Heavily armed drug cops raid retiree’s garden, seize okra plants | Hacker News Reader

Heavily armed drug cops raid retiree’s garden, seize okra plants

washingtonpost.com

18 pointsforrest_t16 comments

Ragweed grows rampantly where I live and at certain times of the year looks quite a bit like cannabis. So now I have to worry that the DEA will come smash down my door over weeds? Terrible Times.

It'd be pretty nice if they knocked politely and pulled the weeds up for me

Raid? They visited him, saw the okra, apologized and left.

It appears to have been an old-fashioned "raid" where they knock on the door and ask what's going on. Not like the modern "raid" where they kick the door down treating the whole thing as an excuse to practice full-breach procedures.

I would also like to know what the definition of "heavily armed K9 unit" is in this case. Was the officer armed normally for his role on the force or was he decked out as a "coperator" playing soldier?

But if this is the result of current policy of enforcing drug laws then I would say this is an improvement over the no-knock nonsense we've been seeing for years now.

EDIT: actually, other than the word "raided" there's no real description of the behavior of the police officers involved. Seems to be a badly worded article that goes out of its way to not provide any facts.

I would also like to know what the definition of "heavily armed K9 unit" is in this case.

"They were strapped to the gills,” according to the property owner, per the original article the Post referred to.

Ok, what does "strapped to the gills" mean?

"To the gills" generally means to "full to capacity" (as in "stuffed to the gills"). And "strapped" would be in the sense of "strapped with weapons."

You still haven't defined what weapons the officers had on hand. What you describe can be completely subjective based on many factors.

Where I grew up a "strapped to the gills" police officer would be one with his standard sidearm and a tactical shotgun with lots of ammo for both. In that area most police officers almost always only carried sidearms. In different areas of the country this could be something totally different.

For me, the only way to answer the question is to list out the equipment the officers had on hand. Which, as far as I can tell, no one has listed.

Sure, if by "visited" you mean "surrounded the house with a helicopter, a bunch of police vehicles, armed officers and a dog". It's true that it could have been worse - it wasn't a "no-knock" raid - but it was still a raid.

And they did take some of the plant material, so "seized" seems appropriate too.

Unless the homeowner had the option of saying "Sorry, I don't grant you permission to invade my home and garden" whereupon the officers would all just go away, it was a raid.

Raid?

Yes, Raid.

The article clearly mentioned "a heavily-armed K9 unit." The property owner could have easily been killed, in that situation. Why do you feel the need to describe it as a harmless "visit"?

I wish I knew why they couldn't just send 2 officers to knock on the door and ask, if the home owner refused then bring in a task force. US Police get more money when they send in a force than just one or two officers.

That was a semi-raid, because they didn't break down his door and force him to the ground while ransacking his house.

Still a raid yes.

Police are always armed. They are trained in their use. A K9 unit is an officer and a dog, trained to be nice to people. This whole article is puffed-up baloney

So the whole thing was more like the neighbor's dog, Spot, crossing your lawn to pick up a frisbee? Interesting viewpoint.

Not at all, that wasn't what was posted at all. But, then, you knew that didn't you?

They visited him with a SWAT Team. That's different than a copper in a squad car.

Although I admit the article is light in describing the makeup of the police officers, I see no mention of SWAT involved.

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