Posted on 12/30/2010 4:19:27 PM PST by smokingfrog
Shouts break the evening silence.
“Police! Search warrant!”
Officers burst through the door. A man appears across the room. Metal glints from his clasped hands. Shots echo from a police-issue Glock 22. Todd Blair slumps to the floor.
“Five seconds,” said Blair’s mother, Arlean. “In five seconds, he was dead.”
Officers entered Blair’s home Sept. 16 during a drug raid when he stepped into the hall, wielding a golf club, police video shows. Ogden police Sgt. Troy Burnett shot Blair, 45, in the head and chest.
The shooting was deemed legally justified.
(Excerpt) Read more at sltrib.com ...
Really, how can you possibly know that I am not acting on them?
What if, and I posit this as a hypothetical so as to force anyone wishing to deprive me of my rights the burden of proof, I were to take my weapon and open carry while voting [02 Nov 10] in a polling place which happens to be an elementary school, given that NMSA 30-7-2.1 — Unlawful carrying of a deadly weapon on school premises makes it a felony to carry a weapon on Elementary School premises. {"Whoever commits unlawful carrying of a deadly weapon on school premises is guilty of a fourth degree felony."}
Why then were there NO CHARGES brought against me? It SHOULD be an open and shut case for the prosecution, no?
For one, there is the State Constitution prohibiting such a law; for another the Federal Law Conspiracy Against Rights may be applied against arresting officers [being more than one person] should they insist continue to hold me in a false arrest.
You can throw a tantrum if you like, but the fact is, the law does not support the nonsense that you are rambling here. And we both know that you don't actually believe your own rambling either. If you think you are right, why don't you go open carry on the premises of a University? Then make your case in Court? If you are so sure that the statute is illegal, why don't you prove it?
Well, for starters being a student I wanted to finish up my degree without any hassles, and even you have to admit that taking a stand while perusing a degree would be a hassle. But AFTER getting the degree, I am free from any sort of retaliation that the university might wish to impose as they cannot hold as ransom the degree for which I have worked, paid, and should receive.
The University statute is the first one I intend to attack, as it is only a misdemeanor offense and cannot therefore be used to unilaterally strip me of my rights.
Though an interesting case would be the City- and Municipal-Courthouses as the State Constitution says "No municipality or county shall regulate, in any way, an incident of the right to keep and bear arms." Therefore, the courts which are municipal or county should not have ANY right to post "No Weapons" upon their properties under their own authority, correct?
Let me turn your own argument against you; how in the name of Chaos is a no-knock warrant GENERALLY APPLIED* reasonable?
*In addition to 'GENERALLY APPLIED' what of "EXCLUSIVELY APPLIED" as in all warrants being no-knock? Would THAT be reasonable?
Your cut and pastes do nothing to answer the direct questions posed to you or the issues raised.
I must conclude based on your statements, and lack thereof in other instances, that your interest is not in freedom or liberty or justice, but rather eroding the same when it suits your views.
If your position is truly as open and shut as you say, then you shouldn't have anything to fear? Right? Why wait? Why don't you take your stand now?
No knock warrants are not "generally applied". The overwhelming majority of warrants that are served are knock and announce warrants. To get a no-knock warrant, the Police have to separately justify the need for one, in addition to the probable cause that they have for the underlying warrant. Contrary to what libertines like to contend, they are not applied to every warrant, nor can the police unilaterally decide to turn a standard warrant into a no-knock warrant.
Botched Paramilitary Police Raids:
An Epidemic of “Isolated Incidents”
At what point does the harm done, erosion of rights, diminished public opinion of LE and the courts, loss of life, etc. outweigh the benefits of this sort of police activity?
Have we “won” the war on drugs yet?
Believe what you want, but the law isn't on your side. Feel free to act on your erroneous interpretations of the law at your own peril.
In that same time period, more than 2000 people were killed by lightning in the United States.
Keep in mind the 357 number represents the total number of "incidents" documented by Cato. Not deaths mind you, but a very broad reading of "incidents."
Obviously that isn’t how it works in real life. In real life they lie.
And you talk about fantasy?
