With the recent acquittal of two of the two detectives in the raid on the apartment of Breonna Taylor and her boyfriend Kenneth Walker, things are going to get violent in Louisville tonight (and apparently already have). And I think we can all agree that while anger may be appropriate, burning and looting the town is not (and would not ever solve anything). But I have some things to say about the incident that sparked this, and I'll put them below the fold.
Put yourself in Kenneth Walker's shoes. Just before 1am, you hear the sound of your front door being smashed in. You dial 911 to report a break-in and grab your (lawfully owned) firearm and go to confront the intruders. You do not see uniformed policemen, or SWAT members, but three plainclothed people in the dark of your home, and they're armed. How unreasonable is it to believe them to be intruders intent on doing you and your partner harm? How unreasonable is it to shoot? So shoot he did. One shot that injured one of the officers in the leg. They responded by firing no less than twenty times into the bedroom, hitting Breonna at least 8 times. Their shooting was in fact so indiscriminate, that several of their shots went into the neighboring apartment where a pregnant woman and her 5 year old child were sleeping. At this point, the police finally identify themselves as such and Kenneth surrenders (he was temporarily arrested and charged with attempted murder of a police officer, but those charges were wisely dropped by the DA about two months later).
There is some dispute as to whether the police announced themselves before breaking down the door. Kenneth and the neighbors say the police did not. The police and the Kentucky AG says they did. I am inclined to take the word of the neighbors and Kenneth Walker that they did not hear any such announcement. After all, at 12:45am, I doubt I'd be able to make out what words were shouted before hearing my door break down. I suspect it would simply register to my waking brain as "shouting". Either way, here is where I come down on this issue. There is no reason to break down doors and execute "dynamic entry warrants" short of a hostage situation, or an armed terrorist hiding out in a building. Even the police do not dispute that what they were looking for was drugs. And not a horde of drugs from some kind of drug kingpin, but a from a small time dealer (namely drugs from Breonna's ex-boyfriend, Jamarcus Glover who had been previously arrested the night of the raid). There was no evidence that he had given drugs to Breonna, that drugs had been sold from Breonna's apartment, or that any current relationship even existed between Breonna and her drug-dealing ex-boyfriend. So what could possibly justify such an early morning raid on a residence?
I've been asked many times why I support legalization of drugs. And I have many (truthful) answers. No, I have never used any illegal drugs (save for underage alcohol consumption when I was under 18-19... *gasp!*), and no I have no desire to do so in the future, but I do believe that we could get much of the crime out of the drug trade by decriminalizing it in the same manner we got organized crime out of the liquor business by abolishing Prohibition. But I want to add to that now. I also want to decriminalize drugs because of raids like this. The idea that it's SO dangerous that a criminal might flush their drugs in a toilet, that it's critical to allow police to break down doors, primed to shoot any and all opposition in the house in order to prevent that is contemptuous. That we value a drug arrest so much that human lives (innocent or otherwise) are less important.
This is not a case of "well, they shouldn't have broken the law" or "well, they shouldn't have resisted arrest". This is a case of a man defending his home and partner from what he very reasonably assumed was a pack of intruders. After all, neither he nor Breonna were engaged in illegal activities (which police have confirmed), so why should he expect police to smash down his door at 1am? And why should you expect police to break down your door? You wouldn't. Neither did Kenneth Walker. And Breonna Taylor paid the ultimate price for it. One day it could be you. This needs to stop.
19 comments:
I want to address a couple of different items, based on the Kentucky special prosecutor's summary of the grand jury's return and of the evidence provided the grand jury.
First, no one was acquitted of anything. The grand jury indicted one and chose not to indict the other two--that's nowhere near an acquittal. Second, a neighbor did tell the grand jury that the police announced themselves. Of course that doesn't prove that Taylor and Walker heard the announcement.
The other is the level of firearms training in that police department. The one who was charged was charged with three wanton endangerment counts. Those stemmed from his emptying his magazine--10 shots worth--all over the place in what doesn't seem to be aimed fire, just a form of raghead spray. Taylor, on the other hand, was hit six times by the other two, one of whom is the one who fired the fatal shot, while her boyfriend doesn't appear to have been hit at all.
Now, I'm going to make a couple of assumptions, without which my subsequent argument doesn't hold up much. One is that the distance over which the cops were firing in the rough direction of Taylor and Walker was about 7 yards or less--the width of an apartment living room. The two were standing in their hallway, so maybe the distance was as great as 10 yards. The other is that Walker was not hiding behind his lady when he fired at the police; most hallways are wide enough to allow adults to stand side by each.
