Posted on 02/07/2009 3:04:18 PM PST by ellery
"They hit the door right here and the door flew open," says Mike Hasenei, standing outside his Elkridge home.
His wife, Phyllis, was watching television with her 12-year old daughter when members of the Howard County Police Tactical Team came through the door.
"They had guns pointed at us. You have 25 guys coming in here all dressed in black and all that we saw were their eyes, and they're screaming 'Hands in the air!'"
Members of the team were acting upon a tip that an assault rifle, magazines and hollow-point bullets stolen from a marked police car the night before may be located inside.
Adding insult to injury, when the search led police to a back bedroom where they encountered the family’s dog, they opened fire.
Officers found no evidence of the stolen goods after ransacking the house.
At this point a complaint has been logged against the department, but Howard County Police aren't about to admit they were wrong or to apologize for their actions.
"No. We didn't find a weapon in this particular case,” said Sherry Llewellyn, a spokeswoman for the department, “but that doesn't mean that there wasn't good information that there were weapons there before we had a chance to get inside the house."
Now, Mike Hasenei is waiting on an Internal Affairs investigation into the raid before deciding whether he and his family will take the department to court.
"I'm not gonna sit down and let people walk all over me and say 'sorry' and walk out of my house."
I agree with you. One of the more sensible comments on this topic - haven’t seen too many I’m afraid.
My husband was a good, decent police officer for 25 years and he’s now retired. He has scars from being knifed, had broken bones and had guns drawn on him. He has two life-saving accomodations. One for running into a burning house to rescue a woman, the other for finding an elderly man who had wandered away from a nursing home, and my husband found him along the railroad tracks. He would have froze to death, or been hit by a train if my husband didn’t find him when he did. Those are just two examples of his dedication to his job and society. Although he was in many dangerous situations, he always came home, thank God. Excuse me for being selfish, but I didn’t care (and still don’t, since he still works as an investigator) what he has to do to come home to me. Some may ask, why did he go through all of that and stick with it? Because he knew in his heart he was doing the right thing - even, unfortunately, if it meant putting his life on the line to protect probably a lot of people with the same narrow-minded ideas of cops as a number of people on here seem to have.
I’m certainly not defending the SWAT officers in this case. I just want to set the record straight, for the people who are basically saying to kill the “pigs” and other such ignorant comments, you are putting my husband’s life at even more risk, and I don’t appreciate it. My husband has to deal with enough danger out there. I don’t have a problem with someone voicing their disapproval of perhaps a police officer doing the wrong thing. But for someone to actually state that cops need to start dying instead of a dog? Those cops have wives and children, and they are fighting a battle every day.
And Gondring, I also agree that we likely will find alot of cops that are against Obama. The FOP (Fraternal Order of Police) are one of the very FEW unions who consistently support and endorse Republicans (as they did in this past election). My husband is a strong conservative and so are all of his friends who are officers. Many of them are strong Republicans and good Americans who have served their country in the military and continue serving their country by protecting society here at home. My husband also fought in Vietnam (while the hippies who called cops “pigs” burned their draft cards).
The parallels to Iraq, Bush and WMD are quite amazing.
“The first SOB barging my door will die, period.”
We have home invaders posing as cops serving no knocks. In this case you would be justified. But if they were actual cops with the wrong address, you will fry.
How are we supposed to know the difference when cops behave like thugs? It’s like asking ‘what’s the meaning of life?’
A reference for the younger Freepers..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WISX2oSExIA
Me and the first shirt would play this during GI parties live.
That’s my point. If they have a problem, tell me. I’m going to be surrounded anyway. I’ll come out.
Bust down my door without notice will engage a firefight.
Now you’re talking possibilities. I have a devious streak too.
“That’s my point. If they have a problem, tell me. I’m going to be surrounded anyway. I’ll come out.”
Old school mentality. David Koresh aka Vernon Howell thought the same way. We know how that turned out.
Both of us know the problem, while neither of us have the power to effectively resolve it. So we are stuck here in cyberspace venting our frustrations. Meantime, somewhere tonight, some innocent citizen is becoming the latest victim.
Yeah, cops are “far down the list.” Tell that to the families of the 331 law enforcement officers who have been killed in the line of duty since 2007 (11 just so far this year). Their job is certainly dangerous enough.
This crap won’t stop till cops start to die instead of us or our pets. The fact that now anything will bring down these no-knock raids is bad news for all of us.
"What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say goodbye to his family? Or if, during periods of mass arrests, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people had not simply sat there in their lairs, paling with terror at every bang of the downstairs door and at every step on the staircase, but had understood they had nothing left to lose and had boldly set up in the downstairs hall an ambush of half a dozen people with axes, hammers, pokers, or whatever else was at hand? The Organs would very quickly have suffered a shortage of officers and transport and, notwithstanding all of Stalin’s thirst, the cursed machine would have ground to a halt! We didn’t love freedom enough. Every man always has handy a dozen glib little reasons why he is right not to sacrifice himself." Alexander Solzenitsyn Gulag Archipelago
Because that's what the job was when he/she accepted it. If they can't do the job without cheating...get out.
Whatever you do, don’t let those nasty little facts get in your way. Fishermen and construction workers are at higher risk. It’s a statistical fact.
And so you know, I come from a family of LEOs. And yes, I was once upon a time one myself. I am sure you are proud of your husband’s service. I am sure he is an honest and decent man. But that does not change the facts of the current discussion. We both know that beyond the role playing of good cop and bad cop, there are actually good cops and bad cops.
Take off your blinders, deal with this situation, and the many like this one occuring all too often. There are issues beyond your husband’s honest and faithful service.
Then he's not the kind being talked about here, so why are you making him one?
The stat I’d like to see is the average dollar amount it costs to be charged by LEOs, then ultimately cleared of all charges.
Seems to me, the only people at risk were the honest citizens who were terrorized by the local gestapo.
Driving a cab is far more dangerous by far than being a cop. Police aren't even in the top 10 most dangerous jobs. If these jerks want to break things and kill people, they need to join the military.
The 10 most dangerous jobs
Occupation
Fatalities per 100,000
Timber cutters
117.8
Fishers
71.1
Pilots and navigators
69.8
Structural metal workers
58.2
Drivers-sales workers
37.9
Roofers
37
Electrical power installers
32.5
Farm occupations
28
Construction laborers
27.7
Truck drivers
25
Somehow I find in hard to believe that the occupational risk has more than doubled since 2002. (or is that: a cop is always on duty, so if he dies for whatever reason "killed in the line of duty")
Table 1. Census of Fatal Occupational Injuries, 2002
Number of deaths per 100,000 employed, Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics
(ref. http://money.cnn.com/2003/10/13/pf/dangerousjobs/ )
Timber cutting 117.8
Fishermen 71.1
Airplane Pilots & Navigators 69.8
Structural Metal Workers 58.2
Drivers Sales Workers 37.9
Roofers 37.0
Electrical Power Installers 32.5
Farmers 28.0
Construction laborers 27.7
Truck drivers 25.0
Sworn Police Officers * 22.2
National average: 4.0
And only about a third of police deaths are from "criminal and accidental use of firearms" (You know cops shooting themselves)
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