Check out this awesome, heartfelt, moving apology from the DEA regarding botched raid

[Downtown Hound]

in which the families' "eighth-grade daughter was forced out of her bed at gunpoint and dragged her down the stairs. The girl later vomited, fainted and had an asthma attack," and the man was forced out of his home into the freezing cold winter night clad only in his underwear. The cops also threatened to shoot the family dogs. Here's a DU thread on it from the other day:


http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x203717

And now, the incredible contrition from the DEA on the incident, which by the way, was not actually made to the family itself, but rather a statment released to the media:

"John P. Gilbride, special agent in charge of the Drug Enforcement Administration, issued a statement Friday clearing Spring Valley resident David McKay and his family of anything to do with the series of drug raids that took place early Thursday in Westchester and Rockland counties.

“We sincerely regret that while attempting to execute an arrest warrant for a member of this drug trafficking organization, the innocent McKay family was inadvertently affected by this enforcement operation,” Gilbride said.

“Though we take many precautions to prevent this type of incident from happening, drug investigations are very complex and involve many fluid factors,” Gilbride said. “DEA will continue to pursue these criminal organizations to protect the public from the scourge of drug trafficking.”

http://www.drugwarrant.com/2011/01/dea-issues-apology/
http://www.lohud.com/article/20110114/NEWS03/101140373/-1/newsfront/DEA-apologizes-to-Rockland-family-for-raid

Wow, what a heartfelt apology, no? But I sure feel safer knowing that at any time, cops in stormtrooper gear can come and roust me out of bed, threaten to shoot my dogs, terrorize my daughter, and humiliate me by making me stand in my underwear outside so that no one can smoke some weed and chill out with a pizza. Yep, feel very safe from that scourge now.

:sarcasm:

[bluestateguy]

1. Saying "we regret" is always a red flag

That's language from corporate attorneys that they teach at MBA schools. It basically saying that you think it's unfortunate that something bad happened, but there is no actual statement accepting responsibility for inflicting pain on someone else.

[midnight]

4. True.... There needs to be accountability for these abuses...

[Vinca]

2. People make mistakes, but it's no mistake they planned to use

200 police officers on pot raids. It's an obscene waste of taxpayer money. Speaking of which, they should cut the McKay family a big, fat check.

[Downtown Hound]

3. I can accept that people make mistakes

But that's precisely why these way over the top heavy handed raids need to be stopped. The cops barge into these people's homes ready for battle, showing no concern for the people that live there. Dragging the daughter down the staris? Threatening to shoot their dogs (we all remember what happened to that one guys' dogs when the cops raided his house, another little oops)? And then, virtually no accountability for any of it. It's all considered justified in the name of fighting the "scourge" of drugs. At least by law enforcement it is, not by me.

[Fumesucker]

5. It's considered justified by the politicians..

The politicians are the ones who set the rules, this could all be ended in a single afternoon with a few signatures and everyone with enough brain cells to keep their ears apart knows it.

[Downtown Hound]

6. No doubt, but also by the cops as well

Bottom line, police and DEA have jurisdiction over how they spend their time and money, and how they apologize when one of their raids goes horribly wrong, like here. 200 officers for some weed and a rash of home invasions, well, I refuse to give law enforcement a pass on that one.

And do I need to remind you that the overwhelming majority of American police officers are Republicans? This is exactly the kind of shit they want.

[Fumesucker]

11. The Democrats are no better on the drug war..

It's not letting the cops off the hook to point out that their bosses, the people who write the rules the cops enforce, are enthusiastic drug warriors.

Joe Biden is the genius who came up with the idea of a Drug Czar.

[Downtown Hound]

12. Never said the Democrats were any better on the drug war

I'm just saying that I refuse to give police themselves a blank pass simply because they're enforcing the law. They chose to be cops, they chose to enforce the law, right or wrong. Being a cop isn't like working at McDonald's. You don't do it because you have no other choice. To become a cop, you have to train, learn, and allow yourself to be subjected to intense background checks, tasered, pepper sprayed, and hooked up to a lie detector and admit every wrong you've ever done in your life. You don't take a job like that unless you really want to do it.

[tblue37]

17. I wish we could fight the scourge of law enforcement--since it never actually does

anything about the real criminals and merely terrorizes those whom Leona Helmsley called "the little people."

[Dawson Leery]

23. +1

[truedelphi]

7. But you know the problem with marijuana legalization -

We'd have a sub group of users who were sleepy, happy and continually in "Munchies" Mode.

Whereas with the drug's continued illegalization, we have these pointless, harmful raids, and also overcrowded prisons, deficits to the state for employing these police, and of course, corruption at all levels.

The billions of dollars of assets that get seized each year are passed on to politicians to help them stay convinced that drugs need to stay illegal. (The movie "Brooklyn's Finest" makes this point.)

It is hard for many elected officials to come out for making drugs legal, when the seizure assets have given them a $ 100K remodel of their formerly drab little office.

Also District Attorneys love to have large staffs - and when we finally get drugs made legal, the cost savings of cutting back their precious personnel will probably bring many of these people to tears.

[DemoTex]

8. Honor graduates of the Sarah Palin School of Contrition

More "collateral damage" in the never-ending War on Drugs.

[Matariki]

9. "The cops also threatened to shoot the family dogs"

Why do they do that? Punishment? Intimidation? General sadism?

[Downtown Hound]

10. The dogs were probably barking

Dogs have a tendency to do that when armed men come in and threaten the master and his family with guns. But try explaining that to police. They simply see them as unruly and dangerous dogs resisting their rightful authority.

[NOLALady]

15. Poodles can be quite frightening to LEOS.

[spanone]

13. will american politicians EVER get over their reefer madness?

40 yeas ago i thought it would happen by now, now i'm not sure it ever will

[Fumesucker]

14. No, it's no closer now than it was forty years ago..

Further away in some respects I think..

[cbc5g]

16. END THE DEA

It's tyrannical, like the DHS

[mike_c]

18. pigs....

eom

[TorchTheWitch]

19. a public apology doesn't mean there wasn't also a private one

I'm not sure why you're making that assumption.

[upi402]

20. True. and...

they could just go ahead and take responsibility more directly. They get the damn address/location wrong far too often. I don't want to see it even one more time.

[Warren DeMontague]

21. It's absolutely fucking ridiculous that pot isn't legal, regulated, and taxed.

The DEA gets $40 Billion a year to "fight" it. It's about the stupid fucking gravy train, pure and simple.

End the Drug War. Now.

[Dawson Leery]

22. Streetwalkers have more honor than ANY DEA agent!