no right to resist unlawful police entry into their homes

[tyme]

Tell that to the judges who sign off on no-knock warrants in cases of (suspected) drug possession/dealing out of a residence.

[HarrySchell]

I read that the state AG is going to file for rehearing.

You are a criminal if you resist an illegal act? That isn't remotely funny.

[Aguila Blanca]

Originally Posted by Glenn Dee

IMO the problems begin when Officers who arent trained to do either try to make a dynamic entry.

Sometimes people including police Officers confuse a premis search with a dynamic entry. This is extremely dangerous for the Officers, and the people inside the warented location.

Comments?

Comments?

http://www.cato.org/raidmap/

Pick some of the denser locations and zoom in to see the full extent of the problem. Pay particular attention to how many of these were actually raids on innocent parties.

And since the justification is supposed to be safety of the police and others, also take note of how many red, blue and black balloons there are. These represent the death of an innocent party, a police officer, or a NON-VIOLENT offender.

Just how much "collateral damage" (meaning deaths) are you willing to accept?

[Glenn Dee]

Aguilla

New York City? It dont get much more dense than that. And I say mistakes in serving warrants are rare.

The problem arize when the police get sloppy, or are unprepared to meet the challange, or are ignorant of the law, and prociedures.

In my career I have served upwards of a thousand search warrants. About 50% of the time my partner and I would just knock on the door. Ask for permission to enter. Show the warrant, and describe what were looking for. Offer the person a chance to show us what were looking for or have us go through all their stuff, and make a mess. I cant remember anyone who didnt take that offer.

When serving narcotics search warrants it was rare to get a no knock. Most were knock and announce. Depending on the nature of the warrant we used our own dynamic entry team or called in the pro's for a controlled entry.

In the case of serving a search warrant where it is a location known to have firearms within, or a location or individuals connected to violence, or has a history of violence a controlled entry is an absolout must.

Again... mistaken warrants are rare... but they are all "man bites dog" stories and are more newsworthy. Having said that I think there should be some serious repercussions for mistaken warrants.


Glenn Dee

[Glenn Dee]

Oh yeah...

Another thing is... sometimes the owner/rentor.. or the custodian of the premisis have absoloutly nothing to do with the warrant. In other words you may know that your squeeky clean, and believe the police are searching your home illegally, but they may in fact be searching for something or someone you have no idea about.

[Spats McGee]

There's one more problem with the intertwined issues here, no-knock raids and the right to defend one's home against an illegal entry. Knowledge on the part of the occupant.

To all appearances, in the case at bar, the occupant knew that it was the police who wanted entry into the residence. In the no-knock raids, the occupant doesn't know who's suddenly storming his house. The whole point of the no-knock is that the suspect isn't suppposed to know what's coming.

Unfortunately for us law-abiding & armed citizens, if the door suddenly comes crashing in, our first response will most likely be to grab a weapon. From the police officers' perspective, they've got the right address, a no-knock warrant, and a man pointing a gun at them. From the occupant's perspective, a bunch of people in dark clothing and carrying guns have just knocked the door off its hinges, and present a threat to life, limb and family. Once the occupant presents his or her weapon, and sometimes once the police see a weapon in his hand, they're going to start shooting.

It's a recipe for disaster. What's the solution? I don't know. No-knocks certainly serve a purpose in preventing the destruction of evidence. On the other hand, the Fourth Amendment is supposed to protect us in our homes. For those innocent civilians whose homes are raided, they're left without much recourse, as the officers are protected by qualified immunity. As a practical matter, that means that
means that any civil rights suit that is brought will be limited to actual damages only, and no punitives. (Punitive damages are unavailable as against a municipality.

I will also offer this, as well. Shutting off the water several hours before serving an ordinary (knock) warrant goes a long way towards preventing the destruction of evidence. Each toilet holds enough water to be flushed one time if there's no water.

[secret_agent_man]

the intertwined issues here, no-knock raids and the right to defend one's home against an illegal entry

The Founders made a big deal out of the second interest. Not so much the first.
In final analysis, the right to be secure in one's home is the dominate interest and must be held to prevail over those of the judiciary.

[zxcvbob]

No-knocks certainly serve a purpose in preventing the destruction of evidence.

Why is protection of the evidence more important than the lives of the officers, suspects, and bystanders involved? Is it perhaps because without finding drugs on the property they can't do a civil forfeiture of that property?

It's all about the money.

[Spats McGee]

Originally Posted by zxcvbob

Why is protection of the evidence more important than the lives of the officers, suspects, and bystanders involved? Is it perhaps because without finding drugs on the property they can't do a civil forfeiture of that property?

It's all about the money.

Preservation of evidence isn't more imporant than those lives. To be clear, I've never said it was. That doesn't mean that no-knocks don't serve a purpose, though. There are instances where a no-knock is (or at least can be) a much safer way for officers to make their entry, . . . at least for the officers. I have my doubts as to whether a no-knock can ever be safer for the people in the residence.

Btw, I do not doubt that civil forfeitures are part of the motivating force behind some of these. There's a huge potential for abuse in forfeitures.

