Here is a portion of an article that I read. I had heard that cities could be held liable for not having some type of response team.
If you think a SWAT team might be good for your agency, but
you’re still on the fence, you might note that not having one can present its own problems. The failure to develop and maintain a SWAT unit, where viable, can be costly. Courts may not mandate that an agency have a SWAT team, but they can encourage its creation.
A 1982 barricade situation ended with an Anchorage patrol
officer taking a suspect’s life. The court ruled the officer’s actions justifiable, but concluded that the absence of mitigators, i.e., a SWAT unit, limited the police department’s options in resolving the situation. The city was held liable for the suspect’s death. Such was the impetus that gave rise to the Anchorage (Alaska) Police Department’s SWAT team.
Sorry don’t buy it. We have swat teams because they get lots of fun toys so law enforcement love em.
First of all there’s the court cases which say the cops are not there to protect individuals.
Secondly there are the multitude of successful lawsuits against cities for abuses by the swat teams. The wrong address, the dead dogs, the dead people at the wrong houses.
Thirdly swat teams tend to use violence to solve problems which results in more lawsuits.