Posted on 03/27/2007 5:12:46 AM PDT by VRing
But...but...then the bad people could flush those drugs down the toilet! The constitution is incompatible woth indoor plumbing!
/drug warrior mode
Compare and contrast:
"If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever."
--George Orwell, 1984
It looks to me as if, in this instance, the facts do not fit what appear to be preconceived notions.
When they arrive on the scene, the police only know that their informant and Baker are fighting over a wad of cash with an unkown person at a random house picked by Baker.
What are they supposed to do? Politely ask everyone to calm down so they can figure out what's going on? Should they ignore the likelyhood that this is a drug buy going bad, and gunfire may break out at any moment?
I'm sure that they could have been more polite and they could have refrained from cursing (the article does seem to make a big deal out of the officers cursing). It appears to me from the story that they had probable cause to search the house.
The story posted by bvw reads as if it were written by the Thompsons' attorney, to publicise a lawsuit. While I think the WOD is a total failure and that we should "Get Out Now!" (copyright Cindy Sheehan), this incident doesn't sound totally unreasonable. Nobody was shot, and the Thompsons' were not hauled off to jail.
That was the original idea all right.
I guess nobody told the cops, but plumbers have gone high tech since then. I can reach a snake with a video camera down that hopper and search the pipe right up to the point it hits the public main.
Anything between the hopper and the main is guranteed to come from that house. And I promise you, with a good snake, you WILL be able to retrieve evidence.
But hey, we're here to play Rambo, not roto rooter. How effin sexy is that?
"Nobody was shot, and the Thompsons' were not hauled off to jail"
I can't believe what I'm reading.
Boy, did they get off lucky or what? huh?
Let me put YOU and your family through that wringer, we'll see if you are so sanguine about the outcome.
Like a liberal turned conservative, its all very different after you been mugged.
And the wife is right; if you sue the cops, who are you going to call next time you need help?
Better still, just get in the habit of shooting the bloody hell out of ANYBODY that breaks in your house.
At least the children weren't there to see all this go down. I would get a really good lawyer, be selling my house & moving asap. If that happened to me I would be having panic attacks without a doubt.
Now there's a consolation worthy of any jackboot. They didn't arrest the innocent homeowner, they didn't kill his dog and they didn't shoot him. How hospitable.
Keep in mind that some Freepers grade liberty on a curve.
And that curve starts with the badge and ends at the fire chief's dog. The rest of us can take a gun butt to the head and like it.
What are they supposed to do? Mitigate crime, not instigate it.
What are they supposed to do? Politely ask everyone to calm down so they can figure out what's going on?
Big advantage here is the homeowner got a good look at the fake undercover guys so he'll be able to obtain satisfaction someday if he wishes.
No kidding. I have a friend whose husband was arrested on false charges made out of spite, brought by someone they thought was a friend. There was nothing of this sort of behavior, just a visit by a cop and request to go to the station with him. Very civil and low key but it really threw them for a loop, and she was one tough cookie, not the easily shook up kind. I agree, time to move and let the department pick up the costs.
And they were darned lucky. That isn't how most of these situations work out.
Precisely!
I know I wouldn't want to stay in that town. If you sue & they really ought to IMO.... their lives will become hell. People who don't know what really went down will think of them as drug dealers, their children will suffer....its time to move asap IMO.
America is slowly moving in the direction of a Third World type nation, where the citizens distrust the police and the police regard themselves as being above the law.
I agree with everything you said except the word, "slowly".
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