Originally posted by HARBINGER:
Back in SC we ran a video store from 93-01 (couldn't compete with blockbuster.) We had about 5-6 movies disappearing a week I fought one guy when the cops got there one said they probably go trade them for crack a few streets over from our store. I asked if they knew it was there why not bust it? He stammered around the question wouldn't answer me. Figured somebody was being paid.

A highly productive confidential informant is extremely valuable to local law enforcement and that is where you will see crimes being manufactured just to keep the productive informant out of jail and on the streets. They gain high levels of credibility with law enforcement and on the street level, can carry more actual authority than those with badges because they effectively have a license to selectively break laws and call in the law, options which regular criminals do not have day to day, but will aspire to gain. It is something that regular citizens would despise if they knew about it, but rarely get privvy to.

Originally posted by J. Croft:
As for SWAT getting away with shit, somewhere down the road someone's just going to have to say fuck it because the current trend of cops getting away with shit isn't going to stop on it's own.

Originally posted by Breacher:

Thing is one of the two officers involved got caught with his pants down with a teenage girl near the high school, in the squad car. Fired, but no charges filed...

The Minneapolis City Council approved a $1 million settlement Friday after a botched drug raid in 2010 in which an officer threw a “flash-bang” grenade into a south Minneapolis apartment burning the flesh off a woman’s leg.

The payout to Rickia Russell, who suffered permanent injuries, was the third largest payout for alleged Minneapolis police misconduct on record.

Flash grenades are intended to distract and intimidate, not to injure people, but during the raid the device rolled under the legs of Russell, who was seated on a sofa, and exploded. The police were looking that day for a drug dealer, narcotics and a firearm, but found nothing.

Russell, now 31, suffered third- and fourth-degree burns that caused a deep indentation on the back of one leg, requiring skin grafts from her scalp. She is still undergoing physical therapy.

“What happened in this case was an accident,” Minneapolis city attorney Susan Segal said in a statement. “It’s very unfortunate that Ms. Russell suffered serious injuries, however, accidents like this are rare.”

Yet incidents of fires, injuries and even deaths caused by the devices have led to costly settlements and policy changes in cities nationwide, including Minneapolis, where a 1989 fire started by a police grenade killed two people.

Originally posted by airforce:
This one will cost Minneapolis $1 million.

Quote

The Minneapolis City Council approved a $1 million settlement Friday after a botched drug raid in 2010 in which [b]an officer threw a “flash-bang” grenade into a south Minneapolis apartment burning the flesh off a woman’s leg.

The payout to Rickia Russell, who suffered permanent injuries, was the third largest payout for alleged Minneapolis police misconduct on record.

Flash grenades are intended to distract and intimidate, not to injure people, but during the raid the device rolled under the legs of Russell, who was seated on a sofa, and exploded. The police were looking that day for a drug dealer, narcotics and a firearm, but found nothing.

Russell, now 31, suffered third- and fourth-degree burns that caused a deep indentation on the back of one leg, requiring skin grafts from her scalp. She is still undergoing physical therapy.

“What happened in this case was an accident,” Minneapolis city attorney Susan Segal said in a statement. “It’s very unfortunate that Ms. Russell suffered serious injuries, however, accidents like this are rare.”

Yet incidents of fires, injuries and even deaths caused by the devices have led to costly settlements and policy changes in cities nationwide, including Minneapolis, where a 1989 fire started by a police grenade killed two people.

Onward and upward,
airforce [/b]

A Kihei couple is suing the Maui Police Department in federal court after officers allegedly raided their home while executing a search warrant on the wrong address last year.

April and Norman Freeland allege that police forced them outside and searched their home for nearly half an hour, even after they knew they were at the wrong location. Attorney Sam MacRoberts of the Law Office of Philip Lowenthal said the couple still has never seen a warrant for the search.

“Everyone is supposed to feel safe inside their home, and the one person who’s supposed to protect you, the police, are the ones who invaded their home,” he said. “They feel violated.” (...)

According to the Freelands’ complaint, they were at home hosting a dinner for three guests on April 15 when they heard a loud noise from their front lanai at around 9 p.m.

When the Freelands approached the door to their lanai they found armed men who did not identify themselves but were later identified as Maui Police officers, according to the complaint.

