Dorothy Brackett didn't know what was happening May 21 when she heard screaming and banging on the other side of her apartment's thin wall.
But the Columbia woman, in her late 50s, said what happened next nearly killed her.
While standing in the kitchen of her apartment on Demaret Drive, an armed law enforcement officer swung open her unlocked back door. Brackett said she did her best to comply with his demands, but she was so terrified she couldn't move.
"He asked me to get down, but I told him I couldn't because I needed assistance," said Brackett, who has health problems. "I was scared. I messed myself. ... I have bad asthma. I nearly had an attack."
The Special Weapons and Tactics officer with the Federal Bureau of Investigations was not after Brackett but instead was monitoring her neighbor's apartment for a Columbia man suspected of firearms violations. The FBI had obtained a warrant to search Apt. A during an investigation of Gary D. Gibson, 25, who lives at 461 Broadview Court.
It's unclear whether the FBI also had permission to search Apt. B, where Brackett lives. The FBI's warrant, obtained through the U.S. Western District Court of Missouri, has not been returned by investigators, meaning the initial request, any evidence collected at the scene or subsequent arrests are not public record.
The entry appears to have been a mistake, though. FBI officers even offered Brackett and her teenage grandchild, who was downstairs at the time, a couple of McDonald's cheeseburgers served to officers on the scene as a sort of peace offering.
"I don't think he meant to scare us," Brackett said. "It's all very embarrassing."
Mistake or not, the incident has had lasting effects. She said she has trouble sleeping, worrying that SWAT officers will return. She's hesitant to file a complaint with the FBI, though, because "we need them at times," she said. "They protect us."
Columbia police also searched Apt. A after the FBI tipped the department off that they found several grams of marijuana and a crack pipe inside that residence. The Columbia search warrant lists Todd Casey as the special agent in charge of the FBI operation. Casey referred the Tribune to an FBI spokewoman, who did not return Tribune phone calls.
According to Columbia police records, Gibson was arrested on suspicion of possession of a controlled substance, and Jaimie D. Wright, 32, of Apt. A was arrested on suspicion of possession of a misdemeanor amount of marijuana.
SWAT team entries can be messy, Paul Howe of Combat Shooting and Tactics, a training institute, wrote in an article earlier this year.
"If we push a fight involving violent criminals" into a "tight apartment complex, with an individual who will probably fight to the death and has the weapons at his disposal, we are responsible for some of the possible negative outcomes," Howe wrote. "In this environment, where the walls are made of drywall and wood, we risk endangering all the other tenants unnecessarily. If innocents are injured during the ensuing raid and gun battle, we are partly to blame. We need to be smarter than this."
The balance between police protection and police aggression has come to the forefront in Columbia as the department deals with the fallout of a controversial SWAT raid at a Columbia home in February. One group, CoMoCitizens, wants the police department to stop using SWAT teams' so-called dynamic entries when executing any search warrant that does not involve a victim.
That's difficult to promise, Chief Ken Burton told the group last week. When officers knock politely at the home of a suspected drug dealer, they don't know what's behind the door. He pointed to one case in which a violent drug offender shot an officer who simply knocked.
■
SWAT teams are used for the execution of all high-risk search warrants, police spokeswoman Officer Jessie Haden said. Because drug dealers are commonly associated with and have access to weapons and ammunition, all narcotics search warrants are considered high risk.
But Burton has acknowledged mistakes in the Feb. 11 raid on Jonathan Whitworth's home in southwest Columbia that resulted in the death of a family dog. He has recently implemented changes to fix those errors.
Now, police policies require a target location be kept under surveillance at all times, something that did not happen in Whitworth's case. If surveillance is interrupted or compromised for any reason, the search warrant might not be authorized or might be changed to reflect the manner it can be served.
"In my experience, if we ever had surveillance on a place, we always did better," said Deputy Police Chief Tom Dresner, a former SWAT commander. "It is a really sound policy for us to act immediately on intelligence."
And if there are children around – which was the case in the Whitworth raid – police won't use dynamic entries unless it's an extreme circumstance.
Mainly, Burton said, police need to execute search warrants within a reasonable amount of time, typically eight hours.
