TheAgitator.com
Prince George’s County Sheriff’s Department Clears Its Own Officers of Wrongdoing in Cheye Calvo Raid
Saturday, June 20th, 2009Yesterday, the Prince George’s County Sheriff’s Department announced that its internal review found that its officers did nothing wrong in the SWAT raid on Berwyn Heights, Maryland Mayor Cheye Calvo’s home.
Last summer, officers intercepted a package of marijuana at a delivery service warehouse. Despite the fact that they already knew of a drug distribution network in which dealers were sending packages of marijuana to random addresses with the intent of having them picked up by accomplices working for the delivery companies, the Sheriff’s Department raided Calvo’s just seconds after his mother-in-law brought the package into the house with no investigation into who actually lived there.
Police and county officials have since admitted that Calvo and his family are innocent. But they stubbornly refuse to acknowledge any wrongdoing, such as not doing the least bit of investigation before sending the SWAT team to take down Calvo’s door, not knocking and announcing before entering, or slaughtering Calvo’s two Labrador retrievers.
In fact, Prince George’s County officials have been stunningly callous about it all, at various points praising the officers for their “restraint,” and commenting that everyone involved in the investigation and raid “deserves a pat on the back.”
So the announcement yesterday that the internal review cleared the department isn’t surprising. But Sheriff Michael Jackson’s comments at the accompanying press conference are really something to behold. From the Washington Post:
The findings of the internal review “are consistent with what I’ve felt all along: My deputies did their job to the fullest extent of their abilities”…
In an interview, Jackson reiterated his explanation that a scream by Calvo’s mother-in-law, Georgia Porter, who saw officers in SWAT gear running toward the house, justified the shooting.
Porter “corroborated that she did scream out ‘SWAT.’ She admitted to that, and [Calvo] admitted to hearing that upstairs in the house,” Jackson said. “That threw out the procedure of knocking and announcing, because now [officers were] compromised.”
One dog was shot four times by the front door. Calvo has said his younger dog was running away from officers when it was shot twice, including once in a hind leg. Jackson said deputies thought the dog was running toward another deputy in the home…
“I’m sorry for the loss of their family pets,” Jackson said. “But this is the unfortunate result of the scourge of drugs in our community. Lost in this whole incident was the criminal element. . . . In the sense that we kept these drugs from reaching our streets, this operation was a success.”
First of all, the police intercepted the package at the warehouse. At that point, they had already kept the marijuana inside from “reaching the streets.” Everything that happened next was at the discretion of the officers who carried out the investigation and raid well after the marijuana had already been confiscated, which means they and they alone own the results of the raid.
Second, what happened to Calvo isn’t the “unfortunate result of the scourge of drugs in our community,” it’s the result of a bumbling, overly aggressive, wholly incompetent police department. And it’s the result of a drug warrior mentality that believes invading someone’s home with guns and filling their pets with bullets is an appopriate response to a possible violation of state marijuana laws. The raiding cops didn’t bother to notify the Berwyn Heights police chief before sending in the SWAT team, which would almost certainly have tipped them off to their mistake. They didn’t bother to do any investigation at all of who lived at Calvo’s residence. Their first resort was to use the most overwhelming force possible.
Third, the purpose of a knock-and-announce requirement is to notify a home’s occupants that the police are outside to serve a warrant, and to give them the opportunity to come to the door and prevent the use of force and violence. Jackson’s excuse that officers feared Calvo’s mother-in-law’s scream when she saw men in black running up the lawn tipped off the drug dealers inside doesn’t fly. Because, again, the entire point of the knock-and-announce requirement is to “tip off” occupants that the police are outside.
Finally, Jackson’s comment that “[m]y deputies did their job to the fullest extent of their abilities” may actually be the only accurate thing he said yesterday. Just not in the way he intended.
“My deputies did their job to the fullest extent of their abilities”…
Well, at least that part is probably true.
The fact that I’m not at all surprised by this, is a sad commentary of our times, and the direction that our citizens are allowing our country to be taken in…
“Government, by consent of the governed…”
are consistent with what I’ve felt all along: My deputies did their job to the fullest extent of their abilities”
hard to argue with that, eh?
30 pounds of weed. That’s what the Tufts campus goes through in about a month. One small university.
Do they think that sending SWAT teams to stop someone bringing in 30 pounds will ever make the smallest dent.
