Do you suppose the wingnuts are thankful for anything? Ace of Spades – we’re thankful Robert Altman is dead.Althouse – I’m thankful for rechargeable batteries.American Thinker – we’re thankful that people in Baghdad get 4 to 8 hours of electricity…

So far, the evidence concerning the reputation of the elderly lady (20 years older–which does make a difference in physical functioning) doesn’t seem similar to this guy’s story to me.

By the way, I started out as a prosecutor 26 years ago. Things like the following started coming out of my mouth, before the facts were all in, too:

“May God forgive this old lady for firing on 3 cops who were, from all available information, just doing their jobs.

Because of her actions in firing on officers, she’s now getting to find out whether that forgiveness is available.”

I quit before I became even more confused and started believing that prosecutors were supposed to be on the side of the police rather than on the side of justice.

Just recognize the costs and benefits of both sides. Preventing dynamic entries will mean the end of effective search warrants in drug cases, as drugs will always be disposed of. Do you want to end undercover buys too?

I want the INSANE War on Some Drugs ended. End the war, and end the dynamic entries and undercover buys.

What a lot of people seem to want is that door-breakers be seen as Officer Friendly. If Officer Friendly, with a heart of gold filled with the milk of human kindness and genuine concern with my welfare, breaks down my door, I can be expected to offer him a toke and congratulate him on his clever contrivance in catching me out. That’s what Patterico wants “dynamic entry” to mean.

But regardless of mealy-mouthed platitudes, breaking down doors is not a friendly act and cannot be construed as one. Not by the victims, and not by the perpetrators, either — as you will find if you ever get to overhear cops discussing it among themselves. All you get from trying to have it both ways is is to lose either form of authority. Pick one and stand by it, and you may or may not succeed. Dithering never gets anywhere.

Regards,
Ric

seriously, i find your argument interesting and also agree that age is a red herring here.

since it is the legislature that creates the laws that carry with them a mandate to enforce, and the police who determine the method of enforcement, it does not seem illogical to hold those institutions to account. By the time the individuals cops have their mission and are massed outside a citizens’ door, the whole process is well nigh rolling along, from the underlying laws to the warrants to the concussion grenades, helmets and flak jackets.

My comment may be convoluted but my point is that anything view of the mechanism leading to cop and citizen deaths such as the one in atlanta has to zoom out to an institutional level, or it is pointless. human error must also be built into any view of the system – where human error results in death and terror there can be no shrugging it off as error. For example, the good faith exception permitting warrantless no-knock (or other) entry is a travesty, albeit a practical one, in that it elevates the governmental interest behind a grevious error above the rights of the citizen without regard to guilt or innocence. Hello…? That is wrong.

All of this should go into any calculus regarding drug laws – then we can talk about Ric’s first stipulation and the meaning of “best interests of the community”.

STIPULATED: Having and enforcing laws against the use of and trade in recreational pharmaceuticals is in the best interest of the community.

STIPULATED: The police officers in the Johnston case were honest, diligent, and brave, acting in the best interests of the community as they understood it.

STIPULATED: The actions of the police officers in the Johnston case were fully in compliance with all laws, regulations, and valid directives of the United States, Georgia, and the County and municipality in which they occurred, and of the Department(s) they were member(s) of.

STIPULATED: Age does not inevitably confer wisdom, sagacity, good judgement, or a desire to conform to Law or community standards, nor is the converse true. A grandmotherly little old lady may be a criminal, just as a jive-talking youth in baggy trousers may be a brave and cooperative member of the community.

Note that I don’t fully agree with all of that, but those points are irrelevant to what makes this case resonate, and it is well to eliminate their use as red herrings to redirect the discussion along unproductive lines.

Simply put: it is time and past for the police to shit or get off the pot — to decide, once and for all, whether to be Dzerzhinsky (”The police are to be feared; obey them or they’ll hurt you”) or Officer Friendly (”The police are to be respected; obey them, because they have your best interests at heart.”) I admit to a preference, but that, too, is irrelevant. Given proper effort, either method can work, for large enough values of “effort” and small enough values of “work”. But the two are utterly antithetical, and in either case the concomitants and side effects of whichever one is chosen will simply have to be coped with. If shooting people is a reasonable tactic, the possibility that they will shoot back has to be lived with.

No-knock raids are pure Iron Felix, and trying to justify them with Officer Friendly arguments (including the vapid “dynamic entry”, buzzwordism at its worst) discredits both approaches. You wind up with the worst of both worlds — too wimpy and indecisive to be feared, too violent and arbitrary to be respected. Which is, in fact, exactly where you are now, and shooting Mrs. Johnston illuminates that like harnessing the Sun to a spotlight.

Regards,
Ric

Do you want to end undercover buys too? Those are very, very dangerous. — P]

how is it legal for police to buy illegal drugs but we are not legally allowed to do so? why are police allowed to break the law, to enforce the law?

Preventing dynamic entries will mean the end of effective search warrants in drug cases, as drugs will always be disposed of.

Maybe, but aren’t there some policies that would mitigate the potential harm, without rendering drug warrants useless? I don’t know, maybe requiring the no-knock to be served in the daytime.(Out of curiosity, have there been any studies done on how often drug evidence is destroyed following a search warrant announcement?)

Do you want to end undercover buys too? Those are very, very dangerous.

I agree, and I might. I don’t have any sort of idea on the percentage of cops who die in undercover buy-related incidents or the percentage of evidence/arrests which come from undercover buys.