That has not always been the case over the past several years.
Columbia's SWAT team served 106 narcotics search warrants between Jan. 1, 2007, and May 11, 2010. The Tribune, through an open records request, received 99 of those search warrants; the others were considered closed records for various reasons.
Of the 99 SWAT narcotics search warrants granted by the Boone County Circuit Court to Columbia police, officers executed 43 percent of them within hours of being issued. Of those, 65 percent resulted in one felony arrest, and 18 percent resulted in misdemeanor arrests.
But the percentage of warrants producing a felony arrest dropped drastically to 37.5 percent when investigators waited one day before serving the search warrant. In those cases, 50 percent produced misdemeanor arrests.
"This does not surprise me," Dresner said. "I think the nature of drug sales is that it is a very immediate transaction. For consumers and dealers, once there is a product available, it travels fast, and sales occur very quickly."
Although the number of felony arrests dropped when search warrants were executed one day after they were issued, warrants appeared more successful on subsequent days. Sixty percent of search warrants executed between one and four days led to felony arrests, and 56 percent served between five and nine days led to felonies.
"The only thing you can say is that they either have not moved the narcotic during that length of time, or they have resupplied," Dresner said. "Maybe we luck into a resupply day."
Missouri gives law enforcement agencies 10 days to serve a search warrant, but Columbia police narcotics investigators never used the full allotment of time during the 40-month sample period. In one case, officers did wait nine days, and that search warrant led to misdemeanor charges.
■
Burton has repeatedly said he thinks Columbia's municipal laws dealing with marijuana are confusing.
In November 2004, Columbia voters approved a measure that made marijuana enforcement "the lowest law enforcement priority." It also said small amounts of marijuana should be misdemeanor violations with a maximum fine of $250 and no arrest.
Burton told CoMoCitizens members that the ordinance doesn't mean officers should turn a blind eye to a substance still considered illegal. Instead, he interprets it to mean an officer should not let a misdemeanor marijuana offense take priority over other crimes that need his attention.
Most narcotics investigations and SWAT raids in Columbia since 2007, though, have been related to marijuana offenses. Of the 99 search warrants the Tribune reviewed, 44 were issued for marijuana, 39 for ******* and eight for a combination.
"There is a lot less ******* or crack *******, period," Dresner said. "It's just so much more expensive and in much smaller amounts."
One problem, Burton said, is that police work is complaint-driven, so if a neighbor reports drug activity nearby, police respond.
"It could be marijuana, it could be ******* or ******," he said. "We don't know until we're well into the investigation."
The fact that Whitworth's pit bull was shot in pursuit of what turned out to be a small amount of pot riled pet owners across the country. It was not the first time Columbia police shot and killed dogs during narcotics raids, though. The cases the Tribune reviewed included two other incidents of shots fired during SWAT narcotics raids, and those both resulted in the deaths of pit bulls in 2008.
In March 2008, investigators were looking for, and found, large quantities of marijuana when they raided Jonathan R. March's duplex on Nikki Way. While seizing three pounds of marijuana, scales and firearms during the raid, officers encountered, then shot and killed, what they deemed an aggressive pit bull.
March's attorney, Dan Viets, advised his client not to comment because of an upcoming sentencing hearing on the incident.
The second incident occurred in December, when SWAT officers performed a dynamic entry on North Garth Avenue. In that case, a loose pit bull was shot and killed during entry into the residence where Barry Lawson, 40, was arrested on suspicion of possession of a handgun and *******. Charges eventually were dropped, and court records indicate the warrant to search his property, along with a probable cause statement, are sealed. Internal affairs investigations into both incidents found officers acted appropriately.
As of May 11, Columbia police have issued 10 narcotics search warrants this year, compared to 38 issued in 2008. In 2009, the city's police budget allocated $43,373 for SWAT efforts. Of that, about $21,600 was spent on vests and $3,720 on travel and training.
This year, the SWAT budget is down to $23,664 with $4,645 spent on traveling and training.
NewsHawk: Ganjarden: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: The Columbia Daily Tribune
Author: Brennan David
Copyright: 2010 The Columbia Daily Tribune
* Thanks to MedicalNeed for submitting this article
But the Columbia woman, in her late 50s, said what happened next nearly killed her.
