Raid On House

[bierman]

If we the people can bear arms. Why do the police have to be armed ?

Because they actively go looking for the people we carry guns to protect ourselves against just in case we run into them?

Thanks Dale. You beat me to it.

[J-Ho]

The militarization of the police scares the snot out of me. Most jurisdictions dont need a SWAT team but it's the cool thing to do & I suspect heavily subsidized by the Feds. Have you ever considered how many armed Federal officers there are? Would be interesting to know, me thinks.

I'm wondering how you decide what towns do and what towns don't need highly trained officers capable of dealing with high risk scenarios? It's kind of like saying "most people don't need guns...only people who carry large amounts of cash or go into bad areas need a gun". Doesn't that ring a bell?

They probably thought they didn't need such a capability in Nickel Mines, PA before Charles Carl Roberts IV decided to take over the Amish school and kill kids.

They probably thought they didn't need that capability in Columbine, CO, which is a very "good" area...but then Klebold and Harris spoiled the fairy tale.

Virginia Tech probably didn't think they needed that capability either....

So really, how do you chose?

The problem (well, one of several) is that the only time you ever hear about a SWAT hit or raid is if something goes wrong, or isn't as it was thought to be. If someone exercises extreme caution, uses their team, and it turns out to be a wasted effort everyone gets mad at them for trying to militaristic and going overboard. The second something bad happens those same people want to know "how the police could let something like this happen"....it's a lose-lose situation. If nothing happens you're going overboard. If something happens you didn't take enough measures to prevent it.

No, I'm NOT on a SWAT team.

Virginia Tech, Columbine, and, if memory serves, the Amish school shooting all ended before SWAT could arrive. We needed a good cleanup crew and forensics, not paramilitary police. Don't get me wrong I know there is a place for SWAT teams. I think that many, not all by any means, juristictions misuse thier SWAT teams. Read my previous post. The policy here was to call in swat whenever guns were known to be in a house. This is a medium sized Texas town. How many homes do you think have guns? The policy was NOT to send in swat if someone was using a gun, but if they had one in the house. SWAT teams should be held to a higher standard than the average cop. We pay for good equipment and training, most of the officers are great, but I think they are at the beck and call of polititions, not law enforcement. SWAT teams should not be used to intimidate! They should be used to respond to situations were the extra force is deemed neccesary. I don't even want them to intimidate the bad guys. They should neutralize the threat of the bad guys. My government should not have a 'show of force' to help keep me inline.

Here's another example.

When my wife and I first married we had a small 'starter' home, if you will. Not the best neighborhood, but we didn't have any kids to worry about yet. The next door neighbor's teen aged son sold pot. This family had the police visit many times. Usually for pretty simple things, noise complaints, family disputes, etc. Why did swat have to come crashing through the yard to raid this house? They had been to the house previously,many times, and had no trouble. Did the threat level suddenly rise because they now had a solid tip that this kid was selling pot? If every other visit by the cops ended with the kid and rest of the family complying with the police's requests, then why send SWAT for this? Even when there were problems after the kid came home, two uniforms knocked on the door.

Militarization of cops is one thing. Misuse of a resource is another. Just because you have a SWAT team with an APC doesn't mean you need to use it for everything.

[scirocco38s]

"The old FBI would have done just that. But this is the new improved, and tactically outfitted FBI. All that BS about talk to the FBI for info and turn around and the FBI says talk to the police. Think about this, the FBI cant do anything in the county that warrant is served under without the permission of the sherriff( or at least in this state they cant) only a US marshall can perform duties without any other LE permission, so in 1 way or another they all are in cooperation. Going up to Suburbia, a half million dollar house who they already know everything in the world about before they planned the raid is just overkill, but it is par for the course in a country run by worthless reject from the effen 60's. "

Please don't take this as being argumentative or any kind of insult as my only intent is to make sure nobody gets bad information as I'm sure that wasn't your intent. Also, I normally wouldn't reply to this, but someone might read and believe it which might cause them trouble at some point in the future (hope not, but you never know).

Obviously, I have no idea where you were told that the FBI (or other federal law enforcement save the U.S.M.S.) can't do do anything in the county etc....without the permission of the sheriff, but it's not true anywhere, including N.C.

I've talked with some retired agents that say they used to hear that frequently and there's a reason why that rumor has stuck around. There was a short period of time back in the 20s when the FBI was the "Bureau of Investigation" where the above was true, but it hasn't been that way for at least 75 years. There is nowhere in the U.S. short of a foreign embassy where the Bu can't serve a warrant, make an arrest etc. There is no requirement to inform or consult with local, county, or state law enforcement. Sometimes it's convenient and polite, but never necessary. The same is true for DEA, ICE etc.

