Posted on 10/24/2011 2:03:16 PM PDT by Immerito
A Gibbs Road couple came home from work Thursday to find their home surrounded by Richland County sheriff's deputies, their front door kicked in and their home ransacked.
Deputies were executing a search warrant at Wanda and Reginald Blanding's home Thursday, after drug agents said a confidential informant "made a controlled purchase of crack cocaine from an unknown black male at the location," according to the search warrant.
"He hit the door right here with it," explained Wanda. "He still had the ram jack in his hand when I walked up."
The informant told investigators the drug buy was made at 402 Gibbs Road. That's where the sheriff's drug unit staged its raid, looking into the one drug purchase the informant alleges happened there.
"They told me why they were here and I was like, 'Okay, no one is supposed to be here. No one sells drugs out of this house,'" said Wanda.
*****
When asked if enough due diligence was done in preparation for the raid, Cowan said the officers did everything they were supposed to do.
****
"This is humiliation," said Wanda. "I mean, come in, I can see the door, go through my room, clothes and everything all over the place. I mean, they went through every room in the house and just tore it up."
****
The sheriff's office says an apology is just not happening, and they'll continue investigating this case until they make an arrest.
(Excerpt) Read more at wistv.com ...
Well, at least no dogs were shot.
I had the good fortune to grow up in Richland County. Don’t remember the Blandings, though.
The article carefully doesn’t say what, if anything, was found during the search.
An implied admission that they found no drugs is here:
“The sheriff’s office says an apology is just not happening, and they’ll continue investigating this case until they make an arrest.”
The refusal to apologize to this family and insistence that they will not leave this family alone until they arrest someone both imply that nothing was found during the raid.
They want to punish this family for their failure to research before entering this family’s house.
Nah, this “progressive” department is escalating to the next threat level—We didn’t find what we were looking for? No problem, we’ll investigate until we find SOME reason to arrest SOMEONE at this house.
If that is all it takes(an informant saying he made a buy at a house) for the police to ransack someone’s house, we are in a whole heap of trouble.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.