While standing in the kitchen of her apartment on Demaret Drive, an armed law enforcement officer swung open her unlocked back door. Brackett said she did her best to comply with his demands, but she was so terrified she couldn't move.
"He asked me to get down, but I told him I couldn't because I needed assistance," said Brackett, who has health problems. "I was scared. I messed myself. ... I have bad asthma. I nearly had an attack."
The Special Weapons and Tactics officer with the Federal Bureau of Investigations was not after Brackett but instead was monitoring her neighbor's apartment for a Columbia man suspected of firearms violations. The FBI had obtained a warrant to search Apt. A during an investigation of Gary D. Gibson, 25, who lives at 461 Broadview Court.
It's unclear whether the FBI also had permission to search Apt. B, where Brackett lives. The FBI's warrant, obtained through the U.S. Western District Court of Missouri, has not been returned by investigators, meaning the initial request, any evidence collected at the scene or subsequent arrests are not public record.
The entry appears to have been a mistake, though. FBI officers even offered Brackett and her teenage grandchild, who was downstairs at the time, a couple of McDonald's cheeseburgers served to officers on the scene as a sort of peace offering.
"I don't think he meant to scare us," Brackett said. "It's all very embarrassing."
Mistake or not, the incident has had lasting effects. She said she has trouble sleeping, worrying that SWAT officers will return. She's hesitant to file a complaint with the FBI, though, because "we need them at times," she said. "They protect us."
Columbia police also searched Apt. A after the FBI tipped the department off that they found several grams of marijuana and a crack pipe inside that residence. The Columbia search warrant lists Todd Casey as the special agent in charge of the FBI operation. Casey referred the Tribune to an FBI spokewoman, who did not return Tribune phone calls.
According to Columbia police records, Gibson was arrested on suspicion of possession of a controlled substance, and Jaimie D. Wright, 32, of Apt. A was arrested on suspicion of possession of a misdemeanor amount of marijuana.
SWAT team entries can be messy, Paul Howe of Combat Shooting and Tactics, a training institute, wrote in an article earlier this year.
"If we push a fight involving violent criminals" into a "tight apartment complex, with an individual who will probably fight to the death and has the weapons at his disposal, we are responsible for some of the possible negative outcomes," Howe wrote. "In this environment, where the walls are made of drywall and wood, we risk endangering all the other tenants unnecessarily. If innocents are injured during the ensuing raid and gun battle, we are partly to blame. We need to be smarter than this."
The balance between police protection and police aggression has come to the forefront in Columbia as the department deals with the fallout of a controversial SWAT raid at a Columbia home in February. One group, CoMoCitizens, wants the police department to stop using SWAT teams' so-called dynamic entries when executing any search warrant that does not involve a victim.
That's difficult to promise, Chief Ken Burton told the group last week. When officers knock politely at the home of a suspected drug dealer, they don't know what's behind the door. He pointed to one case in which a violent drug offender shot an officer who simply knocked.
■
SWAT teams are used for the execution of all high-risk search warrants, police spokeswoman Officer Jessie Haden said. Because drug dealers are commonly associated with and have access to weapons and ammunition, all narcotics search warrants are considered high risk.
But Burton has acknowledged mistakes in the Feb. 11 raid on Jonathan Whitworth's home in southwest Columbia that resulted in the death of a family dog. He has recently implemented changes to fix those errors.
Now, police policies require a target location be kept under surveillance at all times, something that did not happen in Whitworth's case. If surveillance is interrupted or compromised for any reason, the search warrant might not be authorized or might be changed to reflect the manner it can be served.
"In my experience, if we ever had surveillance on a place, we always did better," said Deputy Police Chief Tom Dresner, a former SWAT commander. "It is a really sound policy for us to act immediately on intelligence."
And if there are children around – which was the case in the Whitworth raid – police won't use dynamic entries unless it's an extreme circumstance.
Mainly, Burton said, police need to execute search warrants within a reasonable amount of time, typically eight hours.
That has not always been the case over the past several years.
