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You might want to link to a local article, with more details: Toddler critically injured by
The target of the raid "wasn’t a stranger to ... police ... during a prior arrest on drug charges, investigators discovered ... weapons, including an AK-47."
When drug dealers have military-grade weapons, and are still on the street, police have to act to protect themselves. I'm not a big fan of 3 A.M. raids, but I also don't want to read about raids turning into gun battles.
Somebody drank the Kool-Aid!
When the police are raiding your drug den for the second time, and they found an AK-47 the first time, you are a terrorist!
How does one go from drug dealer to terrorist in a matter of hours or days? Better yet...what would constitute the person being a terrorist? By actions alone, the police are more terrorist than the meth dealer.
An AK-47 leaning in a corner is far different than a stun grenade lobbed into a baby crib. Both weapons only work in the hands of a human and the AK-47 was in no way near taking anyone's life.
If that was my residence and they had broken down the door they asked for the business end of the AK.
In practical terms I see no difference between the SWAT teams and the other home invasion criminals. They are all doing the same things. Often the government SWAT teams are careless and almost never accountable to an outside civilian board. Too many mistakes for good Americans to continue to support this program.
It's called "collateral damage." As tragic as this incident is, it was executed at a known drug house where undercover officers had previously made buys and automatic weapons were known to be present.
The blame for this incident should not fall on the SWAT team and drug enforcement officers, but on the perps who put that child in harms way in the first place.
By that logic...If you are walking with your kids down the street when a car hops the curb and kills your kids - it's your fault?
Give me a freakin' break!
Do you know anything about the meth epidemic? Do you have any idea how it screws up the thinking of normal adults? I can give you THOUSANDS of examples where otherwise "good" parents put their kids at risk of death, all for the high of meth. It's a nasty drug that completely destroys every sensible, reasonable mind process.
MAKE NO MISTAKE: Any "parent" who subjects their child to that environment is completely bankrupt, both morally and spiritually and guilty as hell.
Ever hear of a case where the cops were at the wrong address when they executed their no knock warrant? It has happened before. Or how about the case where the cops gun fired while executing a warrant in the middle of the night and a young child in the residence was killed. Another tragic case. I don't believe the suspect was home in that case either. People need to keep these things in mind. It wasn't until a good number of innocent people were killed over many years time that some police agencies began to change their pursuit policies. Major law suits were the driving factor behind the changes in police policy. The same might apply to these kinds of situations where more defined policies need to be established.
The parents were aware of the fact someone living in the residence was a drug dealer and the dangers involved. Moving the child to another room doesn't remove the danger as we clearly have seen. Still they stayed on. They would have been safer going to a church shelter and seeking temporary accommodations. The suspect they were after wasn't even in the house at the time of the raid. Cops said they were unaware of a child in the residence, that infor by their upstanding informant that had not seen a child during drug buys. That doesn't mean a child or say an elderly bed-ridden person wasn't occupying the house but not in sight. The snitch just didn't happen to see a child so they took his word for it. People of the community have the right to be asking questions about their police departments procedures and wanting a complete explanation of the incident. The parents also are accountable in my opinion. They knew the risks and still put their child in the den of a drug dealer. And they may have known of this dealers past record, which dates back to 2002, before ever going to Georgia. Pity it's so often the children that are the innocent victims.
And what really burns me is that the system failed the citizens by letting this guy out on bond for an October 2013 possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony charge -- the felony being distribution of methamphetamine. Where is the outrage at letting this violent person back out on the streets? If he had been denied bond, this raid would have never happened. Think back to the Hadiya Pendleton case, one of the two thugs was out on bail for a weapons charge. Had he not been given bond, she might be alive today.
Why couldn't they have set a big buy up at some secluded location and then taken the guy into custody, away from the residence and a neighborhood. He has been free on bond since October of last year so they had time on their side and it wasn't like he was leaving the area or the country. Had he been home, it may have still become a fire fight or him using those inside as hostages. Very poor planning and judgement that resulted in an innocent child being critically injured.
although I don't support the war on drugs, I'm not going to get caught up in media sensationalism either. At worst I think meth users should have their children away but outside that I support the right of people to mess up their lives as much as they want as long as we don't have to pay them welfare services or food stamps while they are doing it. The cost of housing people in prison for 'drug crimes' which makes up fully half our prison population, is far higher than the cost of rehabilitation, not to mention it just turns these people into career criminals and makes them addicted to the prison system and a life of crime in a never ending cycle.
Aren't they supposed to roll these things into rooms instead of throwing them?
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