You know, it’s weird to suddenly remember that there’s another side to this whole thing. Most of us readers here have been following the story since it happened, have been up on its various developments and, what’s more, the efforts of Cheye Calvo, quite civilly, to prevent this sort of thing from happening again. I’m sure the lot of us even tossed a question or to at the good mayor during his live chat here. I know I did.
I dunno. I don’t have much else to say other than that’s it’s strange, that to some this is still business as usual. Ah, I’m drunk.
I am stunned. how could they not find themselves guilty of wrongdoing?
just kidding.
Remember folks, this is the same case in which a female deputy suddenly remembered to call the vet – in the presence of the Calvo family – and make an appointment for her dog while the Calvo’s two black labs lie bleeding on the floor.
And yet she did nothing wrong.
The article hints that Calvo’s next action is a lawsuit.
I’m not sure why, but my jaw is on the floor. Do people believe this asshole?
Does he believe his own bullshit?
In a related story from Eugene, Oregon:
Officer sues city, claims retaliation for blowing whistle on SWAT team
http://www.kval.com/news/local/48560212.html#idc-container
It is clear that the police are simply another self-serving bureaucracy.
Unfortunately, too many people still buy into the notion that the police are “noble guardians of justice” or some similar BS. And that notion has some validity: The vast majority of cops are decent people who honestly attempt to do a difficult, stressful, demanding job. But by allowing the incompetents and misfits among them to shelter behind “the blue wall of silence”, they are doing a grave disservice to what they claim to support.
Last summer, officers intercepted a package of marijuana at a delivery service warehouse. Despite the fact that they already knew of a drug distribution network in which dealers were sending packages of marijuana to random addresses with the intent of having them picked up by accomplices working for the delivery companies, the Sheriff’s Department raided Calvo’s just seconds after his mother-in-law brought the package into the house with no investigation into who actually lived there.
I know you cover a lot of stories Radley, and I appreciate reading them, but I am wondering if anyone is covering wether any arrests were ever made of this drug distribution network? Any real arrests does not excuse the officers’ behavior in this case, or excuse this whitewashing of their actions. I am curious though if they ever busted anybody actually, you know, distributing drugs. Maybe they should hold off on the ‘We did nothing wrong’ stuff till they actually do some police work.
#9 | Bronwyn
“Does he believe his own bullshit?”
Yes, I believe he does. And so much so that this asswipe would probably pass a lie detector test. The LE community is egocentrism defined.
@#12, old
Yes, two:
http://www.wusa9.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=74799&catid=189
@#14 KBCraig
Good to know that. What do you want to bet they fucked it up somehow, and the two they did bust are innocent?
Why hasn’t the County Council gotten involved?
Are there any federal investigations into this? Based on your previous posts I doubted seriously if this Sheriff would have come out with a negative report from their own review…
The same comment popped out at me when I read it:
The drugs made me do it.
A Calvo lawsuit against the PG County Sheriff’s Office is probably a waste of time.
The LEO’s have qualified immunity.
It’s a totally rigged system.
The only possible accountability is whether the Sheriff and his political supporters hold elective offices.
Where I live, the County Sheriff is elected.
If so, try to VOTE THEM OUT. Vote OUT the Sheriff, and any others like the County Executive that support him.
Then, make sure the next Sheriff cleans house.
“I’m sorry for the loss of their family pets,” Jackson said. “But this is the unfortunate result of the scourge of drugs in our community. Lost in this whole incident was the criminal element. . . . In the sense that we kept these drugs from reaching our streets, this operation was a success.”
Imagine if Calvo defended himself and his family here a la Corey Maye (or someone similar) (the mother-in-law would have to have not yelled out “SWAT”) and this was rewritten as “I’m sorry for the loss of the police officer, but this is the unfortunate result of the scourge of crime perpetrated by thugs impersonating LEOs in our community. Lost in this whole incident was the human element….In the sense that we accurately defended ourselves from a what could have potentially been a criminal impersonating a LEO, we were successful.”
Wonder if Calvo would have been given the same pass?
Geeze. What does a cop have to do in Prince George’s County to get a reprimand? Treat a citizen with respect?
I realize that most people will find this over the top, but every time I hear about a police officer dying, I think about these guys and I don’t mind in the slightest.