From all of that, I'd have to be going hard at the department's Training Officer and Stan/Eval officer for the utterly inadequate firearms training provided and the marking Operationally Ready by Stan/Eval despite that lack of training.
The firing discipline and non-existent marksmanship is shameful and inexcusable. That applies both to ordinary firing range accuracy and the obvious lack of training for firing under duress. Proper training is expensive. But what's the cost of bad or non-existent training?
Eric Hines
But what's the cost of bad or non-existent training?
Twelve million dollars, in this case, and counting.
And a life.
Eric Hines
It's not training. It's attitude. Them or us. The very people who want to be on a swat team are probably the same ones you don't want on them. "Camp Vickie" ring any bells?
Most of these raids are totally unnecessary, conducted to give some jerk an adrenaline thrill by jacking up some low level punk.
The midnight raid was EXACTLY what the fourth was designed to prevent.
Blaming this on the "War on Drugs" puts you in the same place as blaming it on "systemic racism". You're essentially saying the problem is solved by not enforcing particular laws, or not enforcing the law when crimes are committed by particular racial groups. There's a reason why the people in charge are grabbing these explanations. The mayor in Louisville has been in office for almost ten years and was responsible for hiring and supervising the police chief he fired after the raid killed Ms. Taylor. There were complaints about LMPD practices starting long before this raid. I agree more with Mr. Hines than raven because attitude is part of training, and attitude can be dealt with given proper supervision and oversight. There's a reason this happens in cities dominated by Democrats and not as a counter-example, Rudy Giuliani's New York. You either get the Ferguson MO situation where policing is used as a profit center, or what's happening here where the city government is far more focused on UMC quality of life issues like bike lanes and sportsball parks, and just assumes that city services will come along for the ride.
Truly? So Prohibition DIDN'T cause a massive uptick in crime that subsequently retreated when it was repealed? Huh... interesting take. And yes, we didn't have these no-knock warrants (fyi, the warrant signed by the judge WAS a no-knock warrant; it is after the fact that the police and AG claim that they knocked anyway, but the warrant itself is not in dispute) until the War on Drugs, so yes, I DO actually blame it for the circumstances of this raid. There is no cause to smash down doors in the middle of the night save for the "fear" that criminals will flush drug evidence down the toilet when the police announce themselves (the stated purpose of no-knock raids). Without the "dynamic entry" at hours that most citizens sleep, you don't have the same lethal mix that caused this tragedy.
Seriously, can you not put yourself in Kenneth Walker's shoes and see his actions as completely reasonable? You can blame the Left for many things, but I don't see this as a Left/Right issue, I see this as a Fourth Amendment issue and wish these kinds of raids would be ruled unconstitutional (or at the very least, too dangerous to be worth the benefits).
"War on Drugs" puts you in the same place as blaming it on "systemic racism".
I disagree. Even the loudest of present complaints about systemic racism don't regard the offenses and aggressions of racists as acts of "War".
The War on Drugs brought us asset forfeiture, "zero tolerance", military surplus armor and munitions auctioned off to city police, and pure-pee-testing --not intoxication or impaired capacity -- as a condition of employment. All replicated from Federal to Local levels, and all without, IMHO, constitutional authority for federal involvement at all. If it required the 18th amendment to allow Federal enforcement of booze law, where is the amendment empowering Federal enforcement and war-powers against marijuana or heroin or meth; manufacturers or importers or consumers or mules at any level?
We've turned a policing problem into an insurrection. We don't get a "do-over" ever; but what if ... what-if some malicious evil Nixonian leader behind the scenes simple allowed those trafficking in poisons to kill their own customers? Is there any sort of epidemiological analogy to "herd immunity" in the study of addiction and drug dependency?
Let me endorse Mike on this:
There is no cause to smash down doors in the middle of the night save for the "fear" that criminals will flush drug evidence down the toilet when the police announce themselves (the stated purpose of no-knock raids). Without the "dynamic entry" at hours that most citizens sleep, you don't have the same lethal mix that caused this tragedy."
The postulate on this entails the idea that the quantity of evidence that CAN be so disposed of so quickly, between the announcement of the warrant and the securing of the scene, is physically small enough to go down the toilet. Or sink disposal or fireplace chimney or whatever. The whole "no-knock" idea is to bust CONSUMERS. Not warehouses, not factories, not transportation hubs, not dealer showrooms ... not anybody with suitcases or pallet-loads of merchandise or cash. The evidence sought in a no-knock raid- and-search is inherently SMALL.
