Free Republic

A ban on almost all no-knock warrants is inching towards the Governor Tim Walz's desk with a push from the family of a man killed during the service of one. Legislators got deep into details Tuesday with law enforcement veterans hoping to fine tune the ban on no-knock warrants. But they also heard the emotional side of the story from Amir Locke’s father. Minneapolis police were not looking for Amir Locke when they served a no-knock warrant at the home where he was sleeping in February 2022.

Gun owners and self-defense advocates are lauding a rare victory in which a Texas grand jury has refused to indict a homeowner for shooting and killing a police officer who entered his home unannounced in the middle of the night. The homeowner, Henry Magee, 28, said he thought the officers who broke through his door were robbers and he acted in self-defense to protect his pregnant girlfriend and two children. Police were acting on a tip from a criminal informant that led them to believe Magee had more than a dozen marijuana plants, all at least six feet tall, in...

The Harris family's life began to unravel around dawn on the last day of August. R.J. Harris, who is 77, was in bed when a noise jolted him awake. Bam. What was that? Bam. It sounded like an explosion. Bam. The front door swung open and officers in masks swarmed inside, pointing rifles. Police! Hands up! Police! Harris' wife, an aunt, a son, a grandson, a granddaughter, a great-grandson and a cousin all bolted awake. From the floor above, where one of the Harris daughters lives with her family, came the blast and stench of smoke bombs. Mr. Harris, standing...

“He [a federal agent] had his knee on my back and I had no idea why they were there.”--Anthony Wright, victim of a Dept. of Education SWAT team raid The militarization of American police--no doubt a blowback effect of the military empire--has become an unfortunate part of American life. In fact, it says something about our reliance on the military that federal agencies having nothing whatsoever to do with national defense now see the need for their own paramilitary units. Among those federal agencies laying claim to their own law enforcement divisions are the State Department, Department of Education, Department...

The Guerena Shooting: Initial Analysis As regular readers know, I’m a USAF veteran (I was a security police officer in SAC during the cold war) and have extensive civilian police service, including SWAT duty. I have been writing on the Erik Scott case In Las Vegas since August of 2010. Those extensive posts are available in our Erik Scott archive. The Jose Guerena shooting, which took place on May 5, is similar in many ways. My co-blogger, Bob’s May 25 story on the Pajamas Media site (here) has stimulated considerable interest in the story on the Net. What I’ve yet...

Gwinnett County police said they accidentally broke down the door to the wrong house before going to the correct house and arresting a man on drug charges.Gwinnett County police investigators intended to execute a no-knock search warrant at a home on Valley Spring Drive in Lawrenceville Wednesday morning. Police said the lead investigator mistakenly pointed out a home to the officers and once officers entered the home they realized they were in the wrong house.VIDEO: Gwinnett County Police Break Down Door To Wrong House The homeowner of the incorrectly targeted house told Channel 2 that having guns pointed at him...

Armed with a battering ram and shotguns, Buffalo police looking for heroin broke down the door and stormed the lower apartment of a West Side family of eight. The problem is that the Wednesday evening raid should have occurred at an apartment upstairs. And, that’s only the tip of the iceberg, according to Schavon Pennyamon, who lives at the mistakenly raided apartment on Sherwood Street with her husband, Terrell, and six children. Pennyamon alleges that after wrongly breaking into her apartment, police proceeded to strike her epileptic husband in the head with the butt end of a shotgun and point...

WASHINGTON (Map, News) - The violent assault on Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo’s home late last month was certainly not the first bungled raid by a government SWAT team, but the bad publicity it generated should make it the last time these trigger-happy squads target innocent civilians. Tracking a 32-pound package of marijuana that had been addressed to Calvo’s wife, Trinity Tomsic, Prince George’s sheriff’s deputies forcibly entered the mayor’s home on July 29 and killed his two dogs before handcuffing him and his mother-in-law. But like so many other SWAT team raids across the country, this one turned out...

Awakened before dawn by police officers who battered down the door to his home, Basil Parasiris said he acted in self-defence when he shot at a stranger at his bedroom door. A jury agreed yesterday, acquitting the Montreal-area businessman of first-degree murder in the shooting death of Constable Daniel Tessier, a father of two. The verdict was the latest slap in this case for the Laval police. The trial had revealed that the force's search warrant relied on dubious evidence and didn't allow a night-time raid; that officers didn't properly check whether Mr. Parasiris owned guns; and that they fired...

<p>The man accused of killing Prentiss police officer Ron Jones in December 2001 testified Thursday that he didn't know Jones was a law enforcement officer when he shot him.</p> <p>Cory Maye, 23, said he was asleep on a chair in the living room of his Prentiss apartment as his 14-month-old daughter slept in the bedroom when he heard a loud crash at his front door. "I immediately ran to my daughter's room, got a pistol, put in a magazine and chambered a round," said Maye, who is on trial for capital murder in Marion County. "As I laid on the floor by the bed, I heard kicks at the back door. I was frightened, I thought someone was trying to break in on me and my daughter."</p>

Claim of gun in house justified police search, high court rules BY MICHAEL ROWETT ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE The alleged presence of a handgun in a Conway woman’s home during drug deals justified an unannounced police search of the home, the Arkansas Supreme Court ruled Thursday, reversing the state Court of Appeals. The high court agreed with Faulkner County Circuit Judge David Reynolds’ denial of a motion by Kisha Ilo to suppress drug evidence obtained in the search. Ilo argued that police should have knocked and announced their presence before forcibly entering her residence. She pleaded guilty to charges of possession of...