cannabisnews.com: DrugSense FOCUS Alert #185 September 25, 2000 





DrugSense FOCUS Alert #185 September 25, 2000 
Posted by FoM on September 24, 2000 at 14:17:45 PT
How The Drug War Kills Children 
Source: MapInc.
Drug prohibition took another young life recently when 11-year-old Alberto Sepulveda was shot in the back and killed by police during a drug raid at his family's home in Modesto, Ca. The story was reported in newspapers around the country, but not as widely or with as much soul-searching if Alberto Sepulveda's killer was another child. The drug war has been the cause of many tragic fatalities, and many of the dead (like Alberto) were neither drug users nor drug sellers. 
A recent oped from the LA Times (below) mentions a few of them. It also explains that when we give SWAT teams license to burst into homes with total disregard for the 4th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, its only natural for incidents like this to occur. Please write a letter to the LA Times to remind editors and readers that prohibition supporters often claim to be protecting children, but the drug war itself has no regard for the age of its victims. WRITE A LETTER TODAY It's not what others do it's what YOU do PLEASE SEND US A COPY OF YOUR LETTER OR TELL US WHAT YOU DID (Letter, Phone, fax etc.) Please post a copy your letter or report your action to the sent letter list (sentlte mapinc.org) if you are subscribed, or by E-mailing a copy directly to MGreer mapinc.org Your letter will then be forwarded to the list with so others can learn from your efforts and be motivated to follow suit This is VERY IMPORTANT as it is the only way we have of gauging our impact and effectiveness. CONTACT INFO: Source: Los Angeles Times (CA) Contact: letters latimes.co ARTICLEURL: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00.n1414.a07.html Newshawk: http://www.cannabisnews.com/ Pubdate: Fri, 22 Sep 2000 Source: Los Angeles Times (CA) Copyright: 2000 Los Angeles Times Contact: letters latimes.com Address: Times Mirror Square, Los Angeles, CA 90053 Fax: (213) 237-7679 Website: http://www.latimes.com/ Forum: http://www.latimes.com/discuss/ Author: Sharon Dolovich Note: Sharon Dolovich Is an Acting Professor at UCLA School of Law INVASION OF SWAT TEAMS LEAVES TRAUMA AND DEATH Alberto Sepulveda is no Elian Gonzalez. When 11-year-old Sepulveda was shot and killed last week by a SWAT team member during an early morning drug raid on his parents' Modesto home, the story barely made the papers. Yet, as did the Immigration and Naturalization Service raid on the Gonzalez home in Miami in May, the killing of Alberto Sepulveda highlights a troubling trend in law enforcement: stealth raids on the homes of sleeping citizens by heavily armed government agents. Such raids are the hallmark of police states, not free societies, but as a growing number of Americans can attest, the experiences of these two boys are by no means isolated incidents. Just ask the widow of Mario Paz. She was asleep with her husband in their Compton home at 11 p.m. in August 1999 when 20 members of the local SWAT team shot the locks off the front and back doors and stormed inside. Moments later, Mario Paz was dead, shot twice in the back, and his wife was outside, half-naked in handcuffs. The SWAT team had a warrant to search a neighbor's house for drugs, but Mario Paz was not listed on it. No drugs were found, and no member of the family was charged with any crime. And then there is Denver resident Ismael Mena, a 45-year-old father of nine, killed last September in his bedroom by SWAT team members who stormed the wrong house. Or Ramon Gallardo of Dinuba, Calif., shot 15 times in 1997 by a SWAT team with a warrant for his son. Or the Rev. Accelyne Williams of Boston, 75, who died of a heart attack in 1994 after a Boston SWAT team executing a drug warrant burst into the wrong apartment. SWAT teams, now numbering an estimated 30,000 nationwide, were originally intended for use in emergency situations, hostage-takings, bomb threats and the like. Trained for combat, their arsenals (often provided cut rate or free of charge by the Pentagon) resemble those of small armies: automatic weapons, armored personnel carriers and even grenade launchers. Today, however, SWAT units are most commonly used to execute drug warrants, frequently of the "no-knock" variety, which are issued by judges and magistrates when there is reason to suspect that the 4th Amendment's "knock and announce" requirement, already perfunctorily applied, would be dangerous or futile, or would give residents time to destroy incriminating evidence. California is one of few states that does not allow