Posted on 09/04/2012 11:12:10 AM PDT by Altariel
BUFFALO, NY (WKBW) - When Rita Hairston's husband died five years ago, she adopted a dog to keep her company and help her through an emotional time.
Prada was 5-years-old at the time. The black Labrador Retriever became more than a pet, but a part of Hairston's family. A companion.
Last Saturday morning, she returned to her E. Morris Ave. house in University Heights in Buffalo and discovered her home had been broken into and Prada was missing.
There was a puddle of blood on the floor and bullet holes in the door of a bedroom where Prada slept.
But it was not a burglar who broke in. Hairston found a search warrant, signed by a judge, issued to the Erie County Sheriff's Department, on her kitchen floor.
Hairston said police raided her home, searching for cocaine, connected to a man named Lance Thompson.
Hairston said she rents another home she owns to Thompson, who dates her daughter, but he does not live in her residence and she has absolutely no connection to his alleged illegal activities.
A spokesperson for the sheriff's office said they had probable cause to search Hairston's residence because Thompson's alleged drug activities were suspected to take place from Hairston's house on occasion. The home which she rents to Thompson was also searched.
Deputies were forced to shoot and kill Prada during the raid because he threatened them, the spokesman said.
No drugs were recovered from Hairston's home.
Watch Eyewitness News at 11:00 Thursday night for more on this story.
* In the black/dark/gallows humor vein.
Really? So you can openly take your firearms to your city hall meetings, or the state capitol buildings? Or to schools? How about court?
ALL of the above were common in the early days of the republic, some of those as late as 50 or 60 years ago... are they still the case?
Indeed, in the case of guns, let us examine the law. Let us take New Mexico as our case of study:
NM Constitution, Art II, Sec. 6. [Right to bear arms.]
No law shall abridge the right of the citizen to keep and bear arms for security and defense, for lawful hunting and recreational use and for other lawful purposes, but nothing herein shall be held to permit the carrying of concealed weapons. No municipality or county shall regulate, in any way, an incident of the right to keep and bear arms.
Now, let us examine a law:
NMSA 30-7-2.4. Unlawful carrying of a firearm on university premises; notice; penalty. A. Unlawful carrying of a firearm on university premises consists of carrying a firearm on university premises except by:
(1) a peace officer;
(2) university security personnel;
(3) a student, instructor or other university-authorized personnel who are engaged in army, navy, marine corps or air force reserve officer training corps programs or a state-authorized hunter safety training program;
(4) a person conducting or participating in a university-approved program, class or other activity involving the carrying of a firearm; or
(5) a person older than nineteen years of age on university premises in a private automobile or other private means of conveyance, for lawful protection of the person's or another's person or property.
B. A university shall conspicuously post notices on university premises that state that it is unlawful to carry a firearm on university premises.
C. As used in this section:
(1) "university" means a baccalaureate degree-granting post-secondary educational institution, a community college, a branch community college, a technical-vocational institute and an area vocational school; and
(2) "university premises" means:
(a) the buildings and grounds of a university, including playing fields and parking areas of a university, in or on which university or university-related activities are conducted; or
(b) any other public buildings or grounds, including playing fields and parking areas that are not university property, in or on which university-related and sanctioned activities are performed.
D. Whoever commits unlawful carrying of a firearm on university premises is guilty of a petty misdemeanor.
It is obvious that this law is abridging the right of the citizen to bear arms on universities; indeed as worded it can even prohibit the keeping them, as they cannot legitimately be kept in student housing, which falls under the buildings covered by this statute.
Interestingly, when one tries to challenge this law they are either redirected (AG says to call the state representative or the supreme court, the supreme court says to call a lawyer, the representative says to call the AG, etc.) despite the standard thought in jurisprudence that the [legitimate] law cannot contradict itself; further, other contra-constitutional restrictions [such as firearms in courthouses] are used as excuses/justification for the infringing law's existence.
Now, quick question: what happens when you violate one of these invalid laws? Who responds and why?
No it's not. Safety of innocents should always be top priority.
Ya see 99.9% of these reckless dangerous military style raids are not over violent hostage situations where people could die any second. Nope. Not even close.
They are usually done to search for drugs, medications etc. In fact, if it were not for the government sponsored illegal drug industry, likely 75 percent of these raids would never occur. Ya take that away and you could let go half the government police.
They told ya there was a war on drugs, so they could play war and control others. And believe me, they have created a massive industry around this and why the courts have more cash registers that the local walmarts, with warehouses full of seized stuff. Big industry.
All this and yet drugs can be found anywhere....lol...Talk about job security!
As if they and the corrupt politicians wanted this profitable industry stopped.
Swat style raids should only be used in violent hostage situations and where *extremely* violent people are directly involved. The WOD is basically an excuse for government to grow, control, fine, and seize assets.
Even those drooling in cups figured this out.
That's the only thing I disagree with in your post. SWAT-teams should not exist, period. The hostage and "where *extremely* violent people are directly involved" situations should be handled by the militia, that is the armed body of the people, and not that of the police. (Precisely because of the propensity to use SWAT for more and more, thereby devaluing the innocent-life more and more [because every SWAT action is inherently more lethal].)
