read the bid for yourself.From the www.fbo.gov website:The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms requires the following items, Purchase Description Determined by Line Item, to the following: LI 001, EXACT MATCH ONLY - Leatherman Micra Color: Blue - Part number 64340101K Engraved with: ATF-Asset Forfeiture AND "always think forfeiture" PLEASE REFER TO THE ATTACHMENT. NOTE: ATF MAY REQUEST A SAMPLE...

Son got his first ticket. Policeman said he didn't stop at a stop sign. It was dark, not even street lights in this area, but he saw this difficult-to-tell action in the dark, when Nathan says he had come to a stop. He didn't argue though. But then he wanted to search the car. We've always told son not to agree to that, there is no reason. (actually, his former-cop dad told him don't agree to it) Dad is not in the picture, so I have to ask you all. This was his first traffic stop and he was nervous....

A Northwest Side man has been charged with 12 weapons violations after Chicago police said officers raided his home and confiscated three handguns, three shotguns, six long rifles and several hundred rounds of ammunition.

Medical marijuana in San Francisco may be going up in smoke. In late December, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration sent letters to landlords of buildings that housed medical cannabis dispensaries in the city, telling them they face the loss of their property and possibly prison if the businesses stay open. Now, less than two months later, seven of the city's 28 dispensaries have closed or are on the verge of closing, according to medical marijuana supporters and activists. They fear more will follow. "It's like a dagger in the heart," said Wayne Justmann, a medical marijuana advocate. "We're barely holding...

Late last month, the House Judiciary Committee held hearings on the death of the Kathryn Johnston, the 92-year-old Atlanta woman killed by police during a November 2006 drug raid on her home. Johnston died when she mistook a team of narcotics officers for criminal intruders. When the police broke down her door, she met them with an old pistol. They opened fire, and killed her. A subsequent investigation revealed that the entire chain of events up to and shortly after Johnston's death were beset with lies, planted evidence, and cover-up on the part of the narcotics cops. They fabricated an...

TWIN FALLS, IDAHO As 7 p.m. approaches, the high-desert sunlight lingers with a golden hue and 80 degree warmth, favoring the people who pull their vehicles into the downtown lot by the Lamphouse Theater. Disembarking and filing into the movie theater, they appear to be a Western cross-section: carefully stepping gray-haired ladies, a guy in an electric wheelchair, a few sweet little girls, the vice mayor, a toddler clinging to a mother’s shoulder, two doctors, and the inevitable guy wearing camo pants. Collectively, they would seem to have little to worry about. All around them on this mid-June evening, Twin...

An 18-year-old from Pennsylvania is facing a felony charge after he was caught videotaping a police officer handing out a traffic ticket on a public street. "I didn't think I could get in trouble for that," Brian D. Kelly told The Patriot-News. Apparently, neither did a long list of members of the public, who have erupted on the newspaper's comment page. "This is the most asinine thing I have EVER heard. Citizens have the right, and indeed, often the DUTY to film police officers performing their job," wrote ZippoPA. "I will donate right now to a fund to defend this...

ANNAPOLIS, Md. - Annapolis police raided the wrong apartment Wednesday night, using flash grenades and kicking a resident in the groin before they realized their mistake, police and the family said. Police spokesman Hal Dalton said something must have gone amiss in the briefing beforehand. "We don't know how the mistake was made," Dalton said.

Malaysia: 37 books that 'undermine Islam' banned Associated Press, THE JERUSALEM POST Jun. 6, 2007 Malaysia has banned 37 books and other publications on Islam, saying they contain "twisted facts" that could undermine Muslims' faith. Che Din Yusoh, a senior official of the Publications and Quranic Texts Control Division, said in a statement Wednesday that 21 of the items were English-language publications from the US, UK and Jordan, and 16 others were in the Bahasa Malaysia language, published in Malaysia and Indonesia. "These publications can cause confusion and apprehension among Muslims and eventually jeopardize public order," Che Din said in...

Animal cruelty case yields 'doggone' dismissal June 6, 2007 By Peter Hirschfeld Times Argus Staff CHELSEA – A woman facing jail time for "staring" at a police dog had charges against her dropped Monday after an Orange County prosecutor viewed videotape of the alleged crime. Jayna Hutchinson, now of Lebanon, N.H., was scheduled for a jury trial this week on a misdemeanor charge of cruelty to animals. A Vermont State Police sergeant said Hutchinson was intoxicated and stared at his police dog in a "taunting/harassing manner" last July while officers were in the process of investigating a reported melee outside...