Showing posts with label SWAT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SWAT. Show all posts

Chris Cassidy: The High Cost Of Drug War Mistakes

Wrongful death suit results from botched SWAT raid.      A federal wrongful death suit against a Framingham police officer who accidentally shot to death an unarmed elderly man during a SWAT raid in 2011 was allowed to continue by a judge yesterday. U.S. District Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV ruled that the constitutional rights of Eurie     ... MORE

VIDEO: Police State America - Missouri SWAT Tactics


Would this get mainstream media coverage had the victim been black?

Why Americans Keep Losing To The Police State

by John W. Whitehead.          The game is rigged. Being a citizen in the American police state is much like playing a game of cards against a stacked deck: you’re always going to lose. The game is rigged, and “we the people” keep getting dealt the same losing hand. Even so, we stay in the game, against all odds, trusting that our luck will change.    ... MORE

The Trials of Growing Up in a Police State

by John W. Whitehead.   After a year dominated with news of police shootings of unarmed citizens (including children), SWAT team raids gone awry, photo ops of militarized police shouldering assault rifles while perched on top of armored vehicles, and reports on how the police are using asset forfeiture laws to pad their pockets with luxury cars,  ... MORE

4 Members of Congress Put Their Hands Up in Solidarity With Protesters But 0 Voted to Limit Police Militarization

by Ed Krayewski.   Symbolism without subbstance. Michael Brown was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri, in August. Protests over the shooting yielded a militarized response from police. Renewed protests continued in October and again after a grand jury declined to indict Darren Wilson, the officer who shot Brown.  ... MORE

Are ‘We The People’ Useful Idiots In The Digital Age?

by John W. Whitehead.  Is this really a government of consent? “Who needs direct repression,” asked philosopher Slavoj Zizek, “when one can convince the chicken to walk freely into the slaughterhouse?” In an Orwellian age where war equals peace, surveillance equals safety, and tolerance equals intolerance of uncomfortable truths and       ... MORE

Travis Gettys: Police Expert Says War On Terror Turned Our Cops Into Occupying Armies — And We’re The Enemy

Terrorists and politicians morph liberty to slavery. The war on terror has essentially turned police into occupying armies in some American communities, said a police and criminology expert. Thomas Nolan, an associate professor of criminology at Merrimack College and former senior policy analyst with the Department of Homeland  ... MORE

Jim Hightower: Rabid Florida Police SWAT At Barbers

Barney Fifes on steroids.     When it comes to policing an area, the good people of Orange Country, Florida are lucky, because they’ve got the astonishing law-enforcement team of DBPR and OCSO on the beat, eager to stop any possible criminal activity. Consider just one example of the truly-incredible vigilance of this dynamic policing duo.     ... MORE

How To Serve A Warrant: 1972 Versus Today

by Lt. Harry Thomas.     This past week I was over on Officer.com trying to convince some hot-headed, patriot-hating young cops that the Constitution is actually the law of the land. I failed. One of them refers to open carriers as “attention whores.” I was denounced as a traitor to law enforcement for insisting that gun owners actually have rights    ... MORE

Joshua D. Filler: Time To Call In SWAT Team Reform Crew

Excessive force by cops becoming widely recognized.     In February 2013, an armored vehicle and a special weapons and tactics (SWAT) team funded in part by a Department of Homeland Security grant were deployed by the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department during the manhunt for domestic terrorist Christopher Dorner. Dorner   ... MORE

Cops Do 20,000 No-Knock Raids Against Citizens Each Year

by Dara Lind.     Most of the time, when a person kills an intruder who breaks into his home, dressed in all black and screaming, the homeowner will avoid jail time. But what happens when the break-in was a no-knock SWAT raid, the intruder was a police officer, and the homeowner has a record? A recent pair of cases in Texas are an example of how    ... MORE

One More Unwarranted, No-Knock Raid Ends In Murder

by Stirling Watts.      Cop gets a pass on killing of 7-year-old. The frequency of civil rights violations carried out daily across this nation by out-of-control police departments is as alarming as is their sickening and shocking natures, but unwarranted no knock raids are the worst kind. Just over four years ago, an innocent seven year old girl was shot in  ... MORE

Hollow Justice In Age Of Government-Sanctioned Tyranny

by John W. Whitehead.     “The Constitution is not neutral. It was designed to take the government off the backs of the people.”—Justice William O. Douglas   With every passing day, it becomes more apparent that we live in an age of hollow justice, with government courts, largely lacking in vision and scope, rendering narrow rulings focused on  ... MORE

The High Cost Of Living In A Police State

by John W. Whitehead.     Who pays the price for the police shootings that leave unarmed citizens dead or injured, for the SWAT team raids that leave doors splintered, homes trashed, pets murdered, and family members traumatized and injured, if not dead? I’m not just talking about the price that must be paid in hard-earned dollars, whether    ... MORE

No Charges Against SWAT Team That Disfigured Baby

The war on drugs is a war against people.        A grand jury has announced that the police officers from a Georgia SWAT team will not face any charges in relation to harming and disfiguring the face of the toddler named Bounkham Phonesavanh. The medical bills related to the incident are stacking up, and it’s now questioned whether or    ... MORE

Small-Town America Rebels Against 'Police State' Arsenal

by Leo Hohann.  Citizens urge return of armored vehicles to Pentagon. Residents of an Idaho town are asking their city council to return an armored vehicle to the federal government and just say no to militarization. John Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, said he was contacted by a group of residents from Nampa,      ... MORE

Ed Krayewski: The Role of the Media in the War on Drugs

The strategic air support.     The media's often called the fourth estate. Where's that come from? In the Middle Ages in Europe the first estate was the nobility, the second estate was the clergy, and the third estate was peasants, everyone else. Together the three estates constituted a feudal "realm." The king existed outside the     ... MORE

Rethinking ‘No-Knock’ Tactics In Wake Of Cop’s Death

by Jared Keever.   The downside of breaking in through a window. The recent announcement that a Texas district attorney will seek the death penalty for a man accused of fatally shooting a police officer raiding his home has sparked debate among many as to whether so-called no-knock search warrants, conducted by local SWAT teams, are safe or   ... MORE

Right of Self Defense in Texas Completely Depends on Race

By all means if you're white.    In the first stage of what is known as general adaptation syndrome, a recognized natural response among all vertebrates and many other organisms is hyperarousal or acute stress response. In its more recognizable name, the “fight or flight” response is a natural physiological reaction to a perceived harmful event,    ... MORE