Law Enforcement: SWAT Run Amok

6/20/08

Two recent incidents involving SWAT teams are adding fuel to the fire in the emerging controversy over the routine use of such paramilitarized police units to prosecute the drug war. In Chicago, the Chicago Police Department has been hit with a $10 million lawsuit over a September raid on a social club. Meanwhile, in Florida, the Pembroke Pines Police Department Special Response Team, a SWAT-style unit, shot and killed a 46-year-old homeowner in a dawn raid June 13 that netted a whopping three-quarters of an ounce of marijuana.

SWAT team, Pasadena, Texas(There is even more trouble on the SWAT front. Read StoptheDrugWar.org blogger Scott Morgan's post about the murder prosecution of raid victim Derrick Foster and the killing of raid victim Ronald Terebesi, Jr., here. StoptheDrugWar.org is committed to ending these abuses. Sign our online petition here.)

In the Chicago raid, raw video of which is available here (part one) and here (part two), Chicago SWAT team officers dressed as if heading for combat in Baghdad hit the La Familia Motorcycle Club as it was being used for a birthday party. Officers exploded stun grenades, pointed assault weapons at people cowering in hallways, and, according to the attorney who filed the lawsuit, did so without producing a search warrant.

Attorney George Becker said police also stole $1,500 from amusement machines and $1,000 from a safe they broke open during the raid. Becker also said five women at the club were strip-searched by female officers in front of male officers and club patrons. Becker said those parts of the raid were not recorded because officers pointed surveillance cameras at the ceiling.

"It looked to me like the Chicago Police Department is engaging in military-type activity," said Becker after showing the raid video.

But police are unrepentant. "We believe the officers acted within department guidelines in executing the legal search warrant," Police Department spokeswoman Monique Bond said.

Although police said an informant had told them a shipment of drugs was destined for the building, they seized only a small quantity of drugs and one hand-gun. Two arrests were made -- one on a bond forfeiture warrant and one for reckless conduct.

Police in Pembroke Pines, Florida, are also unrepentant about their SWAT raid that left Victor Hodgkiss dead. Police have released few details about what exactly went down during the dawn raid, except to say they he was shot and killed after confronting them as they entered his home on a no-knock drug search warrant. The raid netted one arrest -- of the girlfriend of Hodgkiss's son, who was charged with possession of less than 20 grams of marijuana.

"We use SRT for all narcotics warrants," Pembroke Pines Deputy Police Chief David Golt told Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel columnist Mike Mayo, who wrote a scathing column denouncing the reflexive resort to SWAT-style tactics. "You never know what you're going to encounter."

As Mayo noted in his column: "In this case, a 46-year-old man with a concealed weapons permit and no record of violent crime encountered his demise in his home of 14 years."

Police did not say whether Hodgkiss was armed when he was shot, but they did say they recovered a weapon from the home.

The Hodgkiss killing bears eerie similarities with another Florida SWAT killing, the 2005 shooting death of Philip Diotaiuto, a 23-year-old bartender shot 10 times by officers after he grabbed a gun as they burst into his home in a dawn raid that netted little over an ounce of marijuana. No charges were ever filed against those officers, but a civil suit filed by Diotaiuto's family is pending.

In both cases, police were aware their target had a weapons permit and used that to justify their resort to SWAT team tactics. In both cases, people ended up being killed over trivial amounts of marijuana.

SWAT team policing excesses are nothing new, but seem to be on the upswing as the units, originally designed for hostage and other dangerous situations, are increasingly used routinely for drug search warrants and other law enforcement purposes. The Cato Institute's Radley Balko has compiled the primary source book for SWAT killings and other abuses, 2006's Overkill: The Rise of Paramilitary Police Raids in America.

Cops with rifles to hit streets this summer

May 9, 2008


By David C. Lipscomb - Metropolitan Police Department officials said yesterday patrol officers will be issued assault rifles by the summer, after policies on their use are released this month.

The Washington Times reported Wednesday that the department is arming the officers with the rifles as part of a national trend to protect them from criminals with increasingly powerful weapons.

Assistant Chief Joshua Ederheimer said the department has spent the past year converting 500 AR-15 rifles from fully-automatic to semi-automatic and drafting training curriculum and policies governing the weapons.

"We didn't want to rush these out on the street," he said. "I think the department acted prudently."

Police in Miami and Los Angeles already use the weapons, and Chicago police have plans to use them in the near future.

Prince George's and Montgomery counties also give officers the option of carrying them.

Chief Ederheimer said the department has 352 officer trained to use the weapons and is prepared to train more, despite criticism from the police union that some tactical officers who already carry the weapons have been unable to get re-certified to use them.

Officer Scott Fike, a canine handler, said his certification for the AR-15 expired in the past three months and was told he cannot re-qualify because the department does not have ammunition.

Officer Fike, speaking for the union that represents D.C. officers, said he is concerned about special police units, which already have the weapons, because if those officers cannot get re-certified they must surrender their weapons.

