We’ve told the story of drug war canicide – dog murder – before here on the Stash. From the LAPD dog killing during dispensary raids to the Buffalo man who pleaded with cops to let him put his beloved pets in another room before cops gunned them down, and even the mayor of a town in Maryland forced to sit handcuffed near a pool of his slaughtered black labs’ blood during a SWAT raid that turned out to be in error.
Don't be scared, Roscoe, I'll protect you from cop canicide!
This incident in Missouri happened in February and is just one of the 100-150 militaristic raids on homes every day in America, most often to serve narcotics warrants, which usually means marijuana, the substance involved in almost half of all drug arrests. But never before have we brought you actual video of law enforcement protecting us from adults smoking a bowl in their own home and serving us by executing family pets in front of small children.
(Warning: if you love your dog as much as I love Roscoe P. Coltrane, my Jack Russell terrier, scratch its belly and get to your serenity place before you view this. It is very disturbing.)
If you notice toward the end of the video you can see what appears to be a small bong on the coffee table. The Columbia, Missouri SWAT team sure took down a big-time drug kingpin while he slept peacefully with his wife and seven-year-old child, huh?
(Columbia Daily-Tribune) Police discovered a grinder, a pipe and a small amount of marijuana, Haden said. Because the SWAT team acts on the most updated information available, the team wanted to enter the house before marijuana believed to be at the location could be distributed, she said.
“If you let too much time go by, then the drugs are not there,” she said.
Drug distributors traditionally have a history with firearms, which is why the SWAT team is used when executing such warrants, [police spokeswoman Officer Jessie] Haden said. If the SWAT team believed they could have executed the warrant successfully during the daytime when the wife and child were not present, they would have, she said.
Well, the “drugs” weren’t there, now, were they? But let’s pretend they were. Let’s say the man was holding enough marijuana to qualify for a felony charge in Missouri (over 35 grams). Are we to understand that holding any more than an ounce and a quarter in Missouri is justification enough to send SWAT to burst into a man’s home late at night and start firing weapons and slaughtering his pets and terrorizing his wife and children?
A Welsh Corgi - the most feared ankle-biting vicious canine the Missouri SWAT have ever seen!
And what exactly is it that made the SWAT team believe it couldn’t execute a successful warrant in the daytime? The presence of his pit bull and corgi (yes, these cops shot a corgi) or that his wife and child would be away so he wouldn’t mind going down guns blazing to protect his lucrative marijuana empire? And if he had enough pot to have a lucrative marijuana empire worth shooting cops over, how exactly did he manage to get rid of it all in the few hours between daytime and that night?
No, folks, the justification is simple: shock and awe. These cops are taught that “druggies” are dangerous armed hostile mentally deranged lunatics who all emulate Tony Montana from Scarface. Then they are taught how to dominate and intimidate and that one of the quickest ways you can do so is to show them you have the power of life and death. And they do this as a message to all the other “druggies” out there that they are not safe and that they are serious about engaging the “enemy” and winning the “war”.
Radley Balko at Reason’s Hit and Run (a top libertarian blog) has been following the story and promises an update from the victim’s mother, who was present at the raid. Jane Hamsher at FireDogLake (a top progressive blog which has recently begun a new campaign for legalization), Scott Morgan at Drug War Chronicle, and Pete Guither at DrugWarRant have also been following the story.
In the end the victim pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor charge of possession of drug paraphernalia in exchange for dropping the charges of misdemeanor marijuana possession and second-degree child endangerment. Yes, you read that right: the police burst into this man’s home, shooting weapons in his home and killing his dog with his seven-year-old sleeping in the next room and he’s the one who was endangering his child by smoking pot in his own home.
P.S. You’d think the ASPCA or PETA would be all over this, wouldn’t you? I did, but found no reference to any police-shooting-dog stories on either of their websites. I once got in contact with people in their organizations but got no interest from them on addressing these clear cases of cruel and unethical treatment of animals. I even tried contacting Bill Maher, a high-profile PETA supporter and marijuana legalization supporter to spotlight the topic, but I’ve never received any response. None of these animal rights supporters seem to think a family pet has a right to be protected from police brutality if the owner is thought to be a “druggie”.
P.P.S. Paul Armentano reminds me that in 2004, seven in ten Columbia, Missouri residents voted for the “arrest, prosecution, punishment, or sanction” citizens for their medical use of marijuana, and six in ten voted for the decriminalization of marijuana for personal use. So the dog was murdered and the family terrorized over something only 30%-40% of residents believe is a crime.
[...] any help from the National Rifle Association. They’ll be as receptive to getting involved as PETA was when the Missouri cops were shooting a man’s pet dog in his home during a raid. Left or right, liberal or conservative, from the NRA to PETA your [...]
[...] armor and flash bang grenades, the tear gas and automatic weapons pointed at 13 year old girls, shooting dogs and hand cuffing people and having them sit in their dog’s blood while they interrogate them [...]
[...] There’s also a blog entry on norml.org about this case. [...]