Let's look at a hypothetical in which a no-knock is clearly warranted, and properly executed. If you've got a situation where the police are after known drug-running, gun-toting gang-bangers holed up in a crack house (a situation that, unfortunately, wasn't that uncommon in the 90s), a no-knock would have been the way to go. The theory (and I stress that because these situations don't always work out ideally) was that by executing the warrant as a no-knock, both: (1) evidence would be less likely to be destroyed; and (2) the occupants would have less opportunity to arm themselves. If the evidence was destroyed, the BGs are back on the street in a couple of days, and back in business by the end of the week. If the BGs got a chance to arm themselves, police, suspects, and nearby citizens could get killed.

Problems arise when the standards for issuing no-knock warrants are too low, or they're executed improperly. That's what I saw when I looked at AB's link: wrong addresses, lack of investigation into a CI's tips, etc.

@ secret agent man -- I don't disagree with your assessment. The RKBA is in the 2nd Amendment, the right to be secure in your home, in the Fourth. I'm not sure that the Founders even considered the possibility of a no-knock warrant, though. No-knocks are a product of the 20th century. In a brief search, I find no case law reference to them before 1974 in Gooding v. U.S., although I did spot one 1970 law review article.

[BlueTrain]

One of the problems with discussing the legal issues in current events, including this one, is attempting to suggest that the people who wrote the constitution and all the other documents before, had the foresight to visualize 20th and 21st century problems. There are many such issues that simply didn't exist in the late 18th century, even if a fair case can be made that they did.

For instance, while alcohol tax was almost an instant issue (which was solved when the militia was called out), illegal drugs, including alcohol, was not. That sort of thing had to wait another 130 years. The founding fathers probably rolled over in their graves when that started to happen.

But on the other hand, in the 18th century, quartering of soldiers was a common practice in England and in the colonies. Barracks were a new thing and if there were no handy old castles or forts near at hand, the soldiers stayed in private homes and inns. Apparently that was though to be a serious problem at the time. But armies were relatively small.

Then there was this militia thing, one reason for the 2d admendment (It does mention the militia, you know). They did not care for standing armies, having had their fill of them sitting around the house (see above) and for similiar reasons. There had been colonial forces before the revolution but without research, I don't know how they were raised or their status, except that they weren't national troops. They were state troops in every sense of the word. Oddly enough, state troops were often distributed along the frontier, mainly up and down the Allegheny Front, what was about the extent of the colonies until after Fallen Timbers. And--they sometimes lived with families. Indian Troubles, you know.

No knock searches? There were no police forces and sheriffs were just getting off the ground, in a manner of speaking, so I imagine it was, well, unimaginable.

I kind of think there have been a lot of revolting developments that would have made those that wrote the constitution shake in their graves.

[secret_agent_man]

Spats, I have no facts, but strongly suspect British forces forcibly and with little or no notice made entry into the home of the colonists in the period preceding and during the Revolutionary War. Just a hunch this may have been a factor in the Fourth Amendment.

[Spats McGee]

Originally Posted by secret_agent_man

Spats, I have no facts, but strongly suspect British forces forcibly and with little or no notice made entry into the home of the colonists in the period preceding and during the Revolutionary War. Just a hunch this may have been a factor in the Fourth Amendment.

And I suspect that you're right. I also suspect that the British forces did not wait until a detached and neutral magistrate had signed off on a warrant, no-knock or otherwise.

[Conn. Trooper]

You are obviously not getting a marijuana grow down a toilet. But drugs and guns go hand in hand. If you have information that there are weapons in the house you are searching, then a no-knock may be the best course of action. Keep in mind, ordinary handgun bullets go right through a house wall. Forget about rifles. You don't knock politely and stand there hoping to get shot until they open the door. If evidence can't readily be destroyed, you knock and announce. "No-Knocks" are not that common, and hardly ever go badly. If mistakes are made, they are few and far between.

[Glenn Dee]

My point exactly Conn Troop. In fact the evidence is not all that important during the entry phase of serving a search warrant. And we found it easy to keep things from getting flushed... Turn the water off. 99% of the time they just curse the landlord, or the water company and go back to bed.

It's really not rocket science. Just common sense. While most drug dealers will have access to firearms... they are usually to protect themselves from being robbed... not to shoot it out with the police. In the rare case I have seen them shoot it out... They always loose. Badly.

The really dangerous warrant exicutions are those against hard core gang bangers, and those for wanted individuals.

Glenn Dee.

[Aguila Blanca]

Originally Posted by Conn. Trooper

"No-Knocks" are not that common, and hardly ever go badly. If mistakes are made, they are few and far between.

The evidence refutes your statement. Did you even bother to look at that link I provided to the Cato Institute's map? That map represents a lot of dead people, including several police officers on top of the innocent victims and non-violent offenders.

I repeat: How much "collateral damage" is acceptable?

