Update on Stockton, CA ‘SWAT’ by Department of Education
KXTV, which ran the original story referred to in my original post, has now updated their coverage.
It appears now that SWAT wasn’t used, but that “federal agents with the Office of the Inspector General (OIG)” served the warrant and broke down Kenneth Wright’s front door. From KXTV:
“OIG is a semi-independent branch of the education department that executes warrants for criminal offenses such as student aid fraud, embezzlement of federal aid and bribery…”
The feds also claim “the search was not related to student loans in default as reported in the local media” and that the raid “was part of an ongoing criminal investigation.”
However, questions remain:
- Since Kenneth Wright wasn’t arrested, why the forced entry?
- If this had to do with non-violent crimes like fraud or embezzlement, why not try a more humane first contact than door-breach and 15 armed personnel?
- Since all the evidence is locked up because the case is ongoing, how do we know the feds are telling the truth?
- How can the Department of Education issue warrants authorizing deadly force for non-violent crimes?
- Doesn’t this sound like the Dupnik defense? (Keep changing the story and blame the victim by implying this is part of a larger investigation.)
And the obvious question; wouldn’t it have been safer for all involved to just stake the house out and wait for the man to go somewhere?
But then they could use all of the “cool” gear they’ve requisitioned against their bloated budgets.
“Since all the evidence is locked up because the case is ongoing, how do we know the feds are telling the truth?”
We don’t, and I don’t believe them.
“How can the Department of Education issue warrants authorizing deadly force for non-violent crimes?”
Yes, that question springs forcefully to mind. Waving flags and sending up flares, popping smoke and dancing in an inappropriate fashion.
Good points.
And I would like to know if this sort of thing (as policy w/in the DOE) is a recent development, or if it’s been going on for — say — more than the past two years.
The more obvious question: Why does the Department of Education have GUNS?
to foist the dewey decimal system of course
They do have guns ,those swat cops weren’t carrying fly swatters.
Why do they have guns? You’re obviously not aware of all of the federal agencies that employ armed federal police officers with enforcement powers – it would blow your mind.
this could be a path that eventually leads to the removal of some of the alphabet agencies
all agencies that have “law enforcement authority” need to be examined
the only “law enforcement authority” should be the department of justice
not only in the name of trimming the fat but to demonstrate the totalitarian aspects of our modern american government
this issue needs to be expanded and reexamined
It is not totalitarianism, but pervasiveness that is the problem. With 9 million programs, they could not get the prompt assistance of a separate agency for enforcement, so they each have their own police. EVERY time we agree to a new “entitlement” we create a new fraud police to enforce the rules. Quit giving away money and you can greatly reduce the amount of policing required. AND the mirror image policing required as tax rates rize, the incentive to tax avoidance rises. So, to get something free from government, someone else’s money must be taken by force, and a third person must be threatened with violence to keep them from cheating the entitlement. Like Reagan said: we can’t afford all the goveernment we want!
If clarity is damning, muddy the waters.
Federal agencies issuing warrants and breaking into private homes for money related offenses? What has happened to our once free country? Where are the court’s?
A judge signed the warrant. So where does that place the court?
In abeyance
Your story said the Department of Education issued the warrant. Leaving that point aside, we no longer live in a free country when SWAT teams can break into your home without any showing of exigent circumstances.
Perhaps another good question: Why can the Dept of Ed issue SWAT warrants in the first place?
fraud and emembezzlement are crimes, why should suspects be treated differently than other thieves or crime suspects
I have a question: exactly when did my country go insane? Is there an actual date like when you use B.C and A.D. or has it just been a gradual slide into a slimy tide pool where reason was washed out to sea like beach erosion?
http://bahaidate.stonesseries.com/
When this became America’s National Religion
That’s a new one. I’ve never heard of a search warrant that explicitly authorizes deadly force for its execution. I’ve heard of no knock warrants, John Doe warrants, and drop guns, but I’ve never heard of a shoot on sight warrant. Usually the use of force is defined by the state’s penal code, departmental policy, and a catch all vague term called “offending the court’s conscience,” which is to be avoided at all cost, if you know what it means. Like the living constitution, the meaning of “offending the court’s conscience,” can change without notice and may vary with the judge and local tradition. The rule of law and lawyers is so unpredictable; it’s getting so you can’t dog eye anyone in self defense anymore without getting sued by some ambulance chaser for psychological torture, especially when serving a no knock and no announce warrant. I suspect the search warrant was for drugs, they didn’t want the evidence going down the crapper, nor catch a bullet entering through the door in a civilized manner.
“I suspect the search warrant was for drugs, they didn’t want the evidence going down the crapper, nor catch a bullet entering through the door in a civilized manner.”
Why would the Department of Education be doing anything about drugs? That would be the FBI, ATF, DEA, or locals.
They’ve admitted the group that pulled this stunt deals with white-collar crimes. Where did you get the idea about drugs?
Maybe it was hidden in his locker.
Perhaps I misspoke. However, when they have a no-knock warrant and they go in armed, deadly force is in play. The judge knew this when signing off for a suspected non-violent offense. So deadly force was authorized, though not specifially ordered. That makes everybody culpable for consequences, as with the Guerena case in Tucson, where Dupnik is still trying to wiggle off the hook.
In any case, they don’t have ‘shoot on sight’ warrants, at least officially, but some people are shot on sight when agents enter with guns. In Guerena’s case, SWAT began shooting when the lead officer fell down in the front door, causing others to think he was shot.
http://bloximages.chicago2.vip.townnews.com/azstarnet.com/content/tncms/assets/editorial/1/dc/b28/1dcb28b4-8825-11e0-b417-001cc4c002e0-revisions/4ddf3bbdc793c.pdf.pdf
Is breaking down a door and confronting a man in boxers, hauling him out in cuffs along with his 3 children, and making them sit in a cruiser for 6 hours while looking for evidence of non-violent crimes such as loan fraud, now to be considered “civilized”?
