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A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

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Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#101

Post by koenigdavidmj »

jcizzle wrote: post #90

1. This happened in rural Georgia, far away from Atlanta. 2. The suspect was later arrested for dealing meth. This isn't a little dime bag situation as the clearly biased writer would have you believe. 3. This isn't the suspect's first arrest, he was arrested before for distribution. Police found an AK-47 in his house. Here are things that could have been done to prevent this situation. 1. The homeowner could have no…

It's entirely legal to own a semi-automatic AK47 (although not if you use and/or possess drugs...but my point stands, as the gun itself would have been perfectly legal).

Signs point to this guy not storing the rifle in a safe fashion, however.

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#102

Post by rosser »

fit2rule wrote: post #63
peterkelly wrote: post #20

I'm struggling to understand how any of the officers on the SWAT team - or, for that matter, those who formulated the policies to use tools like M-16s and flash grenades in drug raids - could possibly consider their actions to be less serious than someone taking or dealing in drugs.

Maybe there needs to be more publicity about drug gangs and the slaves created by the drug cartels. They exist, and they are heinous. But so too are these kinds of reactions from the police. Its really as if the public are caught in the middle of two horrific forces, being created on both ends of the playing field. The question is: who profits? The cold hard answer, which nobody wants to admit is this: the dealers of…

Drug cartels and drug slavery are utterly orthogonal to what amounts to misdemeanor possession, which is essentially what many of these cases (including, for all I know, this one) amount to.

Should the SWAT team be able to toss a flashbang into your child's crib because you have a dime bag in the nightstand?

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#103

Post by jqm »

seanmccann wrote: post #83
iagooar wrote: post #25

When I read stuff like this, I'm really happy that I am not living in the US. It sounds so crazy to a European person, I can't really imagine how Americans manage to normally live their lives.

I live in the US and have never had to deal with this and live a normal life. I am by no means defending this, in fact I think it's disgusting and awful, but it's not happening on every single street in the county. Yet.

I think this type of thing is happening much more than people think.

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#104

Post by simplemath »

jcizzle wrote: post #90

1. This happened in rural Georgia, far away from Atlanta. 2. The suspect was later arrested for dealing meth. This isn't a little dime bag situation as the clearly biased writer would have you believe. 3. This isn't the suspect's first arrest, he was arrested before for distribution. Police found an AK-47 in his house. Here are things that could have been done to prevent this situation. 1. The homeowner could have no…

I was with you all the way up until your demonstrably bullshit conclusion.

This is HN, so remember to get the polish out before you commence with the bootlicking.

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#105

Post by jrs235 »

simplemath wrote: post #37
jordan0day wrote: post #6

The increasing militarization of police in the USA has seemingly had a significant (and hopefully unintended) side-effect: Police tend to treat suspects (and those around them) not as law-breaking citizens , but as enemy combatants .

Hate to be so basic but when you've decided to be a hammer, everything eventually looks like a nail. All of this military surplus gear thats been avalanching into local PDs nationwide isn't going to just collect dust. The good ol' boys in blue will eventually find a reason to use their toys, whether its on you, me, or the family in the OP. Since 'Protect and Serve' has been officially declared false by our wonderful…

The problem is most people think/thought the police are there to "protect and serve" them (the people/individuals) when they are not. The police are there to protect and serve the government.

ADD: The government is SUPPOSE to protect and serve the people.

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#106

Post by chillingeffect »

anigbrowl wrote: post #22

Good grief. SWAT teams in the US are utterly out of control. It's one thing to have resources for the relatively rare armed robbery/hostage/mass shooter situation, to respond to an outbreak of violence; it's quite another to be using them for drug raids and other contexts where they initiate or are the sole cause of violence. This goes hand in hand with the confrontation-obsessed gun culture we have, in which a subse…

That's a fascinating map. One of the interesting things it shows is that the density of botched raids is not correlated to population density.

What that suggests is that the raids are the results of authories in some areas not knowing what they're doing while authorities in other areas do.

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#107

Post by [deleted] »

jcizzle wrote: post #90

1. This happened in rural Georgia, far away from Atlanta. 2. The suspect was later arrested for dealing meth. This isn't a little dime bag situation as the clearly biased writer would have you believe. 3. This isn't the suspect's first arrest, he was arrested before for distribution. Police found an AK-47 in his house. Here are things that could have been done to prevent this situation. 1. The homeowner could have no…

[deleted]

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#108

Post by mrtron »

jacquesm wrote: post #57
DrJones1098 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you being serious? In Mexico the narco terrorists pulled innocent people off of a bus and made them pit fight to the death for their amusement. http://www.chron.com/news/nation-world/article/Mexican-crook... In the middle ages they would impale you on a spike so that you died slowly over days. In Rwanda one tribe butchered 5 million people of another tribe with machetes. An that's just examples I can think of off…

You do realize you're comparing the present day United States law enforcement with Rwandean tribes, Mexican narco-terrorists and the middle ages?

Not really, he was saying people have been and continue to be capable of terrible things.

United States law enforcement included, as described in the article.

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#109

Post by jeroen94704 »

peterkelly wrote: post #20

I'm struggling to understand how any of the officers on the SWAT team - or, for that matter, those who formulated the policies to use tools like M-16s and flash grenades in drug raids - could possibly consider their actions to be less serious than someone taking or dealing in drugs.

That, exactly. And I simply cannot fathom how the response to a flash-bang grenade in a cot with a child in it can ever be "well, obviously there was no way for us to know there were children, so don't blame us" instead of "OH MY GOD WHAT HAVE WE DONE WE'RE SO SORRY!"

Re: A SWAT team blew a hole in my 2-year-old son

#110

Post by angersock »

rayiner wrote: post #85
peterkelly wrote: post #20

I'm struggling to understand how any of the officers on the SWAT team - or, for that matter, those who formulated the policies to use tools like M-16s and flash grenades in drug raids - could possibly consider their actions to be less serious than someone taking or dealing in drugs.

You're missing the social context here. First, this is never about using it's about dealing. Police enforcement efforts are almost entirely preoccupied with trafficking. Second, dealers are, by and large, bad people for other reasons. Your suburban pot dealer isn't the target of no-knock raids. The targets are guys with long rap sheets of felony convictions, often for violent crimes. Drugs are a proxy in a war betwee…

If only we spent the money on schools and social programs instead of prisons and SWAT teams!
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