Nice to know you spent so much time and effort informing yourself to arrive at your opinion. Go read the rest of the posts before jumping to the wrong conclusions.
Kmart wanted the problem dealt with -- loiterers and drag racers.
Unfortunately, HPD went nuts. Rather than going after the loiterers and drag racers, they just started swooping in, blocking exits, and arresting every single person present, including legitimate customers, on bogus charges.
The James Coney Island raid was conducted on adults who had been meeting for ten years with the blessing of the owner of the establishment and were doing absolutely nothing wrong.
Because the police made no effort to separate legitimate patrons from loiterers in either raid, they destroyed their own credibility.
The drag racers and loiterers need to be dealt with, but that probably isn't possible now.
Actually, it's not even clear that K-Mart wanted the problem to be dealt with. The Police Chief admitted today that K-Mart did not sign an affidavit requesting the police to conduct this action, and K-Mart earlier stated that they did not request this raid.
Kmart wanted the problem dealt with -- loiterers and drag racers.
Not just K-Mart, who has since denied they asked for any type of help from the police, but also residents of apartment complexes immediately adjacent to the K-Mart.
Unfortunately, HPD went nuts. Rather than going after the loiterers and drag racers, they just started swooping in, blocking exits, and arresting every single person present, including legitimate customers, on bogus charges.
It seems the implication here is the police just suddenly arrived without warning and started arresting everyone, when no one had done anything wrong. You certainly got that impression with some of the early news reports, with allegedly concerned parents moaning, "Oh, my child is a Straight-A student who has never been in trouble his whole life, and the police just came up and arrested him! Ohhhhh!"
The problem is, that in and of itself is bogus. According to an op-ed piece published in the Houston Chronicle and written by Christine McDonald, the police had been contacted on numerous occasions on complaints of noise and general rowdiness caused by an ever increasing crowd (as mentioned by Houston City Councilman Bert Keller on KHOU-TV).
Police visits to the lot and the posting of No Trespassing signs (which were present on the day of the raid, as indicated by a report by KHOU-TV) went unheeded and ignored.
On August 18, an undercover officer had been inside the K-Mart prior to the raid, handing out cards to whom they believed to be legitimate customers. All they had to do was whip out one of those cards when the raid commenced, and they would not be arrested. The exits were indeed blocked, to keep those who would be arrested from escaping by vehicle.
The James Coney Island raid was conducted on adults who had been meeting for ten years with the blessing of the owner of the establishment and were doing absolutely nothing wrong.
Separate issue, therefore irrelevant.
Because the police made no effort to separate legitimate patrons from loiterers in either raid, they destroyed their own credibility.
Obviously false. If anyone is contributing to the destruction of the credibility of the Houston Police Department, it is the news media, who has deliberately tried to make this look like an act of the Keystone Kops on a group of little angels.
The drag racers and loiterers need to be dealt with, but that probably isn't possible now.
That is, unfortunately, quite so. In fact, things now will only get worse. And you can thank our biased, leftist news media for it.