…another botched drug raid, another misguided informant, and another innocent couple needlessly terrorized.

The man leveled his gun at Nicole Thompson’s face.

Moments later, he had the mother of four on the ground with the barrel to the back of her head. According to her and her husband, the man screamed, “If you move, I’ll shoot you in the f– head!”

It is an experience she can’t get out of her mind. The gunman, it turned out, was a cop. And the whole thing - 12 armed officers storming the family’s split-level Spring Lake Park house - was a big misunderstanding.

Now, a month later - flinching every time there’s on rap on the door and awaking from nightmares - Thompson and her husband say they’ve yet to receive a proper explanation or a sincere apology from police. Reports made by officers involved say they did apologize, but the Thompsons don’t recall it that way.

[...]

They uncuffed the Thompsons and Cordts, explained that a confidential informant had given them bad info, left a business card and, with a remark about “It’s Miller time,” they left.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 27th, 2007 at 10:26 am by Radley Balko and is filed under Police Militarization. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.