#16 “Why hasn’t the County Council gotten involved?”
I can’t speak for Maryland, but in many areas the county sheriff is an elected official outside the power of the county executive and the board. In Kentucky, it would have to be the State Police or the State Atty General who would investigate.
Bob: The PG Police (not Sheriff) recently arrested one of their own for burglarizing a bank (in uniform). The FBI has taken over investigation of that case.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/20/AR2009062001626.html
If procedures were followed, the procedures must be changed so that this sort of thing does not happen again. If these police are in fact working at the limit of their ability (their Peter level) then they need to hire more competent cops; ones who can actually think a bit. I sense a dillemma; if one can think a bit, why would one wish to be a cop? Ergo, they can’t hire anyone better, the same incompetents are promoted and develop bad procedures, and this mess is the result.
The us and them mentality that the police have developed, as many on this site have pointed out, concerns me more than anything. What happens when they become so indignant with attempts to limit their authority that they refuse. It already happens to some extent all around the country.
Everytime I read this BS I think of the old SNL Akroyd/Belushi skits where they are the cops who invariably cause a death and claim it as “another drug related death”… Life may immitate art but it isn’t always pretty….
#25 Primus
“If these police are in fact working at the limit of their ability (their Peter level) then they need to hire more competent cops; ones who can actually think a bit. I sense a dilemma; if one can think a bit, why would one wish to be a cop? Ergo, they can’t hire anyone better, the same incompetents are promoted and develop bad procedures, and this mess is the result.”
One of the biggest problems in this respect is that the police seem to have a cap on how highly they can score on their intelligence exams. Become a bit to smart and suddenly you cant become an “officer of the law” but you become a prison guard. Just like this guy.
Please excuse me if the link didn’t come up properly, I’m very new to html.
@ primus, #25:
This may be relevant to your interests.
Billy-Jay: I just gave you a thumbs-up click.
The police are there primarily to keep the peasants in line while the connected (dope dealers, the well-to-do, politicians, others with tax-funded slots) are free to do as they please.
What seems to not have been given enough attention in this matter is the fact that law enforcement knew that this was a scheme perpetrated by the delivery company. From Balko’s post:
“Despite the fact that they already knew of a drug distribution network in which dealers were sending packages of marijuana to random addresses with the intent of having them picked up by accomplices working for the delivery companies, the Sheriff’s Department raided Calvo’s just seconds after his mother-in-law brought the package into the house with no investigation into who actually lived there.”
So regardless of Calvo being the mayor, and all the sloppiness and unprofessional behavior of all involved in law enforcement, this to me is the worst aspect of this case. The police KNEW that the people to whom the packages were addressed to had nothing to do with it, but still decided to go in guns blazing and terrorize known innocents.
This seems to indicate much worse than mere incompetence and indifference to “civilians,” but actual malice on the part of the police and a desire to bring harm to innocents. They would seem to be consciously and deliberately evil.
@ #30, the friendly grizzly
“The police are there primarily to keep the peasants in line while the connected (dope dealers, the well-to-do, politicians, others with tax-funded slots) are free to do as they please.”
Too right, mate! They are and always have been. The only reason people think otherwise is the massive propaganda campaign that has been fed to children by the public education system from Pre-K on.
“This seems to indicate much worse than mere incompetence and indifference to “civilians,” but actual malice on the part of the police and a desire to bring harm to innocents. They would seem to be consciously and deliberately evil.”
I wonder if the mayor did, or said something that was “Just not allowed” and the entire incident was politically motivated. What are the mayor’s views on marijuana legalization? More likely, he slighted someone at a party and they took offense.
Cause, meet effect. Effect, cause.
This. Thrice.
#11: The vast majority of cops allowing the misfits & incompetents to hide behind the “blue wall of silence” is exactly the reason I don’t find that majority to be good, decent people at all. IMO, the only good cop is one that will “rat” out his brother-in-arms for the protection of civilians & law.
Peasant is just the name given to those people the cops are allowed to beat up in order feel good about themselves.
“The vast majority of cops are decent people who honestly attempt to do a difficult, stressful, demanding job.”
These days I’m not even sure that much is true. Ask yourself this: how do we define a decent cop versus a bad cop?