Kathryn Johnston
November 21, 2006—GA
Acting on a tip from a confidential informant, police conduct a no-knock raid on the home of 88 year old Kathryn Johnston.
Johnston, described by neighbors as feeble and afraid to open her door at night, opens fire on officers as they burst into her home. Three of the officers are wounded before Johnston is shot and killed.
Relatives say that Johnston lived alone, and legally owned a gun because she was fearful of intruders. She lived in the home for 17 years. Police claim that they find a small amount of marijuana in Johnston’s home, but none of the cocaine, computers, money, or equipment described in the affidavit that was used to obtain a warrant.
There are now allegations of a police cover-up.
Cheryl Lynn Noel
January 21, 2005—MD
Baltimore County, Maryland police descend on a home in the Dundalk neighborhood at around 5 a.m. on a narcotics warrant. They deploy a flashbang grenade, then quickly subdue the first-floor occupants — a man and two young adults.
When officers enter the second-floor bedroom of Cheryl Llynn Noel, they break open the door to find the middle-aged woman in her bed, frightened, and pointing a handgun at them. One officer fires three times. Noel dies at the scene.
Friends and acquaintances described Noel as “a wonderful person,” who ran a Bible study group on her lunch breaks. One man collected 200 signatures from friends, neighbors, and coworkers vouching for her character.
Officers conducted the raid after finding marijuana seeds in the Noels’ garbage can.
Alberta Spruill
May 16, 2003—NY
On May 16, 2003, a dozen New York City police officers storm an apartment building in Harlem on a no-knock warrant. They’re acting on a tip from a confidential informant, who told them a convicted felon was dealing drugs and guns from the sixth floor.
There is no felon. The only resident in the building is Alberta Spruill, described by friends as a “devout churchgoer.” Before entering the apartment, police deploy a flashbang grenade. The blinding, deafening explosion stuns the 57 year-old city worker, who then slips into cardiac arrest. She dies two hours later.
A police investigation would later find that the drug dealer the raid team was looking for had been arrested days earlier. He couldn’t possibly have been at Spruill’s apartment because he was in custody. The officers who conducted the raid did no investigation to corroborate the informant’s tip. A police source told the New York Daily News that the informant in the Spruill case had offered police tips on several occasions, none of which had led to an arrest. His record was so poor, in fact, that he was due to be dropped from the city’s informant list.
Tony Martinez
December 20, 2001—TX
On December 20, 2001, police in Travis County, Texas storm a mobile home on a no-knock drug warrant.
19-year-old Tony Martinez, nephew of the man named in the warrant, is asleep on the couch at the time of the raid. Martinez was never suspected of any crime. When Martinez rises from the couch as police break into the home, deputy Derek Hill shoots Martinez in the chest, killing him. Martinez is unarmed.
A grand jury later declined to indict Hill in the shooting. The shooting occurred less than a mile from the spot of a botched drug raid that cost Deputy Keith Ruiz his life. Hill was also on that raid. The same Travis County paramilitary unit would later erroneously raid a woman’s home after mistaking ragweed for marijuana plants.
John Adams
October 4, 2000—TN
On October 4, 2000 at about 10 p.m., police in Lebanon, Tennessee raid the home of 64-year-old John Adams on a drug warrant. In what Lebanon Police Chief Billy Weeks would later say was a “severe, costly mistake,” police indentify the wrong house.
According to Adams’ wife, police don’t identify themselves after knocking on the couple’s door. When she refuses to let them in, they break down the door, and handcuff her. Adams meets the police in another room with a sawed-off shotgun. Police open fire, and shoot Adams dead.
One officer would later be fired after the incident, and several others suspended, but no criminal charges would ever come of the raid. Adams’ widow eventually won a $400,000 settlement from the city.
Alberto Sepulveda
September 13, 2000—CA
Early in the morning on September 13, 2000, agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration, the FBI, and the Stanislaus County, California drug enforcement agency conduct raids on 14 homes in and around Modesto, California after a 19-month investigation.
According to the Los Angeles Times, the DEA and FBI asked that local SWAT teams enter each home unannounced to secure the area ahead of federal agents, who would then come to serve the warrants and search for evidence. Federal agents warn the SWAT teams that the targets of the warrants, including Alberto Sepulveda’s father Moises, should be considered armed and dangerous.