Given that legislatures and prosecutors have been de-emphasizing and even de-"criminalizing" so called "possession" cases, why are police still conducting such midnight raids?
This case is for me, at this moment, one to take no position on.
Why?
Because at the beginning everything I heard about it was wrong or deeply slanted in presentation. Everything. And this was from sources I considered fairly reliable. I'm pretty sure there are a couple items in this post that are not correct (but I'm not certain). It's an issue, it seems, that everyone has a pre-existing angle that it could benefit, and they play it that way- a kind of political Rorschach test. And the media play it up- Just today I listened to the local news report on it and the unrest/rioting, and not once did they say "Grand Jury", and left the clear implication the DA made decisions about prosecution, when that's not the case. So the misinformation continues apace.
I will have to see the testimony transcripts and official documents before I make any further comments on the case. I can't trust anyone on this case at this point, sorry.
Douglas said: This case is for me, at this moment, one to take no position on.
I can respect that, for the particular case.
The general (systemic?) situation of police policy, strategy, and tactics is still a valid issue of our time. "Broken Windows" ; "Stop and Frisk" ; "Continuum of Force" ; "War on Drugs" ; defunding, disarming, qualified limited immunity, social workers, cops-in-schools, pass-the-trash ...
My biggest gripe about BLM is that they have reduced valid concerns about justice-for-all to simplistic cartoons about bigots-with-badges. I reject the cartoon, even though by doing so I postpone work on the actual problems.
I reject the cartoon, even though by doing so I postpone work on the actual problems.
Not at all. It's the cartoon (and I think you're being generous about BLM--that's an outright violent overthrow gang of thugs) that, by its distraction, postpones work on actual problems; it's the elimination of the cartoon that's necessary to getting to work.
Eric Hines
Eric (about me) : I think you're being generous about BLM
Uhm. Thanks. ?
I'm old enough to remember the "TEA" party movement. The rank and file had legitimate, if simplistic, complaints. Making the changes to prioritize and address the real problems was (and is) somewhat more complicated. They (we) needed real leadership to make the tough decisions and persuade the impatient. Such leaders were lacking.
The late-coming "leadership" the TEA party actually got was all about scamming the participants and skimming (skinning?) the donations. Those "leaders" wearing the colors, chanting the slogans, and reinforcing the cartoon did as much or more to damage the reformers as any opposition in either the Deep State or the Drive By Media.
It's not hard for me to imagine a similar dynamic at work among or against persons of goodwill on a point of the political map pretty far removed from my own. BLM (TM) [a subsidiary of CPUSA, Inc.) has driven me away from their stated goals, immediately. I suspect they'll drive their own supporters away soon.
At which point perhaps those of us at the level of rank and file can find some common ground and test some actual reforms.
While I agree that some of the products of the "War on Drugs" are outrageous, such has no-knock raids like this one and all the asset forfeiture issues, I disagree with this: "So Prohibition DIDN'T cause a massive uptick in crime ... ?"
No, what caused the massive uptick in crime was people willing to break the law for a little fun. As much as I enjoy a good whisky, it's not worth supporting violent criminal organizations for. And that's what we're talking about with drugs: The users -- NOT the lawmakers -- are so set on having a little fun that they're fine with bankrolling some of the most violent criminals in the world to get it.
Bad laws don't take away our individual responsibility for our own actions.
Not exactly right RE: prohibition and crime.
We're not talking about "people willing to break the law for a little fun." That's not the uptick in crime that is a concern. (Nor is my criticism of the war on drugs concerned with the "criminality" of recreational pot smokers.)
Ignore the end-drinker, and Prohibition still caused a huge uptick in crime, simply because it created a huge market that could only be served by people willing to commit crime. The drinkers might be the end user in this marketplace, but it is a black market because of the law.
We're talking about the "people willing to break the law for a big pile of cash", i.e., smugglers and distributors of contraband. During Prohibition, this created networks of well-funded and well-organized gangs. Gangs that extended their reach into racketeering, bribery, and corruption.
The war on drugs has repeated the errors of prohibition. Not only has it created a market that can only be served by crime, but it has also compounded the problem by enabling law enforcement to build a symbiotic relationship with the drug trade. As long as society is 'at war' with drugs, then law enforcement can clam justification for all manner of infringements on rights, property, and even life, as it wages the war. The courts have been complicit in this by allowing the erosion of the Bill of Rights in favor of the (supposedly) legitimate policy goals of the war on drugs.
