Posted on 05/11/2011 9:17:14 AM PDT by petitfour
Just to say what I left unsaid, man can take life and liberty, and can (and does) do so with inadequate justification, error, and similar real imperfections in our time on earth.
Your life can be rescinded by a punk, a cop, a terrorist, or a judge. It's up to you to decide when and why you will submit; it's up to the law to sort out the details after an altercation.
Not long after we moved in to our current house, we had a visit from unidentified LEOs. My wife was home alone with my son. Two guys with no badges, and no ID showed up asking for someone with the same first name as me (no last name given). My wife asked who they were, why they were there, and what it was about. They never showed ID, but they didn't force the point. My wife said the only thing was an acronym on their jacket.
After they left, she called me at work and told me about it. It took me three calls to the different local agencies (two to the city and one to the county) to figure out who they were. They were legit, but they were wrong in not showing badges/ID.
Apparently, they were looking for someone who'd missed an appointment with his PO. The address was the right number, but they were on the wrong street. The person I talked to apparently was their boss, so I called him on the BS of not showing ID/badges, and why his guys had the wrong street. He had no answers.
To this day, I wonder, if my wife had not been home, if we would have had a visit in the middle of the night, and what the outcome would have been.
I think if the truth ever comes out that the scenario you describe will be dead on.
No win situation for home owner. No knock warrants need to stop.
Why do they even do this anymore anyway?
Only a couple speeding tickets? Drug dealers 999/1000 have extensive criminal histories. Cops hit the wrong house.
An AR-15 is my home defense SHTF gun. I’d prolly be dead too because I like to think i have decent trigger control and would go safe the second I realized they were the police.
It's an industry. No way is the government going to dismantle a prohibition that employs thousands in law enforcement and incarceration. Get rid of the WOD, and a substantial bulk of entire federal, state, and local LEO employment would become excess.
Exactly correct.
Government has turned the WOD into a lucrative industry, which enables them to hire tens of thousands more government employees, expanding the courts, probation departments, prisons, etc, etc... It's also given government more control, and enabled government to slowly evolved civilian police departments into paramilitary organizations to be used against the people.
We're supposed to be Americans, not the enemy of the police. People have always had drug and alcohol problems and should be given help if they ask for it and need it. Instead of police raids and throwing hundreds of thousands of Americans into cages for substance abuse and seizing their assets.
Furthermore, the WOD is a *huge* factor in creating thousands of violent organized gangs, who themselves have made a violent and very lucrative living off selling the drugs which were made illegal.
The WOD is a lose lose for ALL, expect government and organized gangs.
They both have their hands tied behind them by Political Correctness!
Perhaps they learned their tactics from the Libyan rebels - 3 shots at the target and 68 into the air....................
He does not care to him it is an acceptable loss just friendly fire no big deal.
For everything else I recommend a shotgun. My Browning is a semi-auto and clears hallways with OO-buck.
It is where those five are concerned.
And the government will always serve itself first.
If you see nothing different between a sworn enemy of America in a battlefield setting, and a citizen in his home.....well, I fear greatly for my people.
Iraq is instructive in this issue. We did similar raids all the time. When your intel is good (corroborated HUMINT, SIGINT tips, etc), and your teams are professional, you get very good results, and cause a minimum of discomfort to the community. They don't like it, but they tolerate it, until you've built up enough local security forces.
When your intel is bad (often when rival factions set each other up), or your assaulters are trigger-happy assholes, it can turn a community deeply against you. This is exponentially worse when people are accidentally or carelessly killed. It's hard on the operators (a co-worker of mine shot a man armed with a pistol. Turns out it was the wrong house, and the man was an older bank employee who thought he was being robbed or kidnapped), and it's hard on the community. This is the kind of thing that 'creates terrorists', or worse, politicians with a grudge, out of sheer resentment.
I'm very sympathetic to cops that need to confront armed opponents. It just seems to me that how we dealt with communities in Iraq and Afghanistan was the best of a very bad situation. Actually trying to standardize that as the law enforcement model that in the United States is a tragedy and cause for great alarm. It speaks volumes of how the government views the citizens.
I'd like to think they'd have a bit more care if they ever get a call about my address. I'm a known quantity in the "good guy" column.
I hope.
I'm really upset that the vast majority of posts to this thread seem to blame the police. Totally unfounded. I find it impossible to believe that a SWAT team ( unless they had a no-knock warrant, or for other reasons which would have been clearly spelled out in advance during the briefing did not loudly announce themselves. And any person who then answers his door holding a weapon is an idiot.
There is a natural sympathy here for the deceased because of his military history. He was a Marine, and appears to have served his country honorably. If he were a multiple offender, career criminal, 99.9% of the posts would be cheering the police.
A year of so ago, in Pinellas County, a fugitive was corneredd by police. He open fire, and was struck with about 100 bullets. When the Sheriff was asked later, why he was hit that many times, he replied,,"Because that's ALL the ammo they had with them." That quote was applauded all over FR.
“An AR-15 is my home defense SHTF gun. I’d prolly be dead too because I like to think i have decent trigger control and would go safe the second I realized they were the police.”
I probably would not go safe under that situation for exactly what happened to this guy. The cops are trained to not hesitate, if they see a threat to them (and their pensions) they are trained to empty the clip. You’ve got to have the same attitude if you want to survive that kind of encounter. Besides the gangs are doing home invastions pretending to be cops so how do you know. Best practise is to just open up on whoever is breaking down your door or pointing a gun at you from outside (if your state allows). At least in that case you might live through the incident (although you’re going to be in a hell of a fix defending youself in court).
The purpose of the military is to destroy things and kill people.
Evidently you think thats what Law Enforcement is for as well.
LE, in general, has become an industry, and you would be naive to the extreme if you fail to understand that an opportunity to generate "revenue" trumps any loyalty even local cops have for the "civilians" they are supposed to serve.
Just like they say a conservative is a liberal who's been mugged, perhaps a libertarian is a former conservative whose local SO thought the chance to share in a bail recovery fee ($25K) was worth rousting one of its taxpayers out of bed in the middle of the night and surrounding his house for most of the next day with 6 cruisers and 10 cops.
Like I said in another post, I was simply asking how far that particular poster would be willing to take that sentiment. Nothing else.
You just called a whole bunch of your fellow FReepers idiots. If it's after dark and I'm not expecting anyone, I am absolutely answering the door with a firearm in my hand.
Not a good way for you to sway opinion.
Totally unfounded.
Just like this guys shooting apparently was. Especially if it turns out the SWAT team was looking for the previous owner of this house...
‘I’m really upset that the vast majority of posts to this thread seem to blame the police.”
Who else is to blame, perhaps the mailman?
“I find it impossible to believe that a SWAT team ( unless they had a no-knock warrant, or for other reasons which would have been clearly spelled out in advance during the briefing did not loudly announce themselves.”
BS, we have all see how these go down. The cops rush up to the house and mumble “thisisthepolicewehaveawarrant” as they are breaking down the door. I defy ANYONE to recognize and understand that as a proper announcement. The fact the wife saw them probably caused them to hurry even more.
“And any person who then answers his door holding a weapon is an idiot.”
What you are you a boot licker? Someone breaks into my house and I’m an idiot for arming myself? Perhaps you’d prefer flowers.
The cops murdered this man. The Pinellas County man was a KNOWN criminal with a KNOWN VIOLENT history of crimes. They cops KNEW he had threatened to kill any cops who tried to arrest him. His wife TOLD them he was armed.
The incident you are referring to occured in Polk County and they shot him AFTER he murdered two cops. get your facts straight
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.