N.J. DEA and SWAT raid wrong house – 2nd time in 4 months

Somebody put these DEA and SWAT guys away somewhere. Please. For the safety of Americans.
SWAT team raids wrong home:
State Police and DEA agents frighten residents and tear up house

A State Police SWAT team and a swarm of federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents stormed a four-family home in Newark on Tuesday, kicking down doors, waving guns and ransacking two upstairs apartments.

The officers tore through an armoire looking for guns and shouted curses at frightened adults as they clutched their young children.

Then the officers apologized for being in the wrong house.

Home health aide Cedelie Pompee, 59, was livid yesterday as she recounted how police rushed through the Smith Street house that she has owned for 27 years, leaving cracked door frames, broken doors and scuffed walls in their wake. Pompee shares the home with her two sisters, their children and another family that rents a downstairs apartment.

They didn’t realize their mistake at once.

With guns drawn, they went room by room, breaking through locked doors as they went. When Desir and other family members complained, the officers cursed at them and demanded to know where the guns were kept.

But after 15 minutes of fruitless searching, the officers realized they had made a mistake.

This, of course, after cursing at them. ‘Cause that’s how you do law enforcement these days. The people you’re after aren’t human. They’re the enemy.

State Police Sgt. Gerald Lewis confirmed yesterday the officers and DEA agents raided the wrong house. He would not reveal the nature of the investigation that led them to the house, other than to say it is ongoing. Lewis also refused to disclose who they were looking for.

So just how clueless are these people?

This is the second time in four months the State Police have raided the wrong home. In May, officers stormed the home of a retired truck driver in Woodbridge in search of a prostitution operation.

Yesterday, both Pompee and Desir questioned what kind of investigation even led police to a household of devout Jehovah’s Witnesses in the first place. If any surveillance had been done of the house with the iron gate and small herb garden, Desir said, officers would have known that no one in the house so much as smokes cigarettes or drinks alcohol.

“You’re trying to work in a community and get bad people, but you don’t even know where they live,” Desir said. “When you’re dealing with these type of neighborhoods, there’s no room for incompetent police officers.”