It’s a well worn category here, and that itself is a sad commentary on the state of affairs in Amerika. Here is the first report we discussed just recently.
HENRICO, Va. (WTVR) –Ruth Hunter, a 75-year-old woman, said she was tied up while State Police invaded her Henrico apartment.
She said officers told her during the raid what they were looking for, and court documents also show the information. She said she had nothing to do with the investigation.
Virginia State Police said a drug investigation is what prompted a Henrico County magistrate to issue a warrant for an apartment in the 5600 block of Crenshaw road.
The woman claims that officers ultimately arrested a man who lives two doors down from her.
“I thought someone was breaking in to rob or kill me,” Hunter said.
Seconds after her front door flies open Hunter said she heard a voice yell “Police!”
“…Took my hands with a tie-thing and said ‘You’re under arrest’ and started asking questions,” she recalled. “The more I told them I didn’t know these people, the more he continued.”
Hunter said that police left her apartment and went two doors down, while she was left handcuffed with a zip tie.
The fiancé of the man arrested says she was there at the time, and asked CBS 6 to hide her identity
“Just so happened they came to the apartment and they got it mixed up,’ she said.
The team left her zip tied because as you know, seventy five year old women are such an ever-present danger to law enforcement. She could have thrown down with the best of them while they were busy doing other things, like going to the right house rather than grandmother’s place.
Next up, police in Miami-Dade badly beat a young man with Down Syndrome for packing a Colostomy bag.
Gilberto Powell says the police were following him in their cruiser as he was walking home. The police report says the officers decided to stop Gilberto after they noticed a “bulge” in Gilberto’s pants. After an officer tried to conduct a patdown, the report claims Gilberto attempted to flee.
Gilberto denies trying to run away and says he did everything the officer asked him to do. What happened next resulted in the photograph above.
After Powell was finally handcuffed and questioned, the officers realized he was “mentally challenged, was not capable of understanding our commands, and that the bulge in his waistband was a colostomy bag,” the report said.
By that time, Gilberto had been hit, knocked to the ground and the bag had reportedly been ripped from his body. The father says by the time he and Gilberto’s mother ran outside to their son, the cops had removed Gilberto’s pants and had him out there in his boxer shorts.
The mother asked the officer, “Didn’t you know he was a Down Syndrome kid?” to which the cop responded, “I’m not a doctor, I didn’t know.”
The family’s attorney Philip Gold said that it should’ve been immediately obvious that Gilberto has special needs.
If you just look at Gilberto, he 5-foot-3, 130 pounds with Down Syndrome, it’s 100 percent obvious he has Down Syndrome,” he said. It’s impossible to believe [the police’s story] if you hear one word out of Gilberto’s mouth.”
Because even though Florida’s stop and identify statute applies only to prowling and loitering, 5 foot tall boys with Down syndrome and colostomy bags are such a danger to society.
Next up, news from Framingham.
A Boston television station reported Thursday night, Framingham Police and members of the Massachusetts State Police raided the wrong apartment Thursday morning, when conducting a drug raid.
The police meant to raid 78A at 6 a.m. Thursday morning but instead raided 78B, which was occupied by a mom and her five children, ranging in age from 4 to 18.
Oh, what’s the difference, 78A and 78B? The alpha-numeric characters are, after all, so similar. I’m sure that officers pointed rifles at women and children just in case, you know, so they could be assured of going home safely at the end of their shift. But don’t forget that we have history with the Framingham Police Department when innocent Mr. Eurie Stamps was shot to death by their SWAT team.
Finally, no door is safe with a SWAT team on the prowl.
Midland-A Midland family says they don’t feel safe in their own home after the Midland Police Department’s SWAT team kicked in their front door during last Friday’s tragic standoff.
The family is asking that the city fix the damages that were made to their door, but it could take several weeks before the city takes any action.
For the past four nights, Cesar Reyna and his girlfriend have not been able to sleep in peace knowing that at anytime someone could walk right through their front door.
“I worry for the safety of my son, anything can happen whenever,” said Reyna. “Anybody can just walk into my house, it’s just uncomfortable.”
When Reyna got home from work last Friday night, his front door was wide open and police officers covered his front lawn.
“I came out and talked to them [police officers] and they said they had kicked it in, but they wouldn’t tell me why,” said Reyna.
According to Sarah Higgins, the Public Information Officer for Midland, the SWAT team knocked on the door several times before kicking it in. She said the team had to evacuate the home being that it was right across the street from were the standoff took place.
Reyna and his family were told to call the City’s Safety and Risk Management department to file a claim for the damages that were made to their door, but when they did make the call they were told their case wouldn’t be reviewed until May 13.
These folks weren’t just on some correct or incorrect raid party list. They lived across the street from the raid party. They had the misfortune of living in the wrong place, and the SWAT team decided to bust in their door, and are now guilty of breaking and entering, trespassing, violation of due process rights, violation of rights against illegal search and seizure, destruction of property, vandalism, and so on the list could go. But hey, they got to go home safely at the end of their shift.
The saddest part about all of this is that no judge in America, local, state or federal, so much as gives a damn about any of this. They all play for the same team. And in anticipation of comments concerning the root cause of this sorry state of affairs, it isn’t either police or judges (or politicians, for that matter). It’s not either-or. It’s both-and. All participating parties are culpable for the moral obscenity and the grotesque, twisted monster that has become our system of justice. Let the fan boys from PoliceOne.com chew on these things for a while.
10 years, 3 months ago