After police forcibly enter the Sepulveda home, Alberto, his father, his mother, his sister, and his brother are ordered to lie face down on the floor with arms outstretched. Half a minute after the raid begins, the shotgun officer David Hawn has trained on Alberto’s head discharges, instantly killing the eleven-year-old boy.
No drugs or weapons are found in the home.
The Los Angeles Times later reports that when Modesto police asked federal investigators if there were any children present in the Sepulveda home, they replied, “not aware of any.” There were three.
A subsequent internal investigation by the Modesto Police Department found that federal intelligence evidence against Moises Sepulveda — who had no previous criminal record — was “minimal.” In 2002 he pled guilty to the last charge remaining against him as a result of the investigation — using a telephone to distribute marijuana. The city of Modesto and the federal government later settled a lawsuit brought by the Sepulvedas for the death of their son for $3 million.
At first, Modesto Police Chief Roy Wasden seemed to be moved by Sepulveda’s death toward genuine reform. “What are we gaining by serving these drug warrants?” Wasden is quoted as asking in the Modesto Bee. “We ought to be saying, ‘It’s not worth the risk. We’re not going to put our officers and community at risk anymore.’”
Unfortunately, as part of the settlement with the Sepulvedas, while Modesto announced several reforms in the way its SWAT team would carry out drug raids, there was no mention of discontinuing the use of paramilitary units to conduct no-knock or knock-and-announce warrants on nonviolent drug offenders.
Ismael Mena
September 29, 1999—CO
On September 29, 1999, a Denver SWAT team executes a no-knock drug raid on the home of Ismael Mena, a Mexican immigrant and father of seven.
Mena, believing he is being robbed, confronts the SWAT team with a gun. Police say they fired the eight shots that killed Mena only after Mena ignored repeated warnings to drop his weapon. Mena’s family says police never announced themselves, and fired at the man shortly after entry.
The police later discover they’ve raided the wrong home, based on bad information from an informant. They find no drugs in Mena’s house, nor are any later found in his system.
In 2000, a special prosecutor’s investigation into the Mena shooting would find no wrongdoing on the part of the SWAT team. A separate internal affairs investigation also cleared the SWAT team of wrongdoing, but did find that the officer who prepared the search warrant for Mena’s home had falsified information.
A good example of this is the Samuel Hicks incident that they have listed. This was a standard knock-and-announce warrant. The agents had a lawful warrant, supported by probable cause. As they knocked and announced their presence, an agent looking in the basement window saw the suspect running to destroy evidence. Only then did they break open the door. The suspect's wife fired at the agents down the stairwell and hit one. Cato implies that the wife was just a poor and scared innocent who didn't hear the announcement and thought that the agents were burglars. In reality, tape recorded conversations of her jail-house phone calls after the incident revealed that not only did she know exactly what she was doing and who the agents were, but that she was the ring-leader of the entire drug operation.
So even with "incidents" like these inflating the statistics, Cato can only get to 357 in more than 20 years.
Because the University can claim that it is a private [or public] institution, despite that it DOES receive federal funding (the recipt of federal funds can, itself, place limitations on what an organization can or cannot do.)
Furthermore, just because it is immoral DOES NOT mean that the University would not withhold a degree in response to being called on some impropriety/embarrassment.
Lastly, I would prefer to attack that law w/o having been accused of breaking it; IOW, I wish to attack it from a position of power than from a position of weakness, and make no mistake, attacking the law in court as my defense *IS* a position of weakness. {However, this DOES bring up the interesting point: that EVERY public official I have brought this to has referred me to some OTHER public official and refused to address the issue at all. State AG, State Representative, State Supreme Court, State Bar, etc.}
Sorry, you lack the authority or the credibility to tell me or anyone else what they do or do not like.
So anyone with an opinion different than yours is a lunatic? I guess lunatics are in the majority then.
I believe that is what I directly indicated, you claimed otherwise.
I will.
No, that’s not what I’m asking.
What I am asking is “would it be reasonable if all warrants were no-knock warrants?”
I am NOT saying that there should be, as you have said, some separate qualification/application process to GET a no-knock warrant. Nor am I addressing whether or not the police can ‘upgrade’ a warrant to no-knock.
