Ah, the hunt.
Instead of rifles and stealthily stalking the prey, it’s body armor, pistols and battering rams. Instead of the forest or tundra, this prey is in a fenced yard, closed in a bathroom, or running away in the living room.
It’s a tough sport and the big game hunter must always be vigilant and always shoot first, because who knows what this ferocious beast, who spends his entire day playing with little children, might do to a grown man in body armor.
As always, Radley Balko documents the hunt…
Mendocino Major Crimes Task Force agents, aided by a uniformed Willits police officer, serving a search warrant at 64 Franklin Avenue on July 27, shot and killed a family pet, an 8-year-old half-pit bull mix named Tonka.
When agents searched the home, they found nothing directly linking the residents to the arrest of Craig Anthony Gelber, the target of the search, according to MMCTF Commander Bob Nishiyama. […]
According to resident Anna White, Tonka’s owner, the police shot her pet while it was in a fenced area on her front porch. “We found the shell casing outside by the fence area. Tonka then ran into our house, got onto my bed and died.â€
White described her bedroom following the search, claiming Tonka’s body had been dumped from the bed onto the floor and items from her room dropped onto the body and into the dog’s blood. “They destroyed our house and found nothing,†says White. “Tonka lived long enough to die on my bed, which we shared each night.â€
Meanwhile, we go to Prince George’s County, location of the slaying of Payton and Chase. In case you’ve forgotten…
Prince George County SWAT, intercepting a package of marijuana addressed to Mayor Cheye Calvo’s wife Trinity, and knowing that criminals were addressing packages to innocents and intercepting them, nonetheless burst into the Mayor’s home without even enough investigation to know he was the Mayor or even notifying local police, shot the two dogs (Chase was running away from them when they killed him), and kept the Mayor and his mother-in-law handcuffed on the floor for hours in their dogs’ blood.
Well, last night, Sheriff Michael Jackson said:
“Quite frankly, we’d do it again. Tonight.”
For more outrage, see Radley’s Federal Cop Shoots Dog at a Dog Park. No Charges.
I’d sure love to see some hungry lawyer start gathering folks like these together for a class action suit of some kind… [expletives deleted] I mean what the hell is all this? Where do we live again?
Voters in Prince George’s county really ought to fire their sheriff. The raid on the Mayor’s house is not the only incident that has put them in the spotlight.
this too has been going on since the 70s
Dare to keep cops off donuts!
The largest violence based club in America is the police.
They can do no wrong and if they just aren’t right,they will lie to make it come out right.
I am still investigating an incident in AZ where undercover cops(allegedly)were selling 500 lbs of marijuana to some dealers but it went sour and a cop was killed,another wounded. The second article used the same stroy,cops selling weed,but the third reports the cops were buying weed and the dealers were trying to rob them,
The story keeps changing,with supporting testimony from fellow officers changing as necessary.
http://www.azcentral.com/community/chandler/articles/2010/07/30/20100730chandler-officers-shootout-tried-to-sell-pot.html
http://www.azcentral.com/community/chandler/articles/2010/07/30/20100730chandler-officers-shootout-tried-to-sell-pot.html
http://www.azcentral.com/news/articles/2010/07/30/20100730phoenix-police-drug-bust-gone-wrong.html
It sounds like the cops were trying to rob the dealers to me and it blew up on them. There would have been no police involvement if it had gone right.
Again.
Where do we live, indeed.
Noted.
Hypocritical Thug Addicts with no conscience. [Video]
@paul, Mr. Jackson is voluntarily leaving his position as PG County’s sheriff. The bad news is that he’s seeking promotion to County Executive in November’s election and will likely win the position. The problems in PG County are systemic, supported by the voters and have been in play for as long as I can recall. The really sad thing is that the voters in PG County continue to vote these assholes into office election after election. The only thing that made the Calvo raid significant is that Mr. Calvo is/was perceived as one of their own. It’s apparent to me that Mr. Calvo wasn’t one on the inside circle.
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D.A.R.E. = Donut Abuse Resistance Education.
Cops have always been the state sanctioned gang. This didn’t happen yesterday. That all men are equal sounds good on a “goddamned piece of paper” but that ain’t the way it is in the real world. If any class is above the law then the rule of law is over.
“Quite frankly, we’d do it again. Tonight.â€
What thge hell?
Cops breaking your door down, killing your pets,possibly you…over a plant?
DEA raiding care givers, taking property and money and making NO arrests?
This is terrorisim!
What country do we live in again?
The SWAT thugs who murder people’s pets think that destroying something that couldn’t possibly harm them were they to use alternate procedures to neutralize the animal (like a net or a tranquilizer dart) appear to be trying to prove to themselves how big and tough they are.
These same thugs also seem presume that those whose homes they invade are automatically guilty and therefore deserve the worst treatment as an adjunct to whatever punishment the court might eventually dole out.
It is not the job of the police to punish or execute suspects or their pets.
And anyone who thinks that killing a family pet with a gun makes them big and bad, they’re wrong. It merely makes them admitted cowards and unfit for duty as police officers.
Liked the P, V, and D act piece from /03
What bogus mumbo jumbo legalese, seems conjured up by schoolyard bullies who have names like Spike, and Stoney and Bubba, who worship Devil tattoos.
How sad for the intelligent freeman.
Back in the late 1990’s Richard Miller wrote extensively abouy this ‘big game’ attitude in his Drug Warriors and Their Prey: From Police Power to Police State in which he warned that those doing the hunting were justifying their predations in the same way the Nazis did theirs on ‘undesirables’, seeking to dehumanize them in the public eye in order to legitimize their atrocities. One look at DEAWatch and you’ll find that sentiment at full throttle.
This is not off-handed Godwinism; Miller makes very effective and frightening case that because of drug prohibition, America has erected a de facto fascist state…which is starting to resemble many facets of the late, unlamented (save, perhaps, by some wearing badges and sidearms) Nazi regime.
WAKEY WAKEY sleeping giant . Time to shake off the dirt holding you down(crime made legal via laws). Time to show who really is in charge here. Time to squash these piss ants.
Drug law reform isnt the only place that the voices are rising.
Swat raids are the definition of craven cowardice. The only legitimate use of military force by PEACE OFFICERS is to de-escalate an already dangerous situation. Designed originally for hostage situations, modern law enforcement would use these tactics to enforce parking regulations if they could. We could be grateful these thugs are only killing pets. But as a psychologist, I know the first signs of a dangerously sociopathic personality are violence toward animals and the defenseless. Anybody would be right in being gravely concerned at the direction the police apparatus has taken in this country.
Love your pets. But remember, these people in the examples were innocent of any crimes. Your Poodle ain’t safe, but it may have been your 5 year old daughter just as easily. Absolute outrage is an appropriate response.