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View Full Version : Getting SWAT Raids Under Control-A Start



Kathianne
08-04-2015, 08:12 AM
These 'raids' have been documented too many times to have caused injuries to innocents and even to police. Seems that hitting them with costs may be the best way to address. Now there is an opening:

http://reason.com/blog/2015/08/03/swat-team-liable-for-wrong-house-flash-b


SWAT Team Liable for Wrong-House Flash-Bang Raid on Grandmother, Teen Girl; Can Be Sued For Their Actions (http://reason.com/blog/2015/08/03/swat-team-liable-for-wrong-house-flash-b)

Judge Richard Posner compares police action to Keystone Kops.

Brian Doherty (http://reason.com/people/brian-doherty/all)|<time datetime="2015-08-03T20:19:00+00:00" style="font-family: Helvetica, helvetica, sans-serif; line-height: 1.5em; border: 0px; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-size: 11.8999996185303px; color: rgb(51, 51, 51);">Aug. 3, 2015 4:19 pm

</time>Reason reported back in 2012 (http://reason.com/blog/2012/06/29/police-raid-wrong-house-through-technolo) on a wrong-door smash-and-flashbang SWAT raid on a home in Evansville, Indiana. As Calvin Thompson wrote then:


When Evansville, Indiana, police officers started receiving threats against their families, they acted fast. The police traced the threats to the IP address of the Milan family on East Powell Avenue. And on June 21, they sent in a SWAT team (http://www.courierpress.com/news/2012/jun/22/swat-team-enters-home-people-inside-arent/) to put on an impressive show of force.

Evansville police arrived at the the home of 18-year-old Stephanie Milan and her grandmother, smashing an already-open door and tossing a couple of flashbang grenades in the building....

After smashing the window and busting open the door, they throw in two flashbang grenades, and then barge into the building to do their thing...

After the raid, police determined that the WiFi connection was unsecured, meaning that anyone could have borrowed the connection to post the threats. Well, mistakes happen.


The Milan family sued the department, and last week the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals decided that the police had no legal immunity for being sued by the Milans for their actions that day. [UPDATE: Adding this up top since this was read ambiguously by some readers, but this decision does not say the cops lost the civil suit. It is saying that their attempt to argue that "qualified immunity insulates them from liability" for being sued at all failed, and, as discussed below, the lawsuit can go on to trial.]
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Video and more at site.