“When Norman Freeland touched the door, the men rushed into the Freelands’ home without permission,” the complaint alleges, adding that the officers did not “knock and announce” their presence as required by state law.

The officers “screamed and yelled” as they entered the home, grabbed Norman Freeland by the wrist and forced him and his wife outside, where they were held by a man carrying a “combat-type weapon,” according to the complaint.

The men told the Freelands that they had a warrant but did not show it to them, according to the complaint. It also claims April Freeland told them that they were at the wrong house and pointed out that their address was clearly displayed on the outside fence and door. Still, the officers continued to detain them and searched the house for around 30 minutes, according to the complaint....

Originally posted by Pericles:
Surprised that this one didn't get covered here:

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/53237543-78/police-ogden-officers-force.html.csp?page=1

Money quote: "There really was not a great deal that was unique, other than the outcome," said Strike Force Commander Darin Parke.

What can you say when an Army vet gives the SWAT team a 50% casualty rate.

Originally posted by Pericles:
Surprised that this one didn't get covered here:

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/53237543-78/police-ogden-officers-force.html.csp?page=1

Originally posted by airforce:

Quote

Originally posted by Pericles:
[b] Surprised that this one didn't get covered here:

http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/53237543-78/police-ogden-officers-force.html.csp?page=1

See this thread . This is one of those situations where we just don't have a lot of information to go on, but the Ogden SWAT was involved in at least one questionable shooting in the recent past.

Onward and upward,
airforce [/b]

It was a horror movie come to life.

Judy Sanchez woke Thursday to the sound of heavy footsteps in her stairwell, followed by a loud motor. She got to her kitchen in time to see the blade of a chain saw rip through her front door.

"It was so crazy," Judy Sanchez said. "I was terrified."

Jan. 26 was the day of Operation Red Wolf, a multiagency sweep during which 16 people in Fitchburg were arrested on charges related to gang activity, drug trafficking and illegal gun sales after a two-year investigation by federal, state and local law-enforcement officers.

The people sawing through her door were FBI agents, looking for a gang member suspected of trafficking cocaine. But they went to the wrong address.
photo COURTESY Judy Sanchez The door to the apartment of Judy Sanchez at 391 Elm St., in Fitchburg after FBI agents used a chain saw to tear the door down.

Sanchez said the ordeal traumatized her and her 3-year-old daughter, Ji'anni, and she is unsatisfied with the agency's response to the error.

About 10 FBI agents came into her apartment at 391 Elm St., that morning, guns drawn and pointed at her. There was no knock, and they didn't shout that they were from the FBI until after the saw was buzzing through her six-panel front door, she said.

She believes it took about three minutes for them to saw a big rectangle through the door, then kick in the center. She shouted repeatedly that they had the wrong place.

Once the first agent was inside, she was ordered facedown on the floor at gunpoint. Her 3-month-old pit-bull Lexi wet the floor, and she was instructed to grab the
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dog and hold her. To do so, she said, she had to reach through the dog's urine.

Sanchez doesn't know how long she was held on the floor, but estimates it was between 30 and 45 minutes while her daughter cried in the other room. It was a cold morning, and she was not allowed to put warm clothes on.

"I was still at gunpoint the whole time. I was freezing," Sanchez said.

The FBI agents kept asking her where Luis Vasquez was, and she said she didn't know.

Sanchez and her daughter live in apartment 2R, which is located in the rear of the building. The other apartment on the floor, 2F, is at the front and is the home of Luis R. "Joker" Vasquez, but Sanchez said she only knew him as "Jay."

Vasquez, 41, is believed to be the leader of the local arm of the Sex, Money, Murda gang and was captured in his apartment. He faces up to 40 years in prison, a $5 million fine and lifetime supervision when released.

Tim Christmas, the former building manager, was called in to install a replacement door in Sanchez' apartment. He estimated the fiberglass, prehung door unit he installed cost about $250.

The FBI will reimburse Lancaster Oaks Development, the company that owns the building, for the door.

Christmas also said he repaired the frame to Vasquez's back door, which was pushed in for entrance.

"This is a big screw-up," Christmas said.

He and Sanchez are both in disbelief that Vasquez could be involved in a gang, saying they thought he was a positive influence in the neighborhood and good with children.

