Posted on 06/08/2011 10:52:52 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
Via JWF and Reason, we now present this instructional video from the Department of Education. Now that the government has for all practical pruposes nationalized the student-loan industry, the DoE would like to educate recipients on new loan-collection processes. The banks used to send bill collectors and file claims in court, but the Obama administration doesn’t like those kind of harsh private-sector measures to retrieve lost capital. Instead, they’ll send a SWAT team to kick in your door and frighten your children — even if you don’t live with them anymore:
Kenneth Wright does not have a criminal record and he had no reason to believe a S.W.A.T team would be breaking down his door at 6 a.m. on Tuesday.
“I look out of my window and I see 15 police officers,” Wright said.
Wright came downstairs in his boxer shorts as a S.W.A.T team barged through his front door. Wright said an officer grabbed him by the neck and led him outside on his front lawn.
“He had his knee on my back and I had no idea why they were there,” Wright said.
According to Wright, officers also woke his three young children ages 3, 7, and 11 and put them in a Stockton police patrol car with him. Officers then searched his house.
Why did a SWAT team treat Wright like a drug kingpin?
The U.S. Department of Education issued the search and called in the S.W.A.T for his wife’s defaulted student loans.
Ah, yes. Thank goodness that Stockton sent heavily armed men into a house with three young children, forcibly entering and seizing law-abiding citizens, to demand payment for a student loan from someone who no longer lives in the house. That’s precisely the kind of customer service and competent administration we expected when government monopolized the student-loan industry in the first place.
Say, here’s a question: did anyone on the SWAT team think to knock first and wait for someone to answer?
Matt Welch asks a good question:
[I]f this story isn’t a wake-up call about the militarization of police and criminalization of everything, then I’m afraid the patient is even deader than the Fourth Amendment.
It’s also a wake-up call about the nationalization of what should be entirely private transactions. If the DoE hadn’t handed out direct loans in the first place, then the “suspect” would be dealing with her default in civil proceedings, where the dispute belongs.
Because we were okay with it when they did do it to drug kingpins.
Tyrannical government...
1) Whatever happened to going to court over it?
2) Where was the threat?
this is SO WRONG in every aspect.
Is it too much to ask local LEOs to protect their citizens?
Since when do you need a Federal SWAT team to knock down a door to execute a search warrant?
Could they not just knockon the door and peacefully and courteously execute the search warrant? What were they looking for? The woman? What did they think would happen if they just simply knocked? ...flush the woman down the toilet? They put the man in hand-cuffs?
Seriously???
Our Federal government is out of control.
jw
Well, I guess this is how we will be administered our flu shots in a few years.
Bootlickers in to justify it in 3... 2...
I’m going to be sure I don’t have any overdue library books!
Mark
This story needs to go viral.
Where did the video go?
Guess the Dept of Education did not like how they were portrayed.
More of the “net neutrality” thing?
RE: I’m going to be sure I don’t have any overdue library books!
See, the intimidation is working already... pretty soon, everyone will pay their debts, and return what they borrowed on time :)
Sorry, bud. I saw you tear that tag off the mattress. Yer toast.
A Department of Education that's issuing search warrants is a Department of Education that deserves to be disbanded. A judge that approves a paramilitary-style dawn raid for a student loan search warrant is a judge that deserves to be disbarred. The police chief who authorized this use of force should be canned as well. These are just the preliminary steps that should (and won't) be taken in the wake of this latest demonstration of government brutality.
Rut Roh....my ex and I have been divorced for 10 years and have lived in different states for 8 of those 10. Last month I started getting her unpaid student loan bills sent to my address in her name. Guess I can expect a 6am wake up call from the local SWAT team eh?
What’s next? Is our government going to bring back debtors’ prisons?
“He went on to say OIG is a semi-independent branch of the U.S. Department of Education that executes warrants for criminal offenses such as student aid fraud and embezzlement of federal aid.”
Maybe they should investigate Obama’s college financial aid records?
Update: The television station that first reported this has updated their story to note that it wasn’t a SWAT team, but the federal Office of the Inspector General (OIG). The OIG disputes that the issue was a default, but refuses to explain further:
A U.S. government official confirmed for News10 Wednesday morning federal agents with the Office of the Inspector General (OIG), not local S.W.A.T., served the search warrant. The official would not say specifically why the raid took place. He did say the search was not related to student loans in default.
He went on to say OIG is a semi-independent branch of the U.S. Department of Education that executes warrants for criminal offenses such as student aid fraud and embezzlement of federal aid.
Er … that’s not much of an improvement. Armed federal officers broke into a house and placed themselves and the occupants at risk for a potential case of fraud or embezzlement? For someone who no longer lives there? I’ve changed the headline to reflect the changes in the original reporting, but this does nothing to change the ridiculous nature of this intrusion into a private home.
Now this is illuminating:
U.S. Department of Education Office of Inspector General
http://www2.ed.gov/about/offices/list/oig/ireports.html
THIS is where the insanity originated.
Look at the list of Investigations they have performed.....
UMMMMH UMMMMH MMMH!
The Inspector General Act of 1978,5 U.S.C. app. 3, established criminal investigative jurisdiction for the offices of presidentially appointed Inspectors General. However, prior to enactment of section 812 of the Homeland Security Act of2002 (Pub. L. No. t07-296), the Inspector General Act did not provide firearms, arrest, or search warrant authorities for investigators of those offices.'
Now, please inform us all how SWAT teams to enforce student loans has anyting to do with combatting terrorism.
related: Department of Education buys shotguns
http://www.nationalgunrights.org/department-of-education-buys-shotguns/
Exactly.
Why would you send in paramilitary forces for a non-violent, non eminantly violent situation?
They are trying to squirm their way out of this but there is no reason for this amount of force, especially given there were children in the home.
If it were a terrorist cell making a bomb, I doubt they would have gone in with a S.W.A.T. -type force.
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.