L.A. Liberty

His police title, that’s just a title. He’s still a man just like the next man that commits a murder. So my child’s crime should be treated the same [as] if he’d gotten killed by a regular man.

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- Natasha Allen, mother of Wendell Allen, an unarmed 20-year-old killed during police raid

Should be, but certainly won’t. A regular man who breaks into a house and kills someone, even accidentally, would be guilty of murder. But the drug laws authorize police officers to do things that otherwise would be considered burglary and armed robbery. In this case, the cops charged into the house with guns drawn, knowingly endangering everyone inside:

“All the children said that when they came in and they heard the boom, they put guns in the children’s faces and asked them to back up. They proceeded upstairs and all they heard was a pow and Wendell screaming,” said [Crystal] Butler [Wendell Allen’s aunt]. NOPD confirms that 5 children were inside the Gentilly home when the search warrant was executed ranging from ages 1 to 14.

“We have not been able to yet completely understand what exactly occurred,” Police Superintendent Ronal Serpas said yesterday. No matter why Colclough fired his gun, the crucial error occurred long before he ran up the stairs, when legislators decided this was an appropriate way to deal with a plant they did not like.

Posted March 12, 2012 at 9:39am in cops War on drugs | comments || home