A female FBI agent wrote down a number for Sanchez's landlord to call for reimbursement for the door and the number for Damon Katz, chief counsel for the Boston division of the FBI. Sanchez said she received a quick oral apology that was devoid of remorse.

"Just a little pat on the back and saying 'I'm sorry' is not OK," she said.

She said chain-sawing through a door may be common practice for the FBI, but it was a traumatic event for her and her daughter.

Sanchez attends classes at Fitchburg State University and didn't go to class Thursday, feeling too disoriented. She's having trouble sleeping now, and her daughter didn't want to go into their bathroom all weekend because it is located next to the door the FBI used.

An FBI spokesman read a prepared statement about the incident.

"The mistake was quickly apparent to the FBI agents who entered the apartment. ... The FBI assistant special agent in charge recognized legitimate concerns the resident had about the mistake," the statement read.

The statement maintained that the agent that spoke with Sanchez apologized repeatedly and left her phone number and another number for any "further concerns."

The FBI does not reveal specific operational details about the tactics of an arrest team, such as how long it takes to open a door. The spokesman said the agents typically wield M4 assault rifles and that it's possible the shock of the event confused Sanchez about the length of time everything took.

The Fitchburg Police Department was not involved in the incident. Police spokesman Sgt. Glenn Fossa said he does not have direct knowledge of the details of the incident. He said the concept of compensation for property damage and trauma from a misdirected police raid is too broad a concept to identify a policy for what the department would do in a similar scenario.

According to the complaint, which made its way to Courthouse News yesterday, Cantu, a diesel mechanic, was making his lunch January 22, 2010, when he saw a few cops streaking across his yard. A deafening explosion shook the room as a flash bomb shot through the door. Nearly 20 officers crashed in.

“Get on the ground!” they allegedly ordered him. Cantu, according to the complaint, obliged and was zipcuffed. Inexplicably, the filing claims, the officers kicked and punched him until he was unconscious, lying in a pool of his own blood on the kitchen floor. Meanwhile, they searched his house and allegedly didn’t find what they were after. Cantu’s alleged butcher’s bill: a broken orbital bone, a broken nose, a concussion, traumatic brain injury, a loss of vision in his left eye and loss of hearing in his left ear. According to his complaint, the “injuries required surgical intervention and caused significant scarring and disfigurement.”

Cantu was arrested but never charged with a crime.

Originally posted by airforce:
From Dallas, Texas. See here , also.

Quote

According to the complaint, which made its way to Courthouse News yesterday, Cantu, a diesel mechanic, was making his lunch January 22, 2010, when he saw a few cops streaking across his yard. A deafening explosion shook the room as a flash bomb shot through the door. Nearly 20 officers crashed in.

“Get on the ground!” they allegedly ordered him. Cantu, according to the complaint, obliged and was zipcuffed. Inexplicably, the filing claims, the officers kicked and punched him until he was unconscious, lying in a pool of his own blood on the kitchen floor. Meanwhile, they searched his house and allegedly didn’t find what they were after. Cantu’s alleged butcher’s bill: a broken orbital bone, a broken nose, a concussion, traumatic brain injury, a loss of vision in his left eye and loss of hearing in his left ear. According to his complaint, the “injuries required surgical intervention and caused significant scarring and disfigurement.”

Cantu was arrested but never charged with a crime.

We can't find any record of this anywhere, and the lawyers are not responding to questions. Strange.

Onward and upward,
airforce

New Orleans police officials confirmed Thursday that the 20-year-old man who was fatally shot by a plain-clothed narcotics officer during a drug raid at a Gentilly house a day earlier was unarmed. New Orleans police officer Joshua Colclough, 28, fired a single shot Wednesday evening that killed Wendell Allen, 20. Police officials were guarded in their comments about the shooting Thursday, citing the ongoing investigation.

We have not been able to yet completely understand what exactly occurred,” Police Superintendent Ronal Serpas said Thursday.

The shooting took place inside a red-brick, two-story home at 2651 Prentiss Ave. in Gentilly. Officers were executing a search warrant at the home following a days-old probe of marijuana dealing. Serpas said officers later found drug paraphernalia and 138 grams of marijuana — about four and a half ounces — inside the residence.