The drugs that you worship have killed tens of thousands in that same-time frame, directly or indirectly.
Moreover, intoxication (whether from alcohol or drugs) is specifically forbidden by the law that binds all of mankind, all over the world, at all times, for eternity:
1 Corinthians 6:10 "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkers, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God."
Galatians 5:21 "Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revelings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherent the kingdom of God."
Proverbs 23:19-21, "Hear thou, my son, and be wise, and guide thine heart in the way. Be not among winebibbers; among riotous eaters of flesh: for the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty."
Could the lightning deaths of been prevented?
Acceptable losses right?
Drugs that I worship?
Sorry, you loose.
No one is advocating that the police use no-knock warrants whenever they feel like it, without oversight, without parameters. In fact, even I said that no-knock warrants should be strictly controlled, and are probably over-used, and that this should be reigned in.
However, some people here, and you seem to be among their ranks, want to forbid ALL no knock warrants, when the law clearly allows for them.
Moreover, even you would probably allow for them in certain circumstances as well. (No one is truly an absolutist). We already used the terrorist example. We could use another, such as, what if a person were holding your children hostage, would you require that the police knock and announce their presence before making entry into the suspect's home?
Here's another. What if a suspect were in possession of a nuclear device, and had the means to set it off. Assume for the purposes of this question that the suspect can be stopped if the officers make an unannounced entry, but if the police knock and announce, the suspect will have the time to set off the device. How much of an absolutist are you? Should the police knock and announce or not?
I suspect that even you would admit that a no-knock entry would not only be reasonable, but absolutely necessary in both circumstances, thus, clearly, no-knock entries ARE permissible in some circumstances, even in your theoretical libertine world. The question then becomes a line drawing exercise.
Who draws that line?
Would you, being a father or husband, cower behind protection and require the police to save your family?
That, I think, would be a better way of phrasing it. And along with it, would you seek prevent a father or husband whose family is being held from taking it upon himself to enter into combat for their sakes?
“However, some people here, and you seem to be among their ranks, want to forbid ALL no knock warrants, when the law clearly allows for them.”
And I am not ashamed to be so numbered.
I simply do not believe that it is either reasonable or moral to allow the police to break into ones house. Period.
As someone further up-thread mentioned, if the goal was truly the mere apprehension then things such as cutting the electricity and water or simply waiting outside would be sufficient; but this is not the only goal, the other goal is to make a show of force and, on the psychological level, reduce the non-police to realization that their lives and property are subject to the whims of the government through its agents “the police.”
Well stated, my sentiments precisely.
Ah, you want to bring God and the Bible into this!
Leviticus 6:2–7
“If anyone sins and commits a breach of faith against the Lord by deceiving his neighbor in a matter of deposit or security, or through robbery, or if he has oppressed his neighbor or has found something lost and lied about it, swearing falsely -—in any of all the things that people do and sin thereby-— if he has sinned and has realized his guilt and will restore what he took by robbery or what he got by oppression or the deposit that was committed to him or the lost thing that he found or anything about which he has sworn falsely, he shall restore it in full and shall add a fifth to it, and give it to him to whom it belongs on the day he realizes his guilt. And he shall bring to the priest as his compensation to the Lord a ram without blemish out of the flock, or its equivalent for a guilt offering. And the priest shall make atonement for him before the Lord, and he shall be forgiven for any of the things that one may do and thereby become guilty.”
Deuteronomy 19:15-25 (New International Version)
Witnesses
“One witness is not enough to convict anyone accused of any crime or offense they may have committed. A matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.
If a malicious witness takes the stand to accuse someone of a crime, the two people involved in the dispute must stand in the presence of the LORD before the priests and the judges who are in office at the time. The judges must make a thorough investigation, and if the witness proves to be a liar, giving false testimony against a fellow Israelite, **then do to the false witness as that witness intended to do to the other party.** You must purge the evil from among you. The rest of the people will hear of this and be afraid, and never again will such an evil thing be done among you. Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.”
Proverbs 14:2 & 5 [NIV]
“Whoever fears the LORD walks uprightly,
but those who despise him are devious in their ways.”