"But this is the new improved, and tactically outfitted FBI."

The same can be said for virtually all law enforcement in this country. One thing to consider is that today's bad guys are not the bad guys of old who would normally put their hands up and surrender when challenged by law enforcement. Some of the most dangerous criminals are of the white collar kind....they haven't been in prison before, they have the most to lose, and it's "the end of the world" to them as opposed to the gang banger/drug dealer who's been arrested before, and will likely be arrested again.

"Iff they were going in with that much firepower, why did they knock in the first place. They could see nerdly mcmuffin was no threat why continue the ninja act? If they had done their homework, they would have known he wasnt a problem in the first place. But they dont do the research they should anymore before they fly tactical. "

Before anything like this happens they have to prove to their boss it's the next logical step, they have to prove to an Assistant United States Attorney that it's the next logical step and then they have to do the same with a judge. The affidavit in support of the application was probably 20-40 pages worth of supporting homework to show the research done. It's generally a heck of a lot of work and not something where they can just "fly tactical".

P.S. I have a copy of the Constitution and Bill of Rights on my desk next to my phone and read it pretty frequently as it's never a bad idea to be reminded of what's really important

Edit for poor spelling.

The info I got about the sherriff's power came from a person that worked for the sherriff. This was a incident that happened in the 1990's in a western NC county. The FBI was setting up a arrest of someone and the FBI came into the dept ordering people around like they owned the place and the sherriff and his deputies escorted the entire group to the county line and told them to not return. Maybe they dont have that power anymore.

It doesnt alter the fact that alot of our law enforcement (including DA's and Judge's) are no smarter or thoroughwith their investigations than the news media is. They have made assumptions and stormed houses on hearsey. They have stormed the wrong houses because they dont investigate properly. I Have cooworkers that work on euipment at Federal Prisons and the background checks they have to do for that are extensive, then they really dig into your background to see if you left stuff out they think is important. All most of the people are saying is that we have way to many LE agencies(especially federal) with way to much power and paranoia, and they regularly abuse it or are ordered to use the power incorrectly. After they make a mistake then they want to blame it off on some technicality when they should just man up. In this day and age of electronic surveillance and information gathering via the internet and other govt agencies files on a person, it doesnt take long for the govt to find out if you are a bad guy or not. I will also add that many of the people in LE today are not as good or professional as they were 20 yrs ago. They come out of colleges and tech schools with a degree in socialogy or criminal justice and they just dont have the mental game for LE. They get disrespected by the public at times because they dont show enough confidence that demands repect. I dont know what the answer is to alot of what happens nowdays but I do know that alot of these swat units arent neccessary and they are used wayy to much when a knock on the door and a phone call would have probably answered most if not all of their question more than satisfactorily. The resposne about white collar criminals being unpredictable doesnt wash with me because if they had performed even a little bit of research into what this guy was doing they would have known they could have met him at his office and in 30 minutes time found out his life story. Private detectives do this all the time, and they dont have the resources that the federal govt does. They do it alot cheaper to.

[Nik Habicht]

Militarization of cops is one thing. Misuse of a resource is another. Just because you have a SWAT team with an APC doesn't mean you need to use it for everything.

I'm with you here to a point --- and I have no connection to law enforcement whatsoever. By that logic however, no one should need to carry a gun, unless they've been in several situations where their lives were actually, not perceptually, in danger. That's a road I don't think we want to go down.

Bottom line: We the taxpayers --- through taxes and our elected officials --- employ law enforcement professionals to do a job that is often dangerous and always the polar opposite of making a widget on an assembly line. Morally the only right thing to do is to pay for the best training and equipment, and then trust their professionalism to deal with the situations that arise. In the event of a problem, you conduct an investigation --- to determine what went wrong, what can be learned from it, what needs to be improved. Ideally --- and I'd guess that this would apply in 99% of situations --- you'd find no criminal wrongdoing, and no serious errors.

I read a book a couple of years ago, written by a retired chief of police, who for the most part came off like a liberal knucklehead. It seems that once upon a time, in the city where he was chief, a cop was chasing a suspect with his gun in his hand. Something happened, the gun discharged, and the suspect got shot in the back. Media and politicians in uproar, suggesting that the cop was wrong for having his gun out, calling for policy changes, etc. The furor died down, when the chief answered someone's question about the incident by recounting the story of another patrolman involved in a footchase, who was killed when the suspect suddenly stopped, turned, and shot the cop in the head.