The man shot by Washington County tactical officers in New Columbia Tuesday night had grabbed a gun because he thought intruders were on his property after his wife had checked on their barking dog in their backyard and saw a stranger in dark clothing.

Alberto Flores-Haro, according to relatives and witnesses, did not know that the men surrounding his home and neighborhood Tuesday night were authorities approaching to raid a residence just a few doors down from his home in the 9500 block of North Woolsey Avenue....

Neighbor Juan Soto Martinez, 16, who lives across a walkway from Flores-Haro's home, said he heard Flores at his front door yelling with a man, who seemed to be outside, on the side of his house. Then, he heard multiple gunshots.

Ibarra found his stepdad collapsed in the front doorway of their home, shot in one arm and twice in the stomach, and called 9-1-1 about 10 p.m.

" I grabbed a rag and put pressure on his forearm," Ibarra recalled, and told his mother to grab a towel from the kitchen and place pressure on Flores' torso wounds.

GS.51SHOT115-02.jpgView full size
Ibarra said his family had no idea that the men surrounding their home in tactical uniforms of army green were from the Washington County Sheriff's Office's Tactical Negotiation Team, who were assisting police.

He said of his dad, "I think he just wanted to scare them away. He didn't know who they were."

While his father lay bleeding, Ibarra said he was ordered out of the house.

"Once I stepped outside, I was ordered to get on the ground," said Ibarra, a Roosevelt High School senior.

He said the rest of his family, his mother and four other children from ages 5 and 13, were ordered to get out of the house, and then tactical officers grabbed his stepdad and carried him to a waiting ambulance.

Flores-Haro, 31, remains in serious condition at Legacy Emanuel Medical Center....

While Sgt. Pete Simpson said early today "there was an exchange of gunfire,'' police said later this afternoon that detectives have not determined if Flores-Haro fired any shots at police. Police also said that the officers "repeatedly identified themselves as law enforcement officers.''

"Preliminary information released at the scene was than an exchange of gunfire occurred. However, detectives have been searching for shell casings at the scene, which is lined by a heavily wood area. A handgun was recovered at the scene, but detectives have not determined if the man shot at police.'' (...)

When police broke through the door of Fred Skinner’s house wielding weapons, Skinner, 76, told them they were in the wrong house.

"They tried to put the handcuffs on me. They had my arm back… they said, 'Wrong house.' They took the handcuffs off me and just left," Skinner said.

Police realized that Skinner was telling the truth about five minutes into their house search.

The Finger Lakes Drug Task Force, Auburn Police, and the Rochester Police Department-- which was the lead agency--were involved in the raid.

Auburn Police Chief Gary Gianotta admitted it was a mistake, and Skinner was reimbursed with $1,250 to fix his doors. He said the force raided the wrong house four times in the last 16 years.

On the morning of May 18, 2008, the Easton Police Department got a telephone call from “Chandra Parker.”

It turns out that wasn’t her real name, but that didn’t matter. Solomon now had a reason to take action against Terebesi.

He called in members of the Southwest Regional Emergency Response Team, a SWAT force made up of police officers from Easton and four surrounding towns. Nine heavily armed officers charged into the home based on a search warrant that a miniscule amount of drugs had been seen there by Parker.

When the operation was over, Guizan, who was visiting Terebesi, had been shot dead . . .

Two officers expressed misgivings about the operation prior to its launch. The team’s commander urged it be delayed; another officer suggested the SWAT-style raid wasn’t even necessary. But Solomon insisted the raid had to be conducted that day.

A member of the team with the most critical role in the May 18 raid had received most of his training for a far different role in such an operation. He arrived an hour late to the pre-raid briefing.

And the woman whose complaint led to the search warrant and the raid had a criminal record and gave a false name to officers preparing the warrant — all of which was never conveyed to the judge who authorized the search.

The lawsuit charges that the raid by the Southwest Regional Emergency Response Team should never have been ordered.

“The decision to call out SWERT to execute the warrant was unjustified, unreasonable, an arbitrary abuse of police power and not based on a legitimate law enforcement objective,” the suit states. “It was intended to frighten, intimidate, harass and/or punish Terebisi and Guizan and, on information and belief, to further Solomon’s interests.”

