Another Isolated Incident

Police raid the wrong house in Baltimore. Weeks later, the guy still can't get the city to repair his door. Their explanation is that because the address written on the warrant is the address the police raided, there was no mistake. Even though the guy they were actually after lived and was eventually arrested two doors down.

Ah, but it gets worse. If it's not the cops, it's the bureaucrats. The guy stored his old door in his backyard, hoping the city would eventually repair it. When it became clear that wasn't going to happen, he called the city's special trash pick-up to come and get it. They never did. But a city code inspector did come, and fined the guy $50 for having a broken door in his backyard.

Comments

[Naga Sadow]

So funny and so sad at the same time. Is this what it's like being Radley?

[hmm]

They were operating in good faith. No really. Oddly good faith only goes their way when the face of the warrant is wrong and they raid the house they want.

[Nick]

Holy fucking shit, Batman. It's the trifecta of government abuse. We screwed you by mistake, we ignored our responsibility to do right by you, and we found a creative way to screw you again.

It would be impressive the level of consistency if it weren't so infuriating on every level.

[Pro Libertate]

Baltimore! You are full of stupid!

[libertymike]

Another isolated incident!

Again, libertarians should be sending the message that public employment is for the losers, the parasites and the less than and not for free and industrious peeps.

On a related note, I heard yesterday that the suicide rate of active duty military personnel has been steadily increasing. Suicide by military personnel has always been with us and for good reason: being employed by Caesar for the purpose of aggressing and killing others who have not harmed you is being at war with one's soul. What an empty place to be-cannon fodder for some nation state or political subdivision. Of course its going to produce suicides.

[Solana]

It makes me want to go: AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

[libertymike]

Attack public employment! It is parasitism. It is not being the best and the brightest.

[robc]

How come the one-off cop defenders never show up in these threads?

[robc]

Radley,

When is the book coming out?

I want a copy of Another Isolated Incident. Maybe multiple, to share with friends.

[Xeones]

I want a copy of Another Isolated Incident.

Me too. All seventeen volumes.

[MayorOmalleySuxs]

My comment will not surprise anyone, Fuck Baltimore!

Do you really think The Wire was completely fiction?

[WWJGD]

Hell, I'll settle for just a compilation of all the H&R posts on this. I've got some friends who need to have their love of the police shattered.

[SugarFree]

How come the one-off cop defenders never show up in these threads?

They used to a lot more often. I think they only show up when they are alerted by whatever "love the taste of cop cock" websites they frequent to reminisce about the good old days of stringing up negroes and nightsticking hippies.

[MayorOmalleySuxs]

Do you really think The Wire was completely fiction?

The names were changed to protect the guilty.

[hmm]

Nightsticking hippies can be fun.

[SugarFree]

I didn't mean to sound so disapproving of that part.

[J sub D]

Look on the bright side, there was no puppycide, no mothers killed while holding their baby, no drugs planted by the cops, no dead 92 year old recluse, just a complete diregard for the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects.

REMEMBER KATHRYN JOHNSTON!

[Kyle Jordan]

"They used to a lot more often. I think they only show up when they are alerted by whatever "love the taste of cop cock" websites they frequent to reminisce about the good old days of stringing up negroes and nightsticking hippies."

Thanks for the laugh. This thread was depressing. Still is, just slightly less so.

Time to go nightstick a hippie.

[robc]

I didn't mean to sound so disapproving of that part.

Which part? Stringing up negros or Nightsticking hippies?

[Nick]

Speaking of Isolated Incidents, was Ryan Frederick sentenced yet? Hadn't seen anything about it.

[SugarFree]

robc,

Just the hippies, of course. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying I can understand it.

[Karl]

Perhaps the least egregious part of the story, but WTF is with being able to fine someone for having a broken door in their back yard? On second thought no, it's not the least egregious. How the fuck does the city get the power to make having a broken door in your back yard a fucking CODE VIOLATION?
-K

[robc]

Karl,

I agree. It does make you wonder how it came about though.

[MayorOmalleySuxs]

The Dems have been in power since 1967. Forty-two years with no chance of being unseated by a Republican or anyone else. Any party, even the Libertarians, with a grip on power that tight would become corrupt. The battle for Baltimore is only for the spoils of power among different factions within the Democratic Party. Mayor Dixon wasn't even content with stealing from the taxpayers, she had to start stealing gift cards meant for charities. Hope and fuckin' change!

Theodore R. McKeldin 1963 1967 Republican
Thomas L. J. D'Alesandro III 1967 1971 Democrat
William Donald Schaefer 1971 1987 Democrat
Clarence H. Burns 1987 1988 Democrat
Kurt L. Schmoke 1988 1999 Democrat
Martin J. O'Malley 1999 2007 Democrat
Sheila Dixon 2007 - Present Democrat

[Brandon]

This man has the means to live elsewhere and he chooses to live in Baltimore. And the article suggests he's not really bothered by the raid itself, just the city's bureaucratic fuck-ups afterward. Not the most sympathetic raid victim. Maybe if the police kill his dog next time....