I'm not qualified to tell police officers how to do their job. Most of us aren't. We do have a duty --- through our elected officials, to ask questions in the aftermath of an incident with a less than desirable outcome. We should exercise that. It's also abundantly clear, that these situations will never be resolved in a manner that makes everyone happy. But that's how it goes in professional circles --- we hire people to do a job, in the hope that they've mastered a specialty that we're not willing or able to learn.....

[G-ManBart]

The militarization of the police scares the snot out of me. Most jurisdictions dont need a SWAT team but it's the cool thing to do & I suspect heavily subsidized by the Feds. Have you ever considered how many armed Federal officers there are? Would be interesting to know, me thinks.

I'm wondering how you decide what towns do and what towns don't need highly trained officers capable of dealing with high risk scenarios? It's kind of like saying "most people don't need guns...only people who carry large amounts of cash or go into bad areas need a gun". Doesn't that ring a bell?

They probably thought they didn't need such a capability in Nickel Mines, PA before Charles Carl Roberts IV decided to take over the Amish school and kill kids.

They probably thought they didn't need that capability in Columbine, CO, which is a very "good" area...but then Klebold and Harris spoiled the fairy tale.

Virginia Tech probably didn't think they needed that capability either....

So really, how do you chose?

The problem (well, one of several) is that the only time you ever hear about a SWAT hit or raid is if something goes wrong, or isn't as it was thought to be. If someone exercises extreme caution, uses their team, and it turns out to be a wasted effort everyone gets mad at them for trying to militaristic and going overboard. The second something bad happens those same people want to know "how the police could let something like this happen"....it's a lose-lose situation. If nothing happens you're going overboard. If something happens you didn't take enough measures to prevent it.

No, I'm NOT on a SWAT team.

Virginia Tech, Columbine, and, if memory serves, the Amish school shooting all ended before SWAT could arrive. We needed a good cleanup crew and forensics, not paramilitary police. Don't get me wrong I know there is a place for SWAT teams. I think that many, not all by any means, juristictions misuse thier SWAT teams. Read my previous post. The policy here was to call in swat whenever guns were known to be in a house. This is a medium sized Texas town. How many homes do you think have guns? The policy was NOT to send in swat if someone was using a gun, but if they had one in the house. SWAT teams should be held to a higher standard than the average cop. We pay for good equipment and training, most of the officers are great, but I think they are at the beck and call of polititions, not law enforcement. SWAT teams should not be used to intimidate! They should be used to respond to situations were the extra force is deemed neccesary. I don't even want them to intimidate the bad guys. They should neutralize the threat of the bad guys. My government should not have a 'show of force' to help keep me inline.

Here's another example.

When my wife and I first married we had a small 'starter' home, if you will. Not the best neighborhood, but we didn't have any kids to worry about yet. The next door neighbor's teen aged son sold pot. This family had the police visit many times. Usually for pretty simple things, noise complaints, family disputes, etc. Why did swat have to come crashing through the yard to raid this house? They had been to the house previously,many times, and had no trouble. Did the threat level suddenly rise because they now had a solid tip that this kid was selling pot? If every other visit by the cops ended with the kid and rest of the family complying with the police's requests, then why send SWAT for this? Even when there were problems after the kid came home, two uniforms knocked on the door.

Militarization of cops is one thing. Misuse of a resource is another. Just because you have a SWAT team with an APC doesn't mean you need to use it for everything.

My comments about the Amish school, VA Tech etc were really just to show that very bad things happen in places you wouldn't normally associate with terrible criminal activity. We never know when and where some whacko will decide to hole up and start killing people. SWAT teams may or may not get there in time, but the ordinary patrol officer is simply not armed or equipped to deal with those sorts of threats...although that's changing slowly with increased training on active shooter scenarios and the efforts to get weapons like Colt pattern carbines in more cruisers.

I totally agree that just because you have a SWAT team doesn't mean that you "need" to use it. The problem is that if you don't have it, you might just need it. I'm mentioning that because you said that most jurisdictions don't need a SWAT team. It's pretty easy to pick out places that absolutely need such a team, but it's a pretty tough call to pick those that don't. I certainly wouldn't want to be the guy answering the families of a bunch of murdered people when they asked why I didn't have a SWAT team in my area.

