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(My interview with Radley Balko began here. Part two is here.)
Q. You mentioned no-knock raids -- can you explain what those are, and why you object to them so regularly on your blog?
No-knock raids are when police force entry into a home without knocking
or announcing themselves first. The Supreme Court has recognized that
requiring the state to knock and announce before entering a home is
part of the Fourth Amendment -- part of the "Castle Doctrine" that
extends back into English common law. The problem is that in the same
opinion (Wilson v. Arkansas), the Court carved out enough exceptions to overwhelm the rule.
Police can now enter your home unannounced if they believe that
knocking would endanger their safety, or if they believe it would give
you time to destroy evidence, which in most cases means the time you
would need to flush your drug stash down the toilet.
The problem with no-knock raids is that they're extremely volatile,
confrontational, and leave very little margin for error. They might
make sense when you're trying to defuse an already-violent situation --
say to apprehend a dangerous escaped fugitive, or to end a hostage
standoff. But most no-knocks today are conducted for the routine
service of drug warrants. So they aren't defusing an already violent
situation, they're creating violence where the was none before.
When you break into someone's home, particularly while they're
sleeping, you invoke a primitive, defensive response in them. It's a
particularly dangerous tactic in a country with a history and tradition
of gun ownership.
I should also note here that while the law distinguishes a no-knock
warrant from a knock-and-announce warrant, I'm not sure there's much
practical difference. The real issue here is forced entry -- sending
armed, heavily armored cops barreling into private homes. Whether they
knock and announce themselves in the seconds before they take the down
the door probably isn't going to make much difference in how you
interpret the threat and how you react, particularly if you're sleeping.
Even if police always got the right house and every raid were performed
flawlessly (and that's obviously not the case),
the image of police dressed as soldiers routinely breaking
into private homes to serve warrants for non-violent crimes is one we
ought to find disturbing. At one time we did. There's an old Cold War
saying, "Democracy means that when there's a knock at the door at 3am,
it's probably the milkman." Masked government agents dressed in black
barging into private homes in the middle of the night was once an image
we associated with totalitarian states. We seem to be troublingly
comfortable with it, now.
Comments (19)
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Drug dealers are racketeers (ala the Mafia). It is the difficulty in prosecuting up rackets that have led to special laws being developed to deal with them. This is why you have "famous criminals" like The Dapper Don and Scarface who become untouchable by police. See your post of the Broken Windows policies. If you owned a house or apartment where you were attempting to raise children in a neighborhood that was deteriorating, you would have modified opinions about inviolable rights that will only protect human cancer 99% of the time.
With all due respect, James, if you were to find yourself in a situation where you regularly discus the subject matter of upcoming films because the laws that are supposed to protect your freedoms are generally not thought to apply to "human cancer" you might have a different opinion of the work that Mr. Balko has done on no-knock warrants.
It is a sign of the health of our nation and our liberties that we spend more time worrying about how those rights sometimes protect people we wish they wouldn't.
Since you don't believe in rights per se, wouldn't you have to consider it legitimate for me to deteriorate your neighborhood and ruin the development of your children just for my own amusement? Perhaps you are a sort of utilitarian, but then, perhaps I am a utility monster.
I believe in rights. I just don't believe in giving sociopaths the right to ruin the lives of everyone around them. The sort of behavior you are describing is protected by Balko's hyper-rights-advocating-to-absurdism.
So then you're fine with people having the right to the due process of law and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure (such as breaking down their doors without warning when there is no evidence of eminent violence inside), just like Balko, right? Because protections that don't apply to people that are unpopular aren't rights, and you say you believe in rights, so that must mean you believe in protections for people that are unpopular, such as sociopaths.
I believe American citizens have a right to freedom from UNREASONABLE search and seizure, yeah.
The definition of what is unreasonable for sociopathic racketeers is simply different than it is for other people. Your designation of neighborhood sociopaths as merely "unpopular" is laughable.
(responding to James GW @3:37 here as comments only nest finitely)
The designation of sociopaths as "merely" unpopular is, in fact, yours. My (quite true) claim that they are unpopular does not make reference to any other qualities. The fact remains that "believing in rights" entails believing in rights for those that you don't like.
In any case, the law must be general. So are you claiming that the general protections of the law do not apply to sociopaths (in which case you do not, contrary to your prior claim, believe in rights or the rule of law)? Or would you prefer to retract or amend your previous entailment that reason is not general?
Nonviolent drug offenders are not sociopaths by any common definition. The use of no-knock raids against nonviolent drug offenders is what Balko is protesting.
Straw man much?
The DSM V is coming out soon. People (mostly psychologists at this point) are protesting how it is being developed. If there are real problems, just hope that your own psychology doesn't fall under the new definition of sociopathy.