[?]

I was really disappointed by the part where the guy didn't bomb city hall.

[Warty]

Christopher Hitchens: One tries to avoid clich?. I remember I went to Prague during the old days, the bad old days of the communist regime to attend a dissident meeting. I thought whatever happens to me, I'm not going to mention the name Kafka in what I write. I'm going to be the first reporter who doesn't--who goes to Prague and doesn't bring up Kafka.

Peter Robinson: Does not say Kafka?

Christopher Hitchens: Anyway the policemen came in--the secret police broke into the meeting I was at and slammed me up against the wall and said you're under arrest. And I said what for? And they said we're not telling you what for. And I thought damn, now I have to resort to clich?. I have to mention Kafka.

[Sal Paradise]

Wow, I can't believe they didn't kill the dog. These thugs are getting soft.

[the innominate one]

fuck the police

also, the bureaucrats

[Ricky]

"They never did. But a city code inspector did come, and fined the guy $50 for having a broken door in his backyard."

What an idiot! Anyone living in any large city would know that's how it's gonna play out.

[Dean]

"stringing up negroes and nightsticking hippies."

Stringing up negroes is wrong but nightsticking hippies? I'm okay with that.

[EJM]

Just in case, DCRTV notes that this story is part of today's byline strike at the "Sun" (which is in response to last week's staff cuts).

[hmm]

They need to hire back the people they let go and fire the people that striked. See if that changes their minds.

[Jennifer]

From the article:

Leonard said he isn't angry at the police. One of his best friends is a New York City detective, and Leonard said that he understands that officers put their lives on the line running into dangerous houses. His concern is with the failure of city agencies to follow up.

Wrong lesson, dude. They didn't make this mistake looking for a murderer, a rapist or someone else similarly dangerous to the public; they went after a drug dealer. A political crime, nothing more. Until police stop being used to go after political criminals, they do not deserve any respect. And "putting your life on the line" to prosecute political criminals just goes to show you're a dumbass, or at least someone who can't or won't think for himself.

[CharlesWT]

Formal Sentencing for Ryan Frederick

[Don Tabor]

Ryan Frederick will be sentenced at 8:30 AM on May 8th in Chesapeake. John Wilburn will attend and report at Tidewater Liberty tomorrow.

[secularabsolutist]

Public employees are proof of re-incarnation. They are there as penance for committing suicide in a previous lifetime.

Anybody got proof to the contrary?!?!?

[TrickyVic]

Thanks for the head up Don, and thanks for the reporting during the trial.

[libertymike]

secularabsolutist-

We all should have to do such "penance."

[R C Dean]

One of his best friends is a New York City detective, and Leonard said that he understands that officers put their lives on the line running into dangerous houses.

The IHOPs in New York must be different from the ones around here.

[JB]

A 4am fire-bomb through the Mayor's house would get a response. Governments should be afraid of their people.

[Invisible Finger]

They used to a lot more often. I think they only show up when they are alerted by whatever "love the taste of cop cock" websites they frequent to reminisce about the good old days of stringing up negroes and nightsticking hippies.

I think the majority of cops are sociopaths, but at this point the days of kicking the shit out of blacks and hippies for 10 minutes are preferable to the current m.o. of torturing them via the criminal justice system for the rest of their lives.

[Lost_In_Translation]

I think the majority of cops are sociopaths, but at this point the days of kicking the shit out of blacks and hippies for 10 minutes are preferable to the current m.o. of torturing them via the criminal justice system for the rest of their lives.

I think the majority of cops are bored bureaucrats that hate all the procedural paperwork they have to do on a daily basis. Its a 10% that love their job and get high off the adrenaline rush that scare me. They cause the problems and then get the bored cops to go along with them because its easier than fighting a system designed to protect the violators rather than punish them.

[oldtimer]

Hey, it's not that they hate the paper work, it's just so damned complicated. There are lots of blanks to fill in, check marks, all kinds of shit. Give 'em a break. They went to public school.

[coyote1284]

"Information Transit got the wrong man. I got the *right* man. The wrong one was delivered to me as the right man, I accepted him on good faith as the right man. Was I wrong?"

"Mistakes? We don't make mistakes."

Life immitating Terry Gilliam's "Brazil"

[kodos96]

Did anyone else notice the end of the photo caption "Their dog, Figo, was not harmed during the incident"? Wow, talk about burying the lede!

[mbt]

hi,
everybody, take your time and a little bit.djykjyey

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