[G-ManBart]

"The old FBI would have done just that. But this is the new improved, and tactically outfitted FBI. All that BS about talk to the FBI for info and turn around and the FBI says talk to the police. Think about this, the FBI cant do anything in the county that warrant is served under without the permission of the sherriff( or at least in this state they cant) only a US marshall can perform duties without any other LE permission, so in 1 way or another they all are in cooperation. Going up to Suburbia, a half million dollar house who they already know everything in the world about before they planned the raid is just overkill, but it is par for the course in a country run by worthless reject from the effen 60's. "

Please don't take this as being argumentative or any kind of insult as my only intent is to make sure nobody gets bad information as I'm sure that wasn't your intent. Also, I normally wouldn't reply to this, but someone might read and believe it which might cause them trouble at some point in the future (hope not, but you never know).

Obviously, I have no idea where you were told that the FBI (or other federal law enforcement save the U.S.M.S.) can't do do anything in the county etc....without the permission of the sheriff, but it's not true anywhere, including N.C.

I've talked with some retired agents that say they used to hear that frequently and there's a reason why that rumor has stuck around. There was a short period of time back in the 20s when the FBI was the "Bureau of Investigation" where the above was true, but it hasn't been that way for at least 75 years. There is nowhere in the U.S. short of a foreign embassy where the Bu can't serve a warrant, make an arrest etc. There is no requirement to inform or consult with local, county, or state law enforcement. Sometimes it's convenient and polite, but never necessary. The same is true for DEA, ICE etc.

"But this is the new improved, and tactically outfitted FBI."

The same can be said for virtually all law enforcement in this country. One thing to consider is that today's bad guys are not the bad guys of old who would normally put their hands up and surrender when challenged by law enforcement. Some of the most dangerous criminals are of the white collar kind....they haven't been in prison before, they have the most to lose, and it's "the end of the world" to them as opposed to the gang banger/drug dealer who's been arrested before, and will likely be arrested again.

"Iff they were going in with that much firepower, why did they knock in the first place. They could see nerdly mcmuffin was no threat why continue the ninja act? If they had done their homework, they would have known he wasnt a problem in the first place. But they dont do the research they should anymore before they fly tactical. "

Before anything like this happens they have to prove to their boss it's the next logical step, they have to prove to an Assistant United States Attorney that it's the next logical step and then they have to do the same with a judge. The affidavit in support of the application was probably 20-40 pages worth of supporting homework to show the research done. It's generally a heck of a lot of work and not something where they can just "fly tactical".

P.S. I have a copy of the Constitution and Bill of Rights on my desk next to my phone and read it pretty frequently as it's never a bad idea to be reminded of what's really important

Edit for poor spelling.

The info I got about the sherriff's power came from a person that worked for the sherriff. This was a incident that happened in the 1990's in a western NC county. The FBI was setting up a arrest of someone and the FBI came into the dept ordering people around like they owned the place and the sherriff and his deputies escorted the entire group to the county line and told them to not return. Maybe they dont have that power anymore.

It doesnt alter the fact that alot of our law enforcement (including DA's and Judge's) are no smarter or thoroughwith their investigations than the news media is. They have made assumptions and stormed houses on hearsey. They have stormed the wrong houses because they dont investigate properly. I Have cooworkers that work on euipment at Federal Prisons and the background checks they have to do for that are extensive, then they really dig into your background to see if you left stuff out they think is important. All most of the people are saying is that we have way to many LE agencies(especially federal) with way to much power and paranoia, and they regularly abuse it or are ordered to use the power incorrectly. After they make a mistake then they want to blame it off on some technicality when they should just man up. In this day and age of electronic surveillance and information gathering via the internet and other govt agencies files on a person, it doesnt take long for the govt to find out if you are a bad guy or not. I will also add that many of the people in LE today are not as good or professional as they were 20 yrs ago. They come out of colleges and tech schools with a degree in socialogy or criminal justice and they just dont have the mental game for LE. They get disrespected by the public at times because they dont show enough confidence that demands repect. I dont know what the answer is to alot of what happens nowdays but I do know that alot of these swat units arent neccessary and they are used wayy to much when a knock on the door and a phone call would have probably answered most if not all of their question more than satisfactorily. The resposne about white collar criminals being unpredictable doesnt wash with me because if they had performed even a little bit of research into what this guy was doing they would have known they could have met him at his office and in 30 minutes time found out his life story. Private detectives do this all the time, and they dont have the resources that the federal govt does. They do it alot cheaper to.