no-knock warrants. But the fate of Alberto Sepulveda--who was shot dead an estimated 60 seconds after the SWAT team "knocked and announced"--suggests the problem is not the type of warrant issued but the use of military tactics. The state's interest in protecting evidence of drug crimes from destruction, or even in preventing the escape of suspected drug felons, does not justify the threat to individual safety, security and peace of mind that the use of these tactics represents. On this, the now-famous image of a terrified Elian facing an armed INS agent speaks volumes. Even when no shot is fired, these raids leave in their wake families traumatized by memories of an armed invasion by government agents. Police officers, too, are shot in these raids, barging unannounced into homes where weapons are kept. These shootings may appear to confirm the dangerousness of the criminals being pursued, until one realizes that they are committed when people are caught by surprise by intruders in their own homes and not unreasonably, if unfortunately, grab a weapon to defend themselves. (Suspects also die in these shoo touts. Troy Davis, 25, was shot point blank in the chest by Texas police who broke down his door during a no-knock raid in December 1999 and found him with a gun in his hand. Police had been pursuing a tip that Davis and his mother were growing marijuana. His gun was legal.) Using paramilitary units to enforce drug warrants is the inevitable result of the government's tendency to see itself as fighting a "war on drugs." This rhetoric makes it easy to forget that the targets in these raids are not the enemy but fellow citizens, and that the laws being enforced are supposed to ensure a safe, peaceful, well-ordered society. If lawmakers in Washington and Sacramento are genuinely committed to defending the right of the American people to be safe and secure in their own homes, they would demand an accounting for the thousands of drug raids executed by SWAT teams every year all over the country, raids that get little media attention but nonetheless leave their targets traumatized and violated. Assuming, that is, that they leave them alive. Sharon Dolovich Is an Acting Professor at UCLA School of Law SAMPLE LETTER Dear Editor: Sharon Dolovich hit the nail on the head (Invasion of SWAT Teams Leaves Trauma and Death LAT 9/22) in pointing out our inexorable march towards a police state in the name of "protecting" us from drugs but her article should probably be expanded into a multi-part series. Home invasions by black clad SWAT teams are increasing at an alarming rate and innocent people being killed by those sworn "to protect and serve" with ever increasing frequency nationwide. What we may not realize, however, is that a dozen other societal horror stories are simultaneously causing untold damage to our Bill of Rights, individual liberties, and the love of freedom our forefathers had hoped for. In the name of the "war on drugs," we have wasted hundreds of billions of dollars, incarcerated more of our citizens than any other country in the world, implemented mandatory minimums, and rendered 1.5 million minorities with felony convictions ineligible to vote in this election. "Driving while black" harassment, the Rampart and similar scandals, "testilying" by police officers and a loss of respect for law enforcement can all be traced to the foolish notion that we ever had a chance of making prohibition work. When will we wake up and realize that prohibition has never worked once in the entire history of man? It only creates a criminal black market which leads to increased use and skyrocketing related crime. Many think that drugs are bad so the drug war must be good. I would urge those people to reconsider. Drug use and the related damage of that use are relatively minor in the face of the tremendous damage this foolish drug war has caused our society. Mark Greer IMPORTANT: Always include your address and telephone number Please note: If you choose to use this letter as a model please modify it at least somewhat so that the paper does not receive numerous copies of the same letter and so that the original author receives credit for his/her work. ADDITIONAL INFO to help you in your letter writing efforts 3 Tips for Letter Writers: http://www.mapinc.org/3tips.htm Letter Writers Style Guide: http://www.mapinc.org/style.htm TO SUBSCRIBE, DONATE, VOLUNTEER TO HELP, OR UPDATE YOUR EMAIL SEE: http://www.drugsense.org/hurry.htm TO UNSUBSCRIBE SEE: http://www.drugsense.org/unsub.htm Prepared by Stephen Young Focus Alert Specialist http://home.att.net/~theyoungfamily Focus Alert Archive http://www.mapinc.org/focus/      Media