[KyJim]

I looked at the map. Assuming it is correct, it looks like there have been 55 deaths of police, bad guys, and innocents since 1985 (count could be one or two off). That is assuming the Cato Institutes's numbers are correct and their characterization of the raids as "botched" is correct. Any deaths are too many and I am not making light of the seriousness of the problem.

Yet, there is an average of 2.1 deaths per year. That's a surprisingly low number given the huge number of no-knock searches performed each year. Cato quotes estimates of 40,000 per year. http://www.cato.org/store/reports/ov...-raids-america

[Brian Pfleuger]

Originally Posted by KyJim

I looked at the map. Assuming it is correct, it looks like there have been 55 deaths of police, bad guys, and innocents since 1985 (count could be one or two off). That is assuming the Cato Institutes's numbers are correct and their characterization of the raids as "botched" is correct. Any deaths are too many and I am not making light of the seriousness of the problem.

Yet, there is an average of 2.1 deaths per year. That's a surprisingly low number given the huge number of no-knock searches performed each year. Cato quotes estimates of 40,000 per year. http://www.cato.org/store/reports/ov...-raids-america

Not to mention, the only numbers that are really relevant are the "innocents" since they are the only ones with a reasonable certainty of survival under other circumstances. There is no guarantee that knock/no-knock is the deciding factor in police or bad guy deaths.

[Musketeer]

The only time I would approve of a no knock is when serving a warrant on a known violent offender or if a human life were in immediate danger (in which case nobody would benwaiting for a warrant). If it is simply to get evidence then I think the COTUS rights outweigh the desire of the LEOs to gain evidence. For those who believe the COTUS doesn't properly fit 21st century needs there is an amendment process you are welcome to pursue.

[Conn. Trooper]

I trust the Cato Institute about as far as I can throw a piano. And even the numbers they report are almost zero compared to the number of warrants that are served every day. There is no "acceptable" level of damage, in a perfect world. We don't live in a perfect world. Sadly.

[Musketeer]

You may not trust the CATO numbers but I do not see you disproving any of the entries they list as having gone wrong.

No, we do not live in a perfect world. With that in mind the how many individuals COTUS rights are justified in being trampled for the collection of evidence? How many lives? Give it as a percentage or per capita please.

[Brian Pfleuger]

Originally Posted by Musketeer

You may not trust the CATO numbers but I do not see you disproving any of the entries they list as having gone wrong.

No, we do not live in a perfect world. With that in mind the how many individuals COTUS rights are justified in being trampled for the collection of evidence? How many lives? Give it as a percentage or per capita please.

It's silly to require such things to be expressed in numbers. There is no acceptable number or percentage. Any such number can always be countered by "Well, if 2 is acceptable what happens when it's 2.01? If 2.01 is acceptable what about 2.02?"

It's silly. 0 is acceptable but it's not the world we live in and, contrary to our oft-quoted "Founding Father's" beliefs, which are not necessarily the Gospel Truth, we must ALL give up some measure of liberty in order to obtain some measure of security.

There will always be necessities that we would rather not be, there will always be innocent men jailed, there will always be innocent lives lost.

They must be mitigated but they can not be eliminated. Any requirement to eliminate errors by "the good" will only allow for greater casualties at the hands of evil.

[Conn. Trooper]

You may not trust the CATO numbers but I do not see you disproving any of the entries they list as having gone wrong.

No, we do not live in a perfect world. With that in mind the how many individuals COTUS rights are justified in being trampled for the collection of evidence? How many lives? Give it as a percentage or per capita please.

It's not just evidence collection we are talking about. Guns are everywhere that drugs are. You don't bang on a door and stand politely outside in a suit and tie while gang members or drugs trafficers grab the Mac-10 and shoot you through the wall. And yes, destruction of evidence is a real possibilty. I have seen buckets of bleach in every room of a crack house to throw dope into.

And, if the crack house was next door to your house, or across the street from your kids school, would you want the police to crack down on it? make an arrest that sticks bcause the evidence didn't get destroyed?

[orangello]

IMO, the 4th amendment places evidence for prosecution at a lower level of importance than the individuals' right to security in one's home at its most basic level. This would seem to indicate that the justification of "no knock" warrants as a means to prevent the destruction of evidence would be faulty or unconstitutional.

I feel that such warrants should be reserved for only the most dire of situations (ie, hostages) not simply to make evidence gathering more convenient. If such warrants are to continue to be used, perhaps a more stringent system of review/authorization should/could be required for this particular type of warrant (more than one judge perhaps from a special pool with extra training & experience in this type of warrant, consult with DA, etc.).

[Spats McGee]

Just to play Devil's Advocate for a moment: If it were only a matter of evidence preservation, then the preservation of lives clearly ranks above that. As another consideration, though, it could be argued that where drugs and guns are present, then we must also consider the safety of the residents surrounding the place for which the no-knock warrant is sought. The longer drug/gun-runners stay in one spot, and on the street, the more danger they present to their neighbors.

[hogdogs]

The longer drug/gun-runners stay in one spot, and on the street, the more danger they present to their neighbors.

Those willing to give up a bit of freedom for a little security deserve none of either!

Brent