Title: ‘Where we at?’: SWAT Gets Lost, Throws Grenade Into Innocent Elderly Man’s Home as He Watches TV Source:
Free Thought Project URL Source:https://thefreethoughtproject.com/l ... eam-raids-elderly-man-grenade/ Published:Sep 12, 2020 Author:Matt Agorist Post Date:2020-09-12 19:26:52 by Deckard Keywords:None Views:4854 Comments:33
Henry County, GA — The Free Thought Project has reported on countless cases of police officers, SWAT teams, and other law enforcement agencies going to the wrong address, kicking in doors and terrorizing entirely innocent people. This is a common trend in American policing. However, the following case out of Georgia shows a level of incompetence that rivals many of our most egregious cases.
“Something went off like a bomb in my house,” Onree Norris, 81, recalls from the night incompetent cops raided his home, throwing a flashbang grenade inside after getting lost. As the explosion blew out windows and lit up the inside of his house like a fireball, deputies with the Henry County Sheriff’s Office Special Response Team smashed down his door with a battering ram.
“Sheriff’s office, search warrant!” a deputy is heard yelling. But the search warrant was not for Norris’ home. A scathing report from 11 Alive details the utterly shocking incompetence and excessive force used to terrorize this innocent man.
Before making their way to the wrong home, deputies are recorded on their body cameras, clueless as to where they are.
“Where’s the house?,” a deputy is heard on camera asking, with no response. “Where we at? Where we at?,” he asks again, without any answer.
Another deputy asks, “where’s the f***ing house?,” as the unit continues past the actual house on their way to Norris’ house.
Instead of confirming the correct house, they simply chose Norris’ house, threw in a grenade and went right on in. Had they taken just ten seconds to read the description of the home, they would have known they were at the wrong home.
As 11 Alive reports, “the warrant described an off-white house with a black roof. Norris’ house is yellow with a gray roof. The houses even had separate driveways, addresses, and mailboxes.”
But deputies didn’t care, they just wanted to smash things and kidnap those damn “dope heads.”
When the SWAT team entered Norris’ home, Norris was temporarily kidnapped and his things smashed.
“Got to the hallway, they was all over me,” Norris said. “Grabbed my arm, twisted behind my back, and handcuffed me.”
Norris was 79 years old at the time and presented a threat to absolutely no one.
“That just like scared me to death. I’d already had heart trouble, I had heart surgery,” Norris said.
Norris is heard on the body camera video telling the deputies who just flash banged his home as he watched TV that he has heart trouble. But they couldn’t have cared less.
Eventually, police realized they were in the wrong house and so they began turning off their body cameras in a likely attempt to cover up their dangerous ignorance. Norris says that’s when a deputy told him that they will uncuff him and leave, so long as he signs this piece of paper they placed in front of him.
“So I signed my name on there,” Norris said. “I didn’t get a chance to read it.”
After police eventually left, they walked to the correct house and the heavily militarized SWAT team, equipped with M4 rifles and grenades confiscated a small amount of drugs. The term “overkill” doesn’t even begin to describe the situation and speaks to the utterly anserine and violent nature of the war on drugs.
According to 11 Alive, Norris’ grandson, Wantez Robinson, called 911 and requested an ambulance to check out his grandfather after the raid.
For two years, Norris has been fighting unsuccessfully to sue the cops involved. Thanks to qualified immunity, the officers involved remain protected.
“A pizza delivery man could have delivered a pizza to the correct address,” Norris’ attorney Darryl Scott said of the police incompetence.
“You’re able to come and kick someone’s house down, let flash grenades go, and you’re at the wrong house, and you’re not held accountable for it?,” Robinson questioned. “Someone has to be held accountable for this. You should not be able to just go into someone’s house because you feel like it,” he added.
A few days after the raid, deputies came back and fixed the door but lawyers for the SWAT team have fought vigorously for two years against any other form of compensation.
Norris’ granddaughter, LaCristy Johnson, minced no words when saying, “the government has given officers a blank check to go out in the community and break the law. They feel like they have the right to do that with no consequence.” And, unfortunately, she is right.
Based on how he was treated and the utter lack of concern given to his case, Norris says he has no confidence that these raids on the wrong homes will ever come to an end.
“They’re just gonna keep on doing it,” he said. “They probably go into somebody’s wrong house, somebody’s gonna get hurt.”
This case arises out of the execution of a search warrant at the wrong address.
Plaintiff Onree Norris, whose home was mistakenly raided, sued Defendants Jermaine Hicks, David Cody, David Lemacks, Jerome Moore, and Steven Parrish for violating his Fourth Amendment rights.
