I received a response to my recent blog post on the Department of Education serving a warrant and dragging Kenneth Wright of Stockton, California from his home at six in the morning (incident added to the Raidmap, and here’s an updated link to the story). Here is the word from Department of Education Press Secretary Justin Hamilton:

“Yesterday, the Depart of Education’s office of inspector general executed a search warrant at Stockton California residence with the presence of local law enforcement authorities.

While it was reported in local media that the search was related to a defaulted student loan, that is incorrect. This is related to a criminal investigation. The Inspector General’s Office does not execute search warrants for late loan payments.

Because this is an ongoing criminal investigation, we can’t comment on the specifics of the case. We can say that the OIG’s office conducts about 30-35 search warrants a year on issues such as bribery, fraud, and embezzlement of federal student aid funds.

All further questions on this issue should be directed to the Department of Education’s Inspector General’s Office.”

This does not change my analysis one bit. The Department of Education doesn’t need a squad of “operators” busting down doors in white collar crime cases.

Search warrants issued pursuant to an investigation of bribery, fraud or embezzlement shouldn’t require door breaching at dawn unless there’s some exigent circumstances justification. Did the agents think that Kenneth Wright was going to resist the warrant service with deadly weapons, or destroy evidence? If so, say so. At least it would provide some evidence of surveillance prior to the raid or actual investigation. Investigation or surveillance might have revealed that the target of the warrant, Wright’s estranged wife, would not be home when agents came knocking.

Some gunbloggers wondered a while back about a federal website soliciting contracts to provide short-barreled shotguns for the Department of Education (H/T Uncle and Tam). Now we know what they’re intended for, and it’s incompatible with a free society.

When Cops Go Commando, It’s No Laughing Matter is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Department of Education officers employed a SWAT team because of unpaid student loans. I am not making this up:

Kenneth Wright does not have a criminal record and he had no reason to believe a S.W.A.T team would be breaking down his door at 6 a.m. on Tuesday…

As it turned out, the person law enforcement was looking for was not there – Wright’s estranged wife.

“They put me in handcuffs in that hot patrol car for six hours, traumatizing my kids,” Wright said.

Wright said he later went to the mayor and Stockton Police Department, but the City of Stockton had nothing to do with Wright’s search warrant.

The U.S. Department of Education issued the search and called in the S.W.A.T for his wife’s defaulted student loans.

This, along with the Jose Guerena case, demonstrates how the militarization of police terminology and tactics is incompatible with a free society. Police officers aren’t “operators” like Green Berets or Navy SEALs.

This is just one more reason to abolish the Department of Education and oppose police militarization and federal overcriminalization.

Department of Education SWAT Raid for Unpaid Student Loans is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Bad enough that people get arrested and jailed for drug offenses, but the proliferation of SWAT teams and the tactic of breaking into homes, especially during the night, is reckless.  In this case, the break-in did not lead to any shooting, but as the 68-year old suspect was lying on the ground, complying with all the police commands, he was accidently shot and killed.

FRAMINGHAM, Mass.—A Framingham police officer who shot and killed a 68-year-old man during an early morning drug raid will not face criminal charges.

Prosecutors say the shooting was an accident and Duncan’s actions “do not rise to the level of criminal conduct.”

But attorneys for the family of Eurie Stamps said Wednesday that they will launch a civil rights investigation because the shooting was unjustifiable, his rights were violated and those responsible must be held accountable for his death.

Authorities say Duncan lost his balance while preparing to handcuff Stamps after members of the SWAT team stormed the Fountain Street home just after midnight on Jan. 5.

The Middlesex district attorney’s office says officer Paul Duncan stumbled and accidentally fired his rifle, hitting Stamps as he lay on the floor on his stomach with his hands up.

More here.

Another Life Taken is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

The Baltimore police must have solved the city’s violent crime problem. They’ve shifted resources to illegal gambling:

Baltimore County police arrested five men after an undercover detective infiltrated an illegal high-stakes poker game in Edgemere, records show.

Police say “Texas Hold ‘Em” games were held regularly at the Lynch Point Social Club in the 3100 block of Roger Road, where organizers were making as much as $1,500 in profit a night, according to charging documents.

After receiving a tip, officers conducted surveillance at the club and later sent an undercover detective inside, who participated in a game with a $65 buy-in. The detective played for hours — leaving after he lost all his chips, records show.

A tactical unit conducted a raid on the club Feb. 11, seizing poker chips, electronic gambling machines and a surveillance system, among other items. Forty-one people were inside at the time of the raid.

Posted at the Raidmap, where you can find similar “isolated incidents.” A December gambling raid in South Carolina turned into a gun fight when poker players mistook a SWAT team for armed robbers. The family of Sal Culosi, the Virginia optometrist killed in a 2006 gambling raid, just settled its lawsuit against Fairfax County for $2 million. Radley Balko has more on that tragedy here.

Gambling Raid in Baltimore is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Last year the Prince George’s County Sheriff’s Department SWAT Team raided the home of Berwyn Heights, Maryland Mayor Cheye Calvo. Police officers on the case knew that dealers were sending packages to random addresses so that accomplices in delivery companies could pick them up. The officers didn’t take the drugs out of circulation at the warehouse when they intercepted them. They simply sent them to the bogus address and raided it. The investigating officers did this without checking with local law enforcement officials, who probably would have told them that the mayor wasn’t a drug dealer and that they were barking up the wrong tree. The SWAT team shot and killed Mayor Calvo’s two dogs and caused significant property damage to his home before they got around to figuring out his (nonexistent) role in narcotics trafficking.

The Sheriff’s Office just cleared its deputies of any wrongdoing.

Radley Balko has a post up at Reason. His Cato study, Overkill: The Rise of Paramilitary Police Raids in America, shows that this is not an isolated incident. Check out the raidmap for more detail.

Mayor Calvo spoke at a Cato event in the wake of the raid, “Should No-Knock Police Raids be Rare-or Routine?” He tells his story below:

No Wrongdoing in the Calvo Raid? is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog