SWAT-team style “no knock” raids on individuals, especially for drug use, are becoming more common, often with deadly consequences. Innocent people are killed because they go for their guns or baseball bats when rudely awakened by masked, heavily armed men. Other victims die of heart attacks.
Sometimes the police raid the wrong home. When Manhattan city officials started a hotline for victims of such mistakes, it received over 100 calls in the first week.
Prosecutors rarely go after the law enforcers, who are protected by sovereign immunity. Instead, they prosecute and convict victims who have tried to defend themselves, thinking that they were being attacked by a gang instead of police. We are no longer safe in our own homes.
When we permit, even encourage, our law enforcers to violate the Good Neighbor Policy for our benefit, we should not be surprised that they increasingly adopt aggression as their means. Indeed, aggression may eventually be all that they know.
