“If a widespread pattern of [knock-and-announce] violations were shown . . . there would be reason for grave concern.”

—Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy, in Hudson v. Michigan, June 15, 2006.

I earlier commented on the unjustified use of tasers by US police officers on a university campus (although some disagree). Alarmingly, there are many other examples of police using excessive force, perhaps the most frightening of which is using SWAT-style tactics to arrest non-violent suspects. According to a CATO institute report, SWAT teams are being over-used in the US. Teams invade the wrong houses, or shoot themselves, or their partners, or bystanders. In some cases, these SWAT teams are getting shot at by individuals (innocent or no) who perceive that their house is being invaded by unidentified armed parties (wait, they are being invaded by unidentified armed parties). Other examples of excessive force include:

• Officers fired for no apparent reason on men in town celebrating a stag night, killing the groom
• Police made record-breaking mass arrests of 1800 peaceful protesters and many random bystanders at the 2004 Republican National Convention so they could keep them for 24 hours and prevent disruption of the convention
• Another poor SWAT raid resulted in an innocent women, armed with a gun due to a recent burglary, shot dead
• And many other examples of SWAT team screwups, summarised in this beautiful article
• There is also a map of SWAT raids gone wrong

In two more borderline cases:

• A police drug raid resulted in a 92-year-old woman opening fire on police, she was killed, three cops wounded
• An apartment drug raid resulted in the innocent neighbour, Cory Maye, panicking, grabbing a gun, and shooting a police officer dead; Maye is currently on death row.

I know that SWAT teams are essential for some raids. Police have to deal with scum such as one gunman who used his 17-month old baby as a shield. They were both shot and killed. This sort of situation is what SWAT teams are for. It seems that SWAT tactics are overused because:

• SWAT gear is supplied by persuasive ex-police salespeople who use emotive appeals to police masculinity to sell their products
• The success of high-profile big-city SWAT teams is promoted as best-practice to be emulated by other regions, even when the tactics are inappropriate for those regions
• Small towns (who don’t need SWAT teams) get federal grants for SWAT gear, but no funds for SWAT training
• Bored, under-trained small-town police officers want to emulate movie heroes, so make ordinary drug search warrants into guns-drawn no-knock Hollywood raids

Let me be clear. Police work, that is, upholding a fair system of justice which protects the life and property of every citizen, is good work. Excellent work. Essential work. But it is so easy to get it wrong. It is so easy to get lazy (who doesn’t get lazy?) And it is so easy to grow disillusioned with an underfunded, badly run justice system which lets the criminals back on the streets, with enforcing stupid laws like marijuana and other drug offences, and with a welfare system which rewards bad behaviour (being wilfully unemployed, being a drug addict, having children you can’t afford to look after properly).

A final example of police/government overreaction is from Fairfax County, Virginia, where a mentally disturbed man shot and killed two police officers behind a police station, prompting a law making it illegal for citizens to possess firearms in police stations. Who thinks that this law will prevent a single crime?

Meanwhile here in New Zealand, taser use seems fine (although there are stories of pepper spray being misused), and the Armed Offenders Squad and similar groups seem to be doing a fine job, but a gun shop owner using reasonable force (shooting the offender in the gut) to defend himself and his customers attracts criminal charges. Welcome to paradise.

Posted by Luke H on Sunday, November 26th, 2006 at 11:34 pm.