Posted on 04/05/2006 12:57:02 PM PDT by JTN
In the course of researching paramilitary drug raids, I’ve found some pretty disturbing stuff. There was a case where a SWAT officer stepped on a baby’s head while looking for drugs in a drop ceiling. There was one where an 11-year-old boy was shot at point-blank range. Police have broken down doors, screamed obscenities, and held innocent people at gunpoint only to discover that what they thought were marijuana plants were really sunflowers, hibiscus, ragweed, tomatoes, or elderberry bushes. (It’s happened with all five.)
Yet among hundreds of botched raids, the ones that get me most worked up are the ones where the SWAT officers shoot and kill the family dog.
I have two dogs, which may have something to do with it. But I’m not alone. A colleague tells me that when he and other libertarian commentators speak about the 1993 raid on the Branch Davidian compound in Waco many people tend to doubt the idea that the government was out of line when it invaded, demolished, and set fire to a home of peaceful and mostly innocent people. But when the speaker mentions that the government also slaughtered two dogs during the siege, eyes light up, the indifferent get angry, and skeptics come around. Puppycide, apparently, goes too far.
One of the most appalling cases occurred in Maricopa County, Arizona, the home of Joe Arpaio, self-proclaimed “toughest sheriff in America.” In 2004 one of Arpaio’s SWAT teams conducted a bumbling raid in a Phoenix suburb. Among other weapons, it used tear gas and an armored personnel carrier that later rolled down the street and smashed into a car. The operation ended with the targeted home in flames and exactly one suspect in custody—for outstanding traffic violations.
But for all that, the image that sticks in your head, as described by John Dougherty in the alternative weekly Phoenix New Times, is that of a puppy trying to escape the fire and a SWAT officer chasing him back into the burning building with puffs from a fire extinguisher. The dog burned to death.
In a massive 1998 raid at a San Francisco housing co-op, cops shot a family dog in front of its family, then dragged it outside and shot it again.
When police in Fremont, California, raided the home of medical marijuana patient Robert Filgo, they shot his pet Akita nine times. Filgo himself was never charged.
Last October police in Alabama raided a home on suspicion of marijuana possession, shot and killed both family dogs, then joked about the kill in front of the family. They seized eight grams of marijuana, equal in weight to a ketchup packet.
In January a cop en route to a drug raid in Tampa, Florida, took a short cut across a neighboring lawn and shot the neighbor’s two pooches on his way. And last May, an officer in Syracuse, New York, squeezed off several shots at a family dog during a drug raid, one of which ricocheted and struck a 13-year-old boy in the leg. The boy was handcuffed at gunpoint at the time.
There was a dog in the ragweed bust I mentioned, too. He got lucky: He was only kicked across the room.
I guess the P.R. lesson here for drug war opponents and civil libertarians is to emphasize the plight of the pooch. America’s law-and-order populace may not be ready to condemn the practice of busting up recreational pot smokers with ostentatiously armed paramilitary police squads, even when the SWAT team periodically breaks into the wrong house or accidentally shoots a kid. I mean, somebody was probably breaking the law, right?
But the dog? That loyal, slobbery, lovable, wide-eyed, fur-lined bag of unconditional love?
Dammit, he deserves better.
Radley Balko is a policy analyst with the Cato Institute.
I was once pulled over by a Texas DPS cop who asked me that question you hear on the cop shows on television. You know the one, "Do you have any drugs, guns or dead bodies in the car?" I answered truthfully that I don't take drugs or kill people and then had to repeat myself as the officer didn't seem to comprehend that. By the time he had gotten backup, secured me in the back of his police car and torn my car apart I was more than an hour behind my schedule. I have since learned from my local sheriff, who is a friend of mine, that the correct answer is, "Not yet."
Two pooches? Little wittle pooches?
First of all, he shot AT two, hitting one in the leg (treated and released) and missing the other. Second, the dogs were unregistered with no vaccinations. Third, they were mixed breed -- you can guess the mix. And fourth, both dogs attacked the officer and "bit Blanco several times on his elbows, arms and hips, and he was taken to Tampa General Hospital. Roberts said the dogs attacked Blanco so ferociously he shot at them."
Now, that's the whole truth on one story. Ask yourself how many of the other "poochie" stories referenced by this pro-drug, self-professed Libertarian writing in a Libertarian rag (Reason) are just as misleading?
He and Reason have no shame.
Legalizing drugs wouldn't fully address the issue, but it would give cops - both good and bad - fewer reasons to descend on people's houses, and thus less of an opportunity to make mistakes. Millions of people keep dogs - as pets and/or for protection - and cops would still have to enter people's homes in response to domestic violence, child porn, fugitives, etc. Good cops would still make mistakes, and bad cops would still commit misdeeds, only far fewer of them.
Which is fine, I suppose, as far as it goes. But in the US we are presumed innocent until proved guilty. How do you replace a beloved family pet when it turns out that the police (or their CI) had the wrong address? Sure, broken windows and doors can be fixed, but they can't bring old Yeller back once they've killed him. The same is true for the innocent homeowner who sees his dog killed by some scruffy looking guy in body armor, but no uniform.
Whatever happened to serving a warrant by, well, knocking on the door and serving the warrant? Being prepared for resistance of course.
I wouldn't have any problem with this if the prisoners were convicted and serving time in the county lockup. After all, our troops in Iraq and other places (Djibouti for example) have to put up with lots worse. But it they are awaiting trial, then I have a problem with treating like the scum those actually convicted are (Most of those awaiting trial are too, of course, but not all)
Perhaps so. But it doesn't appear that this puppy-stomping/pet shooting behavior occurs at any other time than these WOD transactions.
BTW, when puppies and babies are killed indiscriminately it speaks poorly for law enforcement. Pleasure at killing small animals and ruthless power displays share much in common with serial killers and sociopaths.
Look at the evidence. Just about every locale has a police force that has a stockpile of body armor and AR-15s.
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Your point made this thread worth reading.
I have looked at the WOD from numerous angles and I have come to believe that militarization of local police departments is one of a just a few underlying reasons for it all.
OK. Then we agree. No need to continue the argument on the rest, I agree with you there to. I just take exception to the linkage, as I don't think it helps win the argument.
As would legalizing murder, rape, smuggling, extortion, money laundering, etc. Catch my point.
It does. The federal BATFE is the prototype and past master of the technique. They've also been known to throw a pregnant woman, not accused of any crime, up against a wall causes her to lose her baby, and that was just over paperwork violations. They've been known to tear a place apart when the owners were not present, leave it unlocked and wide open, with all the legal guns laying around on the floor, and just leaving a note saying "Nothing found, ATF".
I have been coaching 4, 5, and 6 year-olds for four years (seven seasons). I just keep cycling back to the younger child, all daughters.
I really love it. I have some good parents and great kids. My big rule is look at me when I'm talking.
I completely concur with you on the searches.
Sadists just like to kill things.
...for not calling me a raving paranoid nutbag...
...as has been done before when I've made that point.
More the pity.
Thank you for the correction. It is even worse than I thought.
That does cause 'em to pause and contemplate, in my experience.
That concept remains only marginally existent, and only in court.
We've ceded power to LEO's on the scene to be judge, jury, and frequently executioner for a lot of "offenses".
They don't recognize that principle, nor are they required to do so.
"Count me in", said Crockett to Travis (and elkfersupper to Sam and winston).
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