Most of us can probably agree that a cop who engages in outright flagrant corruption or felonious illegal behavior (kinda like that rogue narcotics team in Philly) is a bad cop, but what percentage are they of the force? Maybe 10%?
But what if we broaden the categories some?
- Is an officer who refuses to write traffic tickets for fellow officers a “decent cop”?
- How about one who flips on his flashers so he can run a stoplight or get out of a traffic jam in a non-emergency situation?
- What about the cop who declines to write a ticket when it’s a police car is illegally parked in a handicapped space or a fire zone?
If you include all of these “lesser” instances of cop malfeasance into the definition then the number quickly broadens from 10% to probably somewhere around half.
Next answer me this one. Suppose that a cop is personally ethical in the way he does his own job, but he knows about corruption among his fellow officers and willfully looks the other way? Is this person a “decent cop” or a “bad cop?” Because I submit to you that the percentage of cops who willfully look the other way on instances of corruption by others in their departments is probably somewhere close to 85-90% of the police workforce.
And if that is the definition we are going by, then the vast majority of cops are NOT “decent” and “honest” people doing a thankless job, but complicit enablers of some very bad and dishonest people who happen to share their profession.
Has the sheriff previously claimed that Porter yelled “swat”? And that everyone agrees about this? If I see armed people approaching my house, if I yell anything at all sensible, it’s not going to be ’swat’. This is strange. Is it true everyone agrees to this? Or did the lighting at the press conference give the sheriff sunstroke?
This internal investigation strikes me as a good example of “ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer.” The first link in this tragic chain was the approval of the search warrant.
Did the officers inform the magistrate that the bogus delivery modus operandi was known to be in use? Either they did, and the magistrate deserves a share in the blame for approving the warrant, or they did not, in which case they misled a judge (which, in the federal system, often is a career-ending mistake).
#16 “Why hasn’t the County Council gotten involved?”
Because they just got off the Justice Department’s double-secret probation list. They don’t want to give the feds any excuse to put them back under the microscope.
“I’m sorry for the loss of their family pets,” Jackson said. “But this is the unfortunate result of the scourge of drugs in our community. Lost in this whole incident was the criminal element. . . .”
Funny. The only criminals in Calvo’s home that day were PGSD.
#32
Far as I’m concerned, the pinnacle of law enforcement in the USA occurred on June 16, 1857. It’s all been downhill from there.
“I’m sorry for the loss of their family pets,” Jackson said. “But this is the unfortunate result of the scourge of drugs in our community. Lost in this whole incident was the criminal element. . . . In the sense that we kept these drugs from reaching our streets, this operation was a success.”
Words cannot explain how angry that quote made me when I read it. That someone could inflict such harm upon an innocent family and then laud himself for his actions.
Criminal element? You just broke into the house of a completely innocent family and murdered two of their dogs! Who’s the real criminal here?
When I mentioned this incident to one of my colleagues from Maryland, I was surprised to learn that she had never heard of it. In an attempt to point out how destructive the War on Drugs has become, I told her all about it.
It’s stories like this that–if the media would do it’s damn job– would convince more people that the War on Drugs is wrong.
June 16, 1857? You mean when Eggert Rohwer was born?
Maybe you mean the New York City Police Riot.
Re: #21
Look up the case of Keith A. Washington, an ex-PG County cop who murdered a furniture deliver guy. He was found guilty:
http://www.wtopnews.com/index.php?nid=25&sid=1351635
His buddies in blue apparently showed up in force to “support him” (read: intimidate the prosecutor, judge, and jury) during the trial. I don’t have time to find a good quote, but from this article:
http://www.gazette.net/stories/052908/prinnew173652_32359.shtml
I seem to remember there were a lot of them from the reports.
Anyway, murdering a completely innocent person apparently isn’t enough for some cops there, although to their credit they did investigate and charge him.
Search for this at google:
keith washington “brandon clark”
Brandon Clark was the victim.
Does commenting on this thread result in one making the Fibs’ list of terrorist organizations out to destroy Our Way Of Life? Because count me in. Motherfuckers.
what bothers me the most is that the police are the ones that put the drugs on the mans door step in the first damn place…
an undercover sheriff placed a box known to hold drugs on the doorstep and then the swat team raided the house after that…
how is that not entrapment?
“Finally, Jackson’s comment that “[m]y deputies did their job to the fullest extent of their abilities” may actually be the only accurate thing he said yesterday. Just not in the way he intended.”