I'm willing to bet there's some exageration on the part of the person telling you a sheriff escorted the FBI to the county line...honestly, it would never, ever happen. If they went into the sheriff's office and ordered people around they should have been kicked out of the building for being jerks, but thats where it would end....unless it was in the 20s instead of the 90s...and I've been in LE since the early 90s. Regardless, it doesn't really mean anything, I just wanted to point out that it would be very bad advice to think a federal agent needs permission from anyone other than a judge to conduct a search/make an arrest etc.

"In this day and age of electronic surveillance and information gathering via the internet and other govt agencies files on a person, it doesnt take long for the govt to find out if you are a bad guy or not. "

I'm curious...what experience are you basing that on? The interesting thing is that many criminals don't have much of an "electronic" record to research. They don't use real social security numbers, nothing is in their real name, they have ten different addresses that aren't real...the list goes on and on. Yeah, if you do that kind of search on me you're going to find everything but my shirt size, but it's not so easy on even simple street thugs.

"The resposne about white collar criminals being unpredictable doesnt wash with me because if they had performed even a little bit of research into what this guy was doing they would have known they could have met him at his office and in 30 minutes time found out his life story."

It happens that way far more times than examples like the one you provided. Other times there might be reasons why you don't want to do it at the office...what if the indications are that the evidence might be at the guy's house and someone at the office could pick up the phone to alert a family member who's part of the scam?...no more evidence.

There are simply times when "mistakes" can't be avoided no matter how hard everyone tries. A semi-quick example. There was a case where a couple of months worth of research was done on two white collar bad guys. I'm talking literally a file cabinet worth of research and one of them was a twice convicted felon. After there wasn't any more info to be found through other means a search warrant was authorized. Search warrant day rolls around, five guys go to bad guy #2's house...body armor on, guns in hand (no rifles) knock, knock, search warrant....turns out #2 was a total and complete victim of #1. Bad guy #1 was using #2s info while he was robbing him blind and making it look like #2 was part of the scam. That sort of thing happens pretty frequently and sometimes no amount of research will prevent it because it's part of the bad guy's job to make it hard to figure out what they're doing and who's really involved.

I'm not sure I can find it on the web, but I'll look for it...there is a tape from a press conference a few years back where a very successful executive was interviewed in front of a courthouse before he had to appear before the court. He denied the allegations and then pulled a 6" S&W .357Mag out of his briefcase and killed himself....he could have just as easily popped a cap at two detectives knocking on his door because he thought his fancy life was over. Even innocent people who are ordinarily sane and reasonable sometimes do crazy stuff when put under the stress of a law enforcement action like a search or arrest.

I have never worked with anyone that wanted to bother innocent people or violate their rights. If I had, I would have alerted the proper people and gotten them canned. For one, it's a waste of time that few have to spare. Not only that, but there are more than enough real bad guys/gals to go around that nobody needs to mess with innocent people to stay busy.

There's no doubt that it was an unfortunate event the family had to go through....nobody will argue that. Heck, I feel bad for them and I don't know them. All I know is that there are so many possibilities about why it happened that none of us will ever be able to make an informed decision about whether there was any sort of wrong involved. Without ALL of the facts, that we'll never get, we're all just guessing.

When I was in college I was walking from my friend's house back to my dorm and got stopped by the police. I had to sit on the curb being guarded by a couple of cops for half an hour while everyone walked by staring at me. I had no idea what was going on and was starting to get worried. Turns out there was a stabbing a couple of blocks away at a frat house and the stabber was about my size and general description. Eventually they brought a witness out who looked at me and immediately knew I wasn't involved. Was I upset? You bet I was. Was I wronged? I don't see how. It sucked, but it was just a bunch of coincidences that fell into place at the wrong time. Nowadays, people sue over that kind of stuff....

[kurtm]

EPA swat teams? FDA swat teams? IRS swat teams? FTC swat teams? FAA swat teams? National Park swat teams? Pretty soon the dark dyed, big knifed, velcro crews won't be so special and then we will need "uberswat" who are just a bit darker/cooler/velcroier. So far, the only thing I have seen from SWAT durring catostrophic events I.E. Columbine, Va. Tech is a propensity to wait untill the shooting abates, but remember SPECOPS...90% of the credit, 10% of the work....REGOPS...90% of the work, 10% of the credit. I think it all starts in grade school where we teach that everyone is "special" and then dunk them in black dye!

One riot, one ranger! KURTM

[Larry White]

I seem to recall that the UT tower was resolved by one brave but very scared young cop with a S&W and the help of one good citizen. I think SWAT is a nessary evil that is way over used and under utilized. I also think most SWAT types watch too much TV.--------------Larry

[ima45dv8]

Time out.