“An honest witness does not deceive,
but a false witness pours out lies.”
Malachi 3:5
“Then I will draw near to you for judgment. I will be a swift witness against the sorcerers, against the adulterers, against those who swear falsely, against those who oppress the hired worker in his wages, the widow and the fatherless, against those who thrust aside the sojourner, and do not fear me, says the Lord of hosts.”
1 Kings 21:1-29 (KJV)
And it came to pass after these things that Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard which was in Jezreel, next to the palace of Ahab king of Samaria.
So Ahab spoke to Naboth, saying, “Give me your vineyard, that I may have it for a vegetable garden, because it is near, next to my house; and for it I will give you a vineyard better than it. Or, if it seems good to you, I will give you its worth in money.”
But Naboth said to Ahab, “The Lord forbid that I should give the inheritance of my fathers to you!”
So Ahab went into his house sullen and displeased because of the word which Naboth the Jezreelite had spoken to him; for he had said, “I will not give you the inheritance of my fathers.” And he lay down on his bed, and turned away his face, and would eat no food.
But Jezebel his wife came to him, and said to him, “Why is your spirit so sullen that you eat no food?”
He said to her, “Because I spoke to Naboth the Jezreelite, and said to him, ‘Give me your vineyard for money; or else, if it pleases you, I will give you another vineyard for it.’ And he answered, ‘I will not give you my vineyard.’”
Then Jezebel his wife said to him, “You now exercise authority over Israel! Arise, eat food, and let your heart be cheerful; I will give you the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite.” And she wrote letters in Ahab’s name, sealed them with his seal, and sent the letters to the elders and the nobles who were dwelling in the city with Naboth.
She wrote in the letters, saying, Proclaim a fast, and seat Naboth with high honor among the people; and seat two men, scoundrels, before him to bear witness against him, saying, “You have blasphemed God and the king.” Then take him out, and stone him, that he may die.
So the men of his city, the elders and nobles who were inhabitants of his city, did as Jezebel had sent to them, as it was written in the letters which she had sent to them. They proclaimed a fast, and seated Naboth with high honor among the people.
And two men, scoundrels, came in and sat before him; and the scoundrels witnessed against him, against Naboth, in the presence of the people, saying, “Naboth has blasphemed God and the king!” Then they took him outside the city and stoned him with stones, so that he died. Then they sent to Jezebel, saying, “Naboth has been stoned and is dead.”
And it came to pass, when Jezebel heard that Naboth had been stoned and was dead, that Jezebel said to Ahab, “Arise, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, which he refused to give you for money; for Naboth is not alive, but dead.”
So it was, when Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, that Ahab got up and went down to take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite.
Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying,
“Arise, go down to meet Ahab king of Israel, who lives in Samaria. There he is, in the vineyard of Naboth, where he has gone down to take possession of it. You shall speak to him, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord: “Have you murdered and also taken possession?”’ And you shall speak to him, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord: “In the place where dogs licked the blood of Naboth, dogs shall lick your blood, even yours.”’”
So Ahab said to Elijah, “Have you found me, O my enemy?”
And he answered, “I have found you, because you have sold yourself to do evil in the sight of the Lord:
‘Behold, I will bring calamity on you. I will take away your posterity, and will cut off from Ahab every male in Israel, both bond and free. I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahijah, because of the provocation with which you have provoked Me to anger, and made Israel sin.’
And concerning Jezebel the Lord also spoke, saying, ‘The dogs shall eat Jezebel by the wall of Jezreel.’
The dogs shall eat whoever belongs to Ahab and dies in the city, and the birds of the air shall eat whoever dies in the field.”
But there was no one like Ahab who sold himself to do wickedness in the sight of the Lord, because Jezebel his wife stirred him up. And he behaved very abominably in following idols, according to all that the Amorites had done, whom the Lord had cast out before the children of Israel.
So it was, when Ahab heard those words, that he tore his clothes and put sackcloth on his body, and fasted and lay in sackcloth, and went about mourning.
And the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying,
“See how Ahab has humbled himself before Me? Because he has humbled himself before Me, I will not bring the calamity in his days. In the days of his son I will bring the calamity on his house.”
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