Truer words could not have been spoken!!!
#38 | John_P
Excellent post. Would give you more karma points if I could.
Why is the sherrif opining on what happened before the investigation was concluded.
Not that there was a question of whether these things are illegitimate on their face (clearly they are), but when the head honcho starts out thinking or “feeling” conclusion X, what chance does the investigation have of concluding Y?
I would like to invite Sherriff Michael Jackson to kindly go and start his own country.
Looks like the Prince George Sheriff’s dept just pulled a circle jerk and a daisy chain.
Any bets on whether they already KNEW who lived there? I don’t believe for a nanosecond that the cops didn’t know.
They WILL get theirs in the next life.
Tiocfaidh ar la!
How many more lawsuits can Prince George’s County taxpayers afford thanks to a rogue police force? Considering the ever-contracting nature of the economy, the question will begin to sink into the dimmest citizen’s awareness, particularly if those citizens have gotten pink slips lately, and could use that money.
Oh, and that goes double for the entire country and drug prohibition; the same dynamics are at work. The DrugWar gravy train was always fueled under the false impression the money would always be there because drug prohibition was a ’sacred cow’ (all the prohibitionists had to do was bellow hysterically “SAVE THE CHIL-DRENNNNN!) and the money would could flowing in with almost Pavlovian regularity).
But now, with the recession/depression, that money is needed for other things…like that poor mug with the pink slip needs it for unemployment insurance so he can keep a roof over his kid’s heads and food on the table. He’ll be a lot more worried about that than any any fictional drug dealers chasing his kids down the street with a syringe in one hand and a bag ‘o blow in the other. That particular boogeyman doesn’t spook anyone, anymore.
So, keep it up, DrugWarriors. You’re digging drug prohibition’s fiscal grave, one botched no-knock, dead pets (and dead innocent people!) raid lawsuit at a time.
“…it’s the result of a bumbling, overly aggressive, wholly incompetent police department. And it’s the result of a drug warrior mentality that believes invading someone’s home with guns and filling their pets with bullets is an appopriate response to a possible violation of state marijuana laws.”
Radley — don’t ever stop. The militarization of U.S. law enforcement is so way far out of control that it defies description.
Calvo should forget the mayor’s job and run for sheriff against this clown. Then he can really clean house at the thug (I refuse to call them ‘police’) department!
Jim Bell
Jim Bell
Jim Bell
“… how do we define a decent cop versus a bad cop?”
There are no decent cops. They are all paid with tax money, which is stolen at gunpoint from citizens.
The guys that shot those dogs are sissys. How can anyone justify shooting a couple dogs that will at the most bite your leg. I am assamed of whoever pulled the triger. Keep telling yourself it was justifyed you pussy.
[...] Balko, who was indispensable when the story first broke, provided an update last week. The county sheriff’s department cleared its officers of any wrongdoing. Balko writes, [...]
I don`t think these NAZI like cop`s are real people.
America is full of them,what ever they are.
Things like this give concordance to the Hanger 51,Roswell incident.
One can also look at the US Congress and see striking similarities in their emptiness.
Some are also looking into the possibilities that these NAZI like cops do not have families like real people do.Where are the families?
What do the wives and children think of their Father,Mother,or,what ever these things are….why dosn`t someone ask them,the families?
Hell!! just try to find a family member of these Robot`s.
Put these guys on TV,Post their pic`s anywhere you can..take off their mask..show them to the public,their neighbors,their church,ect,ect.
[...] intercepting the drugs and it’s just supremely dishonest to equate those two outcomes. Radley Balko has more on the fundamental incoherence underlying these latest claims from the PG County Sheriff’s Office. [...]
[...] the drugs and it’s just supremely dishonest to equate those two outcomes. Radley Balko has more on the fundamental incoherence underlying these latest claims from the PG County Sheriff’s [...]
[...] Balko, who was indispensable when the story first broke, provided an update last week. The county sheriff’s department cleared its officers of any wrongdoing. Balko writes, [...]
What’s the deal with these assholes shooting dogs?
They should all go to a vet’s office and be euthanized.
The deputies, that is…not the dogs.
And just think, if marijuana were legalized, or at least de-criminalized then none of this would have happened.
I guess that’s too much to ask here in the “land of the free”.