Solomon, who had been chief since 1995, recently retired from the police department. His lawyer did not return calls and emails for comment. In his deposition testimony he states that based on the information he has now he would not have done anything differently in ordering the SWAT team to raid Terebesi’s home. He claimed he wanted the raid done as soon as possible to ensure that evidence of criminal activity was not destroyed before they could seize it. He continued the raid was necessary to “obtain the evidence that the crime — obviously a crime was occurring, and to obtain that evidence.”

Originally posted by Super Beast:
http://www.wnd.com/2012/06/atf-agents-point-gun-at-8-year-old/?cat_orig=us

ATF Agents raid the wrong house, handcuff the mother and point weapons at an 8 year old.

A Colorado woman has filed a lawsuit after agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the ATF, entered her home without a warrant and threatened her and her 8-year old-son while looking for a previous tenant who had left the address more than a year earlier.

According to the filing from Linda Griego, it was on June 15, 2010, when officers with the ATF – as part of the Regional Anti-Gang Enforcement Task Force – violently entered her home without a warrant, handcuffed and pointed guns at her and her son, Colby Frias.

“They had multiple machine pistols pointed at my son. I could see the laser sights on his body and he began to freak out. While I was cuffed I had to calm him down while the officers broke down his bedroom door,” she said.

Her legal action is against the Greeley Police Department and the ATF for illegally entering the home without a warrant.

David Lane, Griego’s attorney, told WND that to this day the agency still has not produced a warrant authorizing it to enter her home. He said Frias continues to suffer nightmares about the events of that day....

Originally posted by Super Beast:

ATF Agents raid the wrong house, handcuff the mother and point weapons at an 8 year old.
I'm sure this won't make me any friends but I believe the only way to stop these kinds of raids is to respond in kind to those involved.

At 7 a.m. on January 20, 2007, DEA agents battered down the door to Thomas and Rosalie Avina’s mobile home in Seeley, California, in search of suspected drug trafficker Louis Alvarez. Thomas Avina met the agents in his living room and told them they were making a mistake. Shouting “Don’t you fucking move,” the agents forced Thomas Avina to the floor at gunpoint, and handcuffed him and his wife, who had been lying on a couch in the living room. As the officers made their way to the back of the house, where the Avina’s 11-year-old and 14-year-old daughters were sleeping, Rosalie Avina screamed, “Don’t hurt my babies. Don’t hurt my babies.”

The agents entered the 14-year-old girl’s room first, shouting “Get down on the fucking ground.” The girl, who was lying on her bed, rolled onto the floor, where the agents handcuffed her. Next they went to the 11-year-old’s room. The girl was sleeping. Agents woke her up by shouting “Get down on the fucking ground.” The girl’s eyes shot open, but she was, according to her own testimony, “frozen in fear.” So the agents dragged her onto the floor. While one agent handcuffed her, another held a gun to her head.

Moments later the two daughters were carried into the living room and placed next to their parents on the floor while DEA agents ransacked their home. After 30 minutes, the agents removed the children’s handcuffs. After two hours, the agents realized they had the wrong house—the product of a sloppy license plate transcription—and left.

In 2008, the Avinas—mom, dad, and both daughters—filed a federal suit against the DEA for excessive use of force, assault, and battery in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California. That court ruled in favor of the DEA, and the Avinas appealed. Last week, the family got justice.

While the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals defended the agents' rough treatment of Thomas and Rosalie, it also declared that yanking the Avina children of their beds and putting guns to their heads did, in fact, constitute the “intentional infliction of emotional distress.”

"A jury could find that the agents pointed their guns at the head of an eleven-year-old girl, 'like they were going to shoot [her],' while she lay on the floor in handcuffs, and that it was excessive for them to do so," reads the Ninth Circuit's decision, which was filed June 12. "Similarly, a jury could find that the agents’ decision to force the two girls to lie face down on the floor with their hands cuffed behind their backs was unreasonable."

Although there is evidence that the agents released the girls from their handcuffs once they realized how young they were, there is also evidence that the agents knew, prior to entering the girls’ bedrooms, that the girls were children. Rosalie testified that, as the agents were heading towards the girls’ rooms, she screamed at the agents several times, “Don’t hurt my babies.” Moreover, one of the agents testified at his deposition that, when he first saw one of the girls (presumably the older of the two girls), she appeared to be “12 [or] 13 years old.”