"If [special units] don't have them, that just cuts deeper into them not having them in the streets," he said.

Kristopher Baumann, chairman of the labor committee that represents D.C. officers, also expressed concern about the department's repeated delays in distributing the weapons.

Chief Ederheimer acknowledged the department has no practice ammunition, but said higher-quality street ammunition is instead being used and that no certifications have been cancelled.

He also said the program started more recently than five years ago, with the military-surplus guns arriving in spring 2007.

D.C. Council member Phil Mendelson, at large Democrat, said he would not oppose the decision to use assault rifles, but is skeptical that criminals are using more powerful weapons.

"I don't think the firepower has gotten much higher," said Mr. Mendelson who heads the council's committee on public safety. "I think it's an easy argument to make to justify more armaments."

The department did not respond for a second day to a request for data on the types of weapons used in crimes in the District.

Concerns about D.C. officers using excessive force surfaced after the city lowered standards in police recruiting in 1989 and 1990.

City officers fatally shot 12 people in 1998, and the department led the country in fatal shootings in the 1990s.

However, the number of fatal police-involved shootings was five or fewer each year from 1999 to 2006, according to a report from the D.C. police department.

Last month, the department qualified to end a seven-year, voluntary Justice Department oversight of incidents in which officers used their weapons or other forms of force in the line of duty.

The department is now investigating the conduct of two officers who this month were exonerated by federal investigators in the fatal shooting of 14-year-old DeOnte Rawlings, whom they suspected in the theft of a mini-bike.

Ex-cop: Officers routinely lied to obtain search warrants

By STEVE VISSER
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 05/08/08
A former Atlanta police officer testified Thursday that narcotics officers routinely lied under oath when seeking search warrants — a practice that led to police killing a 92-year-old woman.

Former Detective Gregg Junnier told a Fulton County jury that detectives would tell judges that they had verified their informants had bought cocaine from dealers by searching them for drugs before the buy took place.

"I have never seen anyone searched before they go into the house — I've never seen that done — even though officers always swear to it," Junnier said. "It's done that way in 90 percent of the warrants that are written."

But it wasn't just lies to get the warrant to search Kathryn Johnston's home that made Junnier uneasy, he said. He had an inkling something was wrong when he and Officer Jason R. Smith were leading the narcotics team to the front door. He said the northwest Atlanta house differed from the informant's description.

"I said, 'Man, this doesn't look right,' and he said, 'I know,' " Junnier testified. " 'I said what do you want to do.' He said, 'Hit it.'"

A minute later, Johnston was lying on her floor, dying.

Junnier testified at the Superior Court trial of one of his former partners, Arthur Tesler, who was guarding the back of Johnston's Neal Street home on that day, Nov. 21, 2006.

Junnier and Smith pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and face up to 10 and 12 years in prison, respectively, depending on their cooperation. Tesler faces 15 years on charges of lying in an official investigation, violating his oath as an officer and false imprisonment, a charge stemming from illegally surrounding Johnston's house.

Junnier, whose confession unraveled the case, is to testify again today.

"I have already asked for forgiveness from God and everybody I can," he said.

On the day of the raid, Junnier said he knew Smith had lied to a magistrate to get the no-knock warrant — which allows police to break in before identifying themselves — to seize the cocaine they had been told was in the house.

Junnier testified that Smith, who had sworn out the warrant, had lied about more than searching the informant for drugs. Smith swore that a reliable confidential informant had bought cocaine from the Johnston house, Junnier said. In actuality, he said, they relied on Fabian Sheats, a low-level dealer arrested earlier that day.

Junnier said they had confidence in Sheats' descriptions, which detailed the drugs, location and a dealer named "Sam," whom Sheats said worked from the house.

He said the chance to seize a kilo — 2.2 pounds — of cocaine also drove the officers, who normally made arrests for much smaller amounts.

In the raid, police fired 39 shots. Junnier was shot in the face, chest and leg. Two other officers were also wounded. Investigators determined Johnston had fired one round from a revolver; the officers were shot in their own crossfire.

Junnier described entering Johnston's house: "She was still alive. She was gasping for air. I heard ... the order to cuff her."

Later that day, he said, the cover-up began.

Massachusetts Police Get Black Uniforms to Instill Sense of 'Fear'

Not a good way to instill trust. People will hate what they fear....automatically instigates violence and dangerous conditions in the streets.
Tom

Thursday, April 24, 2008

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Springfield's men in black are returning. The city's new police commissioner, William Fitchet, says members of the department's Street Crime Unit will again don black, military-style uniforms as part of his strategy to deal with youth violence.

Fitchet's predecessor, Edward Flynn, had ditched the black attire as part of an effort to soften the image of the unit. Flynn left Springfield in January to become the police chief in Milwaukee.

Sgt. John Delaney told a city council hearing Wednesday that the stark uniforms send a message to criminals that officers are serious about making arrests.

Delaney said a sense of "fear" has been missing for the past few years.