While I tend to agree with Balko, I think that he gilds the lily when he keeps referring to police SWAT teams as military or paramilitary. Take this latest, where he refers to "police dressed as soldiers". Come on now!
I fail to understand Balko's problem with police being heavily armored when they perform their (likely unnecessary) raids. Would he prefer that they did it in t-shirts and dungarees, so they'd be dressed like sailors? Isn't it enough to say that it's unnecessary to break in to people's homes when looking for your local doper?
What I hear you saying is "our police look like soldiers because they're acting like soldiers". Isn't that also Balko's point?
It's been well documented that municipal police forces have been trained by our military. FUnding for local police forces has grown dramatically as a percent of local spending, too. Also, compared to say 30 years ago, our police forces are much more militarized, employing both their tactics and equipment.
FD: I am not related to Mr Balko.
The appearance of the police forces is mentioned because it is indicative of the mentality with which they approach their job, not because it is a problem in itself. I think Radley's main point is -- as you say -- that "it's unnecessary to break in to people's homes when looking for your local doper", but the war and the warrior culture go hand in hand.
Look at the well documented cases where police have conducted No Knock or Knock and Knock and Announce warrants on either the wrong home or based their warrant on bogus information with disastrous consequences. The uses of hyper-aggressive tactics by police raises the danger for everyone involved.
As a non-criminal, my mindset might lead me to react different than someone with a guilt conscience. If I was to be awakened in the middle of the night by someone breaking down my door and screaming: I am not thinking police, I am thinking HOME INVASION ROBERY! My conditioned response is most likely going to be OPEN FIRE. If that happens, it’s not going to end well for anyone. The type of weaponry I have for my personal defense is capable of punching through body armor (a dead or maimed police officer is not good). In the event that I am not quick enough then I am dead or maimed (dead is not good for me). That does not even address the danger to my children.
I do believe that there is a place for “no knock” warrants. The issue seems to be how commonly they are used. It seems that these types of very aggressive tactics are not being sparingly used, but are becoming commonplace.
Balko is 100% right, unfortunately nobody will listen to him, because, as people James GW say, nobody wants to "give sociopaths the right to ruin the lives of everyone around them." Spoken like one of my superiors James!. I am the State's licensed kidnapper. I steal children for CPS. I am always under police escort, and I must tell you all, if you have any belief that the police or CPS follow the rule of law, you are sadly mistaken. They pretty much do what they want. Children are frequently removed from their homes for petty drug use, and occassianally they are removed for only ALLEGATIONS OF DRUG USE. The real horror is when the State places these children in foster homes, and they are molested (usually by other children, and not by the foster parents), or worse, as happened in one case, the child drowns in a pool, but lives as a human potato. Don't worry though, the false allegations of drug use were cleared up when the parents took a piss test, and they got their potato back. Let me assure you, the State deeply apologized for the mistake. But hey guys, as James GW said, we don't want to give these "sociopaths" the rights to ruin the lives of people around them, so lets arrest them and take their children.
I agree that police and CPS decision-makers should be made miserable for errors and violations of the law. I think it is awful when they aren't. I don't think the solution to out-of-control police and CPS is to balance things by strengthening the hands of criminals, predators, and others who make a mockery of liberty. That would be crazy.
It doesn't matter what you believe. You are our tool. You label people as "criminals" and "predators." You frame the debate in a way where "the law" stands on one end, and the "criminals" at the other. You must be for one or the other. There is no compromise. As long as people like you have a say in the way government is run, mass abuses will always exist. If one were to say that drugs should be decriminalized (as they are in Portugal, little known fact), and that only people who are a physical threat to others should be incarcerated, you would accuse them of "strengthening the hands of criminals, predators, and others who make a mockery of liberty." On the one hand, I find you morally repugnant and rightfully believe that you are a frightened little tyrant who believes that only government force can bring him peace. On the other hand, it is frightened little tyrants like you that ensure that I will continue to be employed, so I must admit I am in a bit of a paradox.
It's about time we had a second Bill of Rights, and its first article should be to ban these practices -- and the unnecessary use of SWAT teams and excessive force generally!
Article two would require full compensation for any damage done by a raid that doesn't result in criminal conviction of the person damaged -- preferably paid for by the officers themselves unless they can prove it was an accident.
In response to some of the above comments: the chief of the Idaho State Patrol refers to his job as a paramilitary organization, and has been actively recruiting gulf war vets, because they fit well into that kind of organization.
These guys wear kevlar, sport M4's and MP5's, combat boots, etc, etc. They are as well outfitted as any army grunt.
I have no respect for any police officer that participates in such raids. We had one here over tomato plants (they thought it was dope). Realizing they made an error, the Pullman, WA cops became-- jerks on steriods. No repairs, no apology, nothing.
Kill a few of them and they may rethink their employment options.
You might want to look over Balko's archives; a fair number have been killed, often in attacks on completely innocent people.