You suspect the warrant was for drugs, all while calling others to task about misinterpreting the warrant. If it was for drugs, why not the DEA instead of the DOE? Curious.
Can someone find a oopy of the warrant and the supporting affidavit?
There should supporting documents – under oath – for the warrant and the warrant itself should have been served on Wright.
May not be available if the case is still ‘ongoing’.
The warrant served on the homeowner is certainly available – the affidavit may still be unavailable.
If there is no “Copy” then maybe there’s an ‘oopsy’.
Hey everyone, if this upsets you please call the inspector generals office who issued this kind of invasion. Contact Katheren Grant and let her know you are a concerned citizen about a police state 202-245-7023
Better yet, let your own Congressman/woman know that you are VERY concerned about a police state and what are they going to do about getting to the bottom of this case.
Instead of letting the bureaucrats and red tapes bury this extraordinary story. We the citizens need to keep our vigil and let our representatives know about it.
I think the Obaminator should get a team of Secret Service together, head over to the Dept of Education head offices, round everyone up, and take them back to the White House lawn. Then subject them all to the abuse the citizen felt, pulled from his house in his boxer shorts and forced to the ground on his front lawn in front of all his neighbors. Make ‘em all strip, take a picture, blow it up to poster size and send it back with them to the office.
And all the proceeds, from the sell of the posters, can be put into the Obama Vacation Account.
A SWAT team hammered on my door at 6:30 a.m. one morning. Obviously the wrong house, but I opened the door. They swarmed in; eight, ten, twelve. I don’t know how many. When our dog rushed to the door, growling, one of them aimed his gun at her. I grabbed her and shouted not to shoot the dog, that she wouldn’t hurt them. They all had guns. My kids remember the guns, though they didn’t aim them at people. They had a warrant to search for child porn.
I don’t know how any of you feel about that particular crime (downloading only; not distributing or creating), but it is another non-violent crime. They had no reason to think that we would react violently. They could have waited until my husband came outside to mow the grass, for crying out loud. Swarming into my house with ten or twelve guns made the situation incredibly chaotic and inherently dangerous.
I still cannot talk about the invasion without crying. The police wore ICE jackets and when I called the lead investigator to ask about something they took from the house, it turns out I was calling Homeland Security. I’d love someone to sort that out for me.
@anonymous
You have my sympathies. Using tactics like this for non-violent crime is becoming the norm. LEO’s attitudes these days are “Better 100 innocent civilians die than one LEO get a scratch from his own incompetence.
Thank you for the sympathy…you might be in the minority with this particular crime. I don’t know why the legitimacy of these searches hasn’t been challenged.
How can the Department of Education issue warrants authorizing deadly force for non-violent crimes?
The warrant doesn’t “authorize” any force at all. That’s not how warrants work, is it? The warrant authorizes a search. Force, if it’s part of the search, is not part of the warrant itself.
Thus the key question is “how can the DoEd issue warrants at all”? Well, because the Office of the Inspector General is law enforcement.
Think of it this way – would anything be different if, instead of the OIG asking a judge for a warrant and then executing it, the FBI had done it?
I’m not sanguine on any difference. If we’re going to have laws against fraud and embezzlement (and I think we should!), someone has to be enforcing them.
So either we end up with an umbrella agency that the others “subcontract” to for warrants and arrests and the like, or they do it themselves – or they have to shoehorn local police who aren’t even charged with enforcing Federal law into doing it, which isn’t even a plausible option.
Both of those solutions have endemic potential problems.
(If we folly Daxypoo’s suggestion of only DOJ having police powers, then DOJ agents will most likely either be so closely linked to the other agencies that the distinction is meaningles, or so disconnected from them ["call DOJ and get me a warrant and some cops for this!"] that they won’t even really understand the laws they’re enforcing.
Neither option is all that compelling.)
There are two common excuses used to justify–rationalize, excuse, take your pick–these no-knock “dynamic entry” operations.
1) As those schmucks on the US Supreme Court just ruled, “to prevent the destruction of evidence.” Apparently, they were afraid that the woman who was not in the home she no longer lives in was going to flush a bunch of hard drives and filing cabinets down the toilet.
2) “Officer safety.” “The most important thing is for all officers to go home at the end of their shift.” Apparently it is so important for Deputy Fife to survive his day that he is justified in blowing you away for trying to tell him he has the wrong house.
Both of these rationales forget the Prime Directive of The American Criminal Justice System, at least as I was taught in the Detroit Public School System–admittedly, no longer a good example–”It is better for a guilty man to go free than for an innocent man to be convicted.”
So we’re we’re going to bust down doors, wave automatic weapons, shout and yell and physically abuse and generally terrorize American citizens–all too often law-abiding citizens in the wrong house–and risk blowing someone, may ]be a child’s, brains out, to prevent them from flushing something down the toilet, or defending themselves or their families because you’re creating such a fuss they don’t hear, or understand, the part where you’re an officially designated jackbooted government thug, duly authorized to stomp their kitten, shoot their dog, and murder them if they look at you wrong.
Not that I have any strong feelings about this…
BTW, where are the liberals who were just whinging about how we were so evil for celebrating the death of Osama Bin Laden?
So it wasn’t a SWAT. It was a group of agents dressed like soldiers, armed with automatc weapons. Definetely not SWAT.
Hello There. I discovered your weblog the use of msn. This is a very well written article. I’ll be sure to bookmark it and come back to learn extra of your helpful information. Thank you for the post. I’ll certainly return.