Defendants now move for summary judgment based on qualified immunity.
Start by trying to overcome, "Plaintiff explicitly concedes that Defendants Hicks, Lemacks, Moore, and Parrish are entitled to qualified immunity against Plaintiff's claims."
Next, attempt to overcome Plaintiff's failure to name Team Leader Kendig as a defendant.
If you overcome the untimely attempt to add Team Leader Kendig, then overcome "Even if Plaintiff had shown good cause, the Court would deny his motion to amend as futile because, for many of the same reasons explained below, Agent Kendig is entitled to qualified imunity for his participation in the raid on Plaintiff's house."
Then you can apply yourself to Doc #80, CLERK'S JUDGMENT in favor of defedants against Plaintiff Norris for costs." And Doc #88 "Costs taxed in amouhnt of $1833.36 against plaintiffs."
It is a shame that everything in the bullshit article about this 2018 case is contradicted by the actual court opinion.
Norris v Hicks, Doc 79 Order Granting Summary Judgment (16 Mar 2020) by nolu chan on Scribd
It is the Opinion of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, Atlanta Division, issued by Michael L. Brown, United States District Judge.
It is just a coincidence that yet another court opinion says that Deckard and his bullshit source of Matt Agorist are full of shit. Again. On this shit case from 2018, decided in March 2020.
You just can't deal with what the court had to say.
Qualified immunity: Police off the hook for no-knock raid on wrong house
You be their lawyer and help them collect.
Start by trying to overcome, "Plaintiff explicitly concedes that Defendants Hicks, Lemacks, Moore, and Parrish are entitled to qualified immunity against Plaintiff's claims."
Next, attempt to overcome Plaintiff's failure to name Team Leader Kendig as a defendant.
If you overcome the untimely attempt to add Team Leader Kendig, then overcome "Even if Plaintiff had shown good cause, the Court would deny his motion to amend as futile because, for many of the same reasons explained below, Agent Kendig is entitled to qualified immunity for his participation in the raid on Plaintiff's house."
Then you can apply yourself to Doc #80, CLERK'S JUDGMENT in favor of defendants against Plaintiff Norris for costs." And Doc #88 "Costs taxed in amouhnt of $1833.36 against plaintiffs."
It is a shame that everything in the bullshit article about this 2018 case is contradicted by the actual court opinion. When bullshit is taken to court, it loses.
In the United States, qualified immunity is a legal principle that grants government officials performing discretionary functions immunity from civil suits unless the plaintiff shows that the official violated "clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known".
Detroit, Michigan (May 2017): After conducting a one-day(!) human trafficking investigation, a SWAT teams raids the wrong house, handcuffs everyone present (including two children) before discovering their mistake.
Detroit, Michigan (September 2017): DEA agents raid two(!) wrong addresses. The forty officers(!!) recover no drugs. Search warrants and property receipts left at the properties by the feds were blank, according to this report.
Bowling Green, Kentucky (July 2016) - Police raid the wrong house looking for a Black suspect. Officers handcuff and question the homeowner, who weighs 100 pounds less than the suspect they're looking for. The interrogated homeowner is also one foot taller than the suspect. He's also white.
Louisville, Kentucky (July 2020) - Cops raid a vacant house looking for a drug suspect who had already been arrested and was in jail. Officers break windows, destroy a door, and handcuff the man hired to paint the interior of the vacant residence.
Cleveland, Ohio (November 2018) - Wrong house raided during a shooting investigation. Cops cause over $8,000 of physical damage to the house and spend an hour interrogating all the residents -- some of whom are disabled -- before realizing their mistake.
Strongsville, Ohio (May 2010) - A man and his 14-year-old daughter are forced out of their house and made to lay face down on the lawn until officers realize they have the wrong address.
Cleveland, Tennessee (May 2018) - DEA and local cops raid wrong house in search of murder suspect. Flashbangs are deployed into the house despite the presence of young children -- something officers should have been able to discern from the number of toys around the front entry of the residence.
This is just a small sampling. And this is just from this circuit, which covers only four of the 50 states. This happens far too frequently for it to be shrugged off by an Appeals Court, even if the facts of the case might lead the court to conclude a mistake in an affidavit doesn't warrant the suppression of evidence.
The Fourth Amendment places the sanctity of the home above all else. And yet, officers continue to perform searches without performing the due diligence required to support a home invasion. Outdated info, unverified claims by informants, minimal investigative work… it all adds up to situations where rights are violated and residents are recklessly subjected to violence and deadly force.