That some people served bootleg gin (or are rolling a joint) at a parties is not what animates most critics of the war on drugs, and it's disingenuous to point to examples of harmless recreational users and say that they are solely responsible for creating the problem. As if Elon Musk lighting up during an interview leaves the police no choice but to no-knock raid people's houses in the middle of the night.
"it is a black market because of the law" --- No. It's a black market because of the end users. If no one was willing to buy, there'd be no black market. You can't ignore the end drinker because he or she is who the black market with all it's violence and crime exists to serve. No end user, no black market.
I am not really concerned about the guy who sets up an illegal still just for himself but never goes further. Yes, that's a crime, but as you point out, it's not a crime that really seems to harm society. Much like the fellow who grows his own pot and smokes it himself, but doesn't get into dealing it. I'm not worried about that guy.
Also, I don't think any of this justifies the tactics that have been adopted. I agree with you about no-knock raids and asset forfeiture. I also agree that it should have taken a constitutional amendment for the federal government to ban these drugs, just like it did with alcohol. So that's not our disagreement.
Much like the fellow who grows his own pot and smokes it himself, but doesn't get into dealing it. I'm not worried about that guy.
You may not be, but the law certainly is. That man's plants bear enough pot to have him arrested for distribution (because the law doesn't actually require that he actually distribute it, just that he possesses an amount deemed "enough to qualify"). And they will conduct a midnight, no-knock raid on his house if they believe he may flush (or otherwise dispose) of an amount of drugs sufficient to reduce what they can pin on him. And they will seize his home, and assets (as those assets are part of his "drug trade"), and they throw him into a prison with violent criminals because of the "danger" he presents to society. THIS is the world we live in thanks to a War on Drugs that we are losing, and will never actually win. And you can blame the guy who doesn't have a field to grow his own pot for buying from a criminal who will use violence to protect his drug trade and say that pot user is bad, but the guy who grows his own is okay all you like. But unless you're willing to decriminalize it, that violence is going to contine. I think we've had about 60 years to show that pot use isn't going to just go away because the government has deemed it illegal.
And they will conduct a midnight, no-knock raid on his house if they believe he may flush (or otherwise dispose) of an amount of drugs sufficient to reduce what they can pin on him. And they will seize his home, and assets (as those assets are part of his "drug trade"), and they throw him into a prison with violent criminals because of the "danger" he presents to society.
And, of course, I don't think any of that is good or right.
And you can blame the guy who doesn't have a field to grow his own pot for buying from a criminal who will use violence to protect his drug trade ...
And I do. The violence isn't a secret. It's not like users can say "Oh, my! I didn't realize I was subsidizing all this senseless violence!" No. They know, and they're still happy buy.
Pot is NOT a necessity. If the government outlawed food, who could blame the "users" of food for subsidizing whatever violence resulted? That would be survival. There's no comparison here. Pot is a RECREATIONAL drug. Users are subsidizing a whole lot of violence and bloodshed for their own fun.
And it doesn't take a field, by the way. You can grow it as a houseplant, if you like.
But unless you're willing to decriminalize it, that violence is going to contine.
I never said I wasn't willing to decriminalize it. However, you are confusing solutions with blame. I would be willing to decriminalize a lot of stuff, as long as the blame goes where it belongs. The end users of recreational drugs bear a whole lot of responsibility for the violence and destruction they knowingly subsidize. No solution should obscure that.
As for solutions, before we even get started on that, I don't think federal anti-drug laws should be treated as constitutional. They weren't until the Supremes began twisting the Commerce Clause out of recognizable shape back in the 1930s, and all of that should be untwisted and put in force again properly. So those laws should disappear just for constitutional reasons. That would leave it to the states, where it should be.
Also, although it hasn't come up, I'd like to say here that I'm perfectly fine with medical marijuana, or whatever. If medical science shows that something is a safe, useful treatment, great. Allow it.
So let's say the federal laws just magically went poof, and no-knock raids and asset forfeiture were stopped (because I think we both agree all that should happen). Should the states also decriminalize these drugs?
I tend to think it depends on a number of factors, including honest assessments of whether the drugs really are dangerous, community values, etc. The normal things we would base laws on. If they end up legal in Colorado and illegal in Texas, or mixed with some legal in one state and other legal in another, I'm fine with that.
I honestly think marijuana has greatly contributed to the madness we see today, manifest in the riots, TDS, and general hyper sensitivity we see in society today.
Thanks for that link, douglas. I knew about the link between cannabis use and schizophrenia, but this article has a lot that I wasn't aware of.
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