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This would be much more interesting as a heatmap normalized for population and/or crime. As is, it's hard to read anything much into it, as many of the points are too tightly clustered (NY & Chicago) to tell if there is actually any significant difference between the failed raid rates of the different population centers.
The point is that paramilitary police teams are not harmless. These soldiers are being deployed to serve basic search-and-arrest warrants; their use is not limited to emergencies or to suspects that are believed to be heavily armed (if there were so many suspects so heavily armed, our cities would literally be war zones). The real question is this: are paramilitary police teams actually necessary in the tens of thousands of raids they conduct each year?
From the article:
From the graph they present, I cannot determine a pattern. That has nothing to do with the necessity of the raids.
Read the opinion: http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vo...
The court found that a single "knock-and-announce" violation (not waiting 10 to 20 seconds in this case) wasn't enough to disqualify evidence that was found in the hours following, during the execution of the search warrant. What Kennedy meant was that if this wasn't an isolated incident and was in-fact becoming a common side effect of police procedure, then the legal system would have to start reevaluating how strict it will be with such violations.
Relevant paragraphs:
Today's decision does not address any demonstrated pattern of knock-and-announce violations. If a widespread pattern of violations were shown, and particularly if those violations were committed against persons who lacked the means or voice to mount an effective protest, there would be reason for grave concern. Even then, however, the Court would have to acknowledge that extending the remedy of exclusion to all the evidence seized following a knock-and-announce violation would mean revising the requirement of causation that limits our discretion in applying the exclusionary rule. That type of extension also would have significant practical implications, adding to the list of issues requiring resolution at the criminal trial questions such as whether police officers entered a home after waiting 10 seconds or 20.
In this case the relevant evidence was discovered not because of a failure to knock-and-announce, but because of a subsequent search pursuant to a lawful warrant. The Court in my view is correct to hold that suppression was not required. While I am not convinced that Segura v. United States, 468 U. S. 796 (1984), and New York v. Harris, 495 U. S. 14 (1990), have as much relevance here as Justice Scalia appears to conclude, the Court's holding is fully supported by Parts I through III of its opinion. I accordingly join those Parts and concur in the judgment.
Do you read the news? Parts of Chicago are basically war zones. That is why it is the most violent city in the US. The big gang wars are out of control. Every weekend I see how many new people were killed in the violence here. Really sad that this isn't a solved problem in such an otherwise beautiful city. (Disclaimer: I live in a nicer part of Chicago)
they truly need a system like NYC's stop and frisk. Unfortunately that is threatened regardless of the good it has shown to do by misguided rights activists. Chicago is a great example of PC gone wrong. The main beneficiaries have been minorities and those who live in the "war zones".
The means to fix Chicago's problem is available, however it requires a mayor with strength of character more concerned for the people than himself.
Unfortunately, the paper the map is based on costs ten dollars[1], which seems odd for a paper from a think tank.
Apparently, Cato sells a lot of books/papers[2]. Is that a common practice for think tanks (I have no idea)?
[1] http://store.cato.org/reports/overkill-rise-paramilitary-pol... [2]http://store.cato.org/books
I wonder if anyone is doing something similar for the UK?
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Jean_Charles_de_Menez...)
Including information for Northern Ireland would be problematic.
Armed raids are comparatively rare in the UK, and when they do take place, they are far less spectacular than in the US.
Be fair, we in the UK don't have the gun issues the US has. Raiding a property here isn't as much of a risk. Probably the same across Europe. The trick for us is to keep it that way. To try to be kind to US law enforcement, I suspect that part of the reason they like to be so spectacular, is an attempt at a deterrent.
Imagine the dumbest, most brutish cunt you knew in high school. After he failed at life for half a decade, he became a cop. I think that that has more to do with it.
That honestly isnt my impression of any Brit police office I have dealt with. Granted they do like their power, but generally, I have found them to be mostly OK. High on the power, jobs worth, arrogant, yes, but not that dumb and/or brutish. That said, I have not been under any sort of crowd or riot control. So, possible they roll out the big dumb heavy wing of the police force there.
I assume you are talking about US police? I have no experience of them. Well, apart from watching US TV and movies!!!
Yes, and not all police of course. But the job does attract a certian personality type.
The number of people shot by the police at all In the UK is tiny each year, even in Northern Ireland and they tend to make the news.
Sending armed police officers to raid a building here is very rare. The vast majority of warrants and searches, even dealing with folk with previous for assaulting police offices are carried out by a handful of normal, unarmed, beat cops.
Just think...this could happen to any one of us (here in the US, at least). Sad.
Firstly, I don't understand what is happening with HN. It's becoming a blatantly US political site and not a particularly insightful or discerning one.