Saw a squirrel once without a nut in his mouth, too. So what?
Just more ugly government arrogance.
That's right, so what, shoot the woman's GD dog to death and leave a note... Whoops! So what!
We all know how that worked out.
Now even small rural towns have militarized units, with attitudes of an occupying army. This should have never been allowed to escalate to what it is today.
They use any excuse to use these government militarized units and these operations are now conducted hundreds of times per day in the U.S.
They walked away and left a puddle of blood on the woman’s floor, too. This is beyond Soviet pitiful.
Shooting a Black Labrador????
What were they afraid it was going to do? Lick them to death?
A governmental War On Drugs is like a governmental War On Poverty: the more vigorously the war is waged, the stronger the enemy becomes. Only a utopian statist can believe in either War.
When US citizens within the US start knowingly disappearing in the night, it's already too late by then.
The CIA has been “disappearing” people abroad to secret prisons without charges, warrants, etc for a long time and holding them without trial. Read about the prisoner rendition programs.
I have no doubts that they also “disappear” inconvenient US citizens that don't have much family/friends to look for them.
“I have no doubts that they also “disappear” inconvenient US citizens that don’t have much family/friends to look for them.”
Oh, Lord. Did you bring tinfoil for everyone? Hats on the house! You all didn’t even read the articles or watch the video., so I doubt you will follow up on the disposition of the poor coke dealer and his innocent girl...but I’m sure you’re all good God-fearing conservatives who swallow the media feeds and knee-jerk respond. Good luck to all you freedom lovers. Really.
A *claim* that both addresses were on the warrant is made by the reporter (this claim is not corroborated by showing both addresses), just before the same reporter launches into the police’s defense.
That's also what I saw on the video: only one address.
I watched the video and saw no second address. I did hear the reporter *claim* there was a second address - which is more than the sheriff's department claims in the text.
I used to defend police. Now, I cannot stand the union thugs.
Lmao. With the future of nanotechnology in the hands of our corrupt government, we're sadly not too far away from tinfoil hats. Power = Corruption. ALWAYS
I'm not speaking of this one story in particular. Just the general trend of our government naturally becoming more corrupt and secretive as they gain control.
Read about Gary Webb. He was an investigative reporter found with two gunshot wounds to the head and immediately declared a suicide. He exposed that the CIA assisted cocaine producers and smugglers in the 1980s.
Read about the plane that went down with several tons of cocaine just a few years ago. The crew was never found at the scene. It is the same exact plane used for CIA prisoner rendition. Tail number N987SA. How convenient that the FAA records for this plane “disappeared” after the connection was revealed and now only show up on European flight data. The official US crash record lists the flight origin as “?”.
>>>I watched the video and saw no second address. I did hear the reporter *claim* there was a second address - which is more than the sheriff’s department claims in the text.<<<
So you are saying the reporter simply LIED about a verifiable fact? I don’t trust the media either, but if anything the fact that both houses were on the warrant goes AGAINST the reporter’s clear agenda of painting this as a “cops raid wrong house” story.
It doesn’t really make sense that the police would go to the trouble of getting a warrant for the daughter’s boyfriend’s residence, but then perform what would clearly be an illegal, warrantless search on the dog owner’s home.
Also, in the article and video the woman whose dog was killed NEVER claimed that there was no warrant for her house. She seemed to be diputing the validity of the warrant for her home. I have no idea whether the warrant was justified, but obviously a judge thought it was (though he would be going by the information the police provided).
The ONLY thing that even suggests that this was a case of the cops raiding the “wrong” home, was the misleading headline.
I watched the video and saw no second address. I did hear the reporter *claim* there was a second address - which is more than the sheriff's department claims in the text.
So you are saying the reporter simply LIED about a verifiable fact? I don’t trust the media either, but if anything the fact that both houses were on the warrant goes AGAINST the reporter’s clear agenda of painting this as a “cops raid wrong house” story.
It doesn’t really make sense that the police would go to the trouble of getting a warrant for the daughter’s boyfriend’s residence, but then perform what would clearly be an illegal, warrantless search on the dog owner’s home.
All of that is conjectural - are you backing off your claim, "if you watch the video of the local news (at about the 1:46 mark) it is clear that the warrant was for BOTH her tenant’s home and her personal residence"?
Also, in the article and video the woman whose dog was killed NEVER claimed that there was no warrant for her house.
Flat wrong - at 1:30 in the video she says the warrant was for a different address than hers.
She said that there was a warrant for the residence of the alleged drug dealing tenant/daughter’s boyfriend, that she also owned. She NEVER said that the warrant did not cover her personal residence as well. The reporter clearly stated that it did cover both houses.
In context, it seems clear that what the woman was saying is that the alleged drug dealer didn’t live with her, so the warrant only should have included his residence, and not hers.
Nor did she say it did. No evidence there for your claim, "if you watch the video of the local news (at about the 1:46 mark) it is clear that the warrant was for BOTH her tenant’s home and her personal residence."
The reporter clearly stated that it did cover both houses.
Stated with no corroborating evidence on display. No evidence there for your claim, "if you watch the video of the local news (at about the 1:46 mark) it is clear that the warrant was for BOTH her tenant’s home and her personal residence."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.