Columbia's SWAT team served 106 narcotics search warrants between Jan. 1, 2007, and May 11, 2010. The Tribune, through an open records request, received 99 of those search warrants; the others were considered closed records for various reasons.
Of the 99 SWAT narcotics search warrants granted by the Boone County Circuit Court to Columbia police, officers executed 43 percent of them within hours of being issued. Of those, 65 percent resulted in one felony arrest, and 18 percent resulted in misdemeanor arrests.
But the percentage of warrants producing a felony arrest dropped drastically to 37.5 percent when investigators waited one day before serving the search warrant. In those cases, 50 percent produced misdemeanor arrests.
"This does not surprise me," Dresner said. "I think the nature of drug sales is that it is a very immediate transaction. For consumers and dealers, once there is a product available, it travels fast, and sales occur very quickly."
Although the number of felony arrests dropped when search warrants were executed one day after they were issued, warrants appeared more successful on subsequent days. Sixty percent of search warrants executed between one and four days led to felony arrests, and 56 percent served between five and nine days led to felonies.
"The only thing you can say is that they either have not moved the narcotic during that length of time, or they have resupplied," Dresner said. "Maybe we luck into a resupply day."
Missouri gives law enforcement agencies 10 days to serve a search warrant, but Columbia police narcotics investigators never used the full allotment of time during the 40-month sample period. In one case, officers did wait nine days, and that search warrant led to misdemeanor charges.
■
Burton has repeatedly said he thinks Columbia's municipal laws dealing with marijuana are confusing.
In November 2004, Columbia voters approved a measure that made marijuana enforcement "the lowest law enforcement priority." It also said small amounts of marijuana should be misdemeanor violations with a maximum fine of $250 and no arrest.
Burton told CoMoCitizens members that the ordinance doesn't mean officers should turn a blind eye to a substance still considered illegal. Instead, he interprets it to mean an officer should not let a misdemeanor marijuana offense take priority over other crimes that need his attention.
Most narcotics investigations and SWAT raids in Columbia since 2007, though, have been related to marijuana offenses. Of the 99 search warrants the Tribune reviewed, 44 were issued for marijuana, 39 for ******* and eight for a combination.
"There is a lot less ******* or crack *******, period," Dresner said. "It's just so much more expensive and in much smaller amounts."
One problem, Burton said, is that police work is complaint-driven, so if a neighbor reports drug activity nearby, police respond.
"It could be marijuana, it could be ******* or ******," he said. "We don't know until we're well into the investigation."
The fact that Whitworth's pit bull was shot in pursuit of what turned out to be a small amount of pot riled pet owners across the country. It was not the first time Columbia police shot and killed dogs during narcotics raids, though. The cases the Tribune reviewed included two other incidents of shots fired during SWAT narcotics raids, and those both resulted in the deaths of pit bulls in 2008.
In March 2008, investigators were looking for, and found, large quantities of marijuana when they raided Jonathan R. March's duplex on Nikki Way. While seizing three pounds of marijuana, scales and firearms during the raid, officers encountered, then shot and killed, what they deemed an aggressive pit bull.
March's attorney, Dan Viets, advised his client not to comment because of an upcoming sentencing hearing on the incident.
The second incident occurred in December, when SWAT officers performed a dynamic entry on North Garth Avenue. In that case, a loose pit bull was shot and killed during entry into the residence where Barry Lawson, 40, was arrested on suspicion of possession of a handgun and *******. Charges eventually were dropped, and court records indicate the warrant to search his property, along with a probable cause statement, are sealed. Internal affairs investigations into both incidents found officers acted appropriately.
As of May 11, Columbia police have issued 10 narcotics search warrants this year, compared to 38 issued in 2008. In 2009, the city's police budget allocated $43,373 for SWAT efforts. Of that, about $21,600 was spent on vests and $3,720 on travel and training.
This year, the SWAT budget is down to $23,664 with $4,645 spent on traveling and training.
NewsHawk: Ganjarden: 420 MAGAZINE
Source: The Columbia Daily Tribune
Author: Brennan David
Copyright: 2010 The Columbia Daily Tribune
* Thanks to MedicalNeed for submitting this article