Secondly, what is the point of this map ? For all I know there could be millions of legitimate raids each year in which case the tens of botched ones here would make for a statistical impressive record. Seems borderline deceitful on their part not to state how many total raids happened each year.
I think the first is a result of the NSA leaks. HN I think is already extremely inclined to US politics and an issue that hits so close to home is bound be the spark that blows the powder keg.
According to the abstract of the paper, estimates are at 40k paramilitarized police raids PER YEAR. I agree that statistically the data is insignificant but looking at the number of innocent deaths (1-5 per year generally), I have an uneasy feeling that this increase in force may have hit diminishing returns as far as safety goes and are now into the zone of increasing false positives.
1 to 5 deaths for 40k raids is not at all in the realms of statistical significance. In terms of innocent people killed by the police it strikes me as being so far down the list as not a problem with "paramilitary" "raids".
Both of course are loaded terms. Another way to play it would be to say that better trained and experienced officers are conducting these operations with a very low rate of adverse outcomes. Would they be higher if the cops who weren't on these teams were carrying out these "raids".
How many people are year are killed by emergency services vehicles? How many are killed following other police interactions?
I literally said I agree that statistically the data is insignificant
You're kidding right? Is this really an acceptable form of argument? The point isn't total number of deaths, the point is the increasing use of flak jackets, stun grenades ("flashbangs" but don't kid yourself, they're grenades), automatic weapons, and military counter-insurgency tactics in situations where you can't rationally justify such actions.
And to preempt an obvious red herring: Gang shootouts, extensive drug rings, hostage situations, and violent offenders DO JUSTIFY the use of such force. Nonviolent offenses and other situations where there is little reason to expect an armed suspect do not.
My point is that flak jackets don't kill people, and automatic weapons don't unless they go off. Stun grenades might if they cause a heart attack, but so could the pressure of a police investigation. So could a speeding police car.
You presented the issue as 1-5 people a year being killed. If you agree it isn't significant then what is the problem? Because it isn't that it causes deaths.
If you're going to tackle perceived problems with American policing there seem to be far better areas to address than "I don't like paramilitary raids that don't actually have statistically meaningful adverse outcomes".
2012 - 0 botched raids. 100% success rate.
2011 - 6 botched raids. 99.99% success rate.
2010 - 17 botched raids. 99.96% success rate.
Call me crazy but that seems like a very impressive success rate given 40000 total.
It's unrealistic for CATO to go digging through court cases across the country. They use aggregate sources of data from other institutions funded specifically to study police. Thus their data is limited to confirmed court cases and available police documents from other organizations.
Their success rate for 40,000/yr does properly reveal if the botched raids were a cost of doing business or a consequence of increased militarization. For all we know, stricter scrutiny regarding situations where SWAT teams are used could reduce the raids to 35,000/yr and almost completely eliminate botched raids without decreasing overall safety (the primary reason for using SWAT teams). The point here is to point out excessive force in a few categories of situations, not to put into question the whole purpose of SWAT teams.
A cursory search reveals these "botched" raids in 2012 alone: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/06/swat-team-throws-...
http://www.wnd.com/2012/08/cops-kill-dog-handcuff-kids-in-wr...
http://www.businessinsider.com/9-horrifying-botched-police-r...
http://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle/2012/aug/04/arizona_swat...
http://rt.com/usa/swat-billings-burns-fasching-312/
Or how about this: when the DEA pulled local SWAT resources (the majority of local SWAT forces) to raid Oaksterdam in Oakland (unarmed civilians protected by state law), they failed to respond to a shooting in a university a few MILES away.
http://www.eastbayexpress.com/LegalizationNation/archives/20...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/blogpost/post/oakland-sc...
The shooter described lining people up against and firing at them Ceaușescu style.
A statistical impressive record which leaves a streak of innocent people gunned down in their homes by the people who are entrusted to protect them? Fuck that, utterly and completely, up and down, to oblivious. Seriously. How can you see this and even think that it's even potentially justifiable because there are lots of paramilitary raids that don't kill people?
So many of these stories have disputes between what the police claim to have done and what the civilians claim. It seems that it is very difficult to prosecute the police on these matters. Would hard evidence, such as video or audio recordings make a difference in the chance of winning a lawsuit or criminal conviction? Or would that evidence get destroyed or be inadmissible in court?
In interested to know how the prevalence of always on recording devices might impact law enforcement.
Is there a map showing the non-botched raids? Without that for comparison, it is hard to make anything useful out of this.
Also, note that unless you change the settings, it is showing 28 years worth of data. If you don't notice this, you'll get the impression that botched raids are happening all the time.
http://xkcd.com/1138/