Of course we'll have to wait until the real truth comes out, (since the first few news stories concerning something like this are sometimes wildly inaccurate), but if this part proves to be true, it would have been a very stupid thing for the SWAT team to do, especially in light of recent stories of home invasion robberies and murders around the country.OverEasy wrote:Does this part of the story bother anybody?
"SWAT team because its members were wearing street clothes, masks and carrying weapons as they approached the mayor's house."
I would open the door if a uniformed officer knocked and I could confirm his ID.
Howerver, I myself would most likely OPEN FIRE if men in street clothes and masks tried to break into my house. What are these people thinking these days?
I hope the whole SWAT team and all the supervisors end up in jail for this one.
I won't say anymore, OE
Not being in Law Enforcement, I don't know if they had a duty to inform the local department of their impending actions, but it seems to me the prudent thing to do in case the local department has any useful information on the occupants that may help with SWAT team safety. That's when they would have found out who lived there, and they might not have gone rushing in expecting a fire-fight. Not saying they should give the mayor special treatment, but they might have done things differently had they known he wasn't the usual scumbag drug dealer with attack dogs.
And the dogs...there's got to be a better way to handle them. How about lobbing a flash-bang grenade as soon as the door is breached in every case? I'd bet even the biggest, toughest dog would be found afterwards trying to dial 911 from under the bed! Even in the small town I live, the SWAT team goes out of their way to NOT shoot dogs. They formulate a plan ahead of time to deal with dogs that they believe to be a threat.
Sounds like these SWAT guys were in too much of a hurry and at the very least they put their own safety at risk. Now they've got to deal with all the mistakes that were made because of it. What was this guy going to do with 32 lbs. of pot in a couple of hours? Smoke it all? As long as he didn't leave the house, it wasn't going anywhere. He might have had time to open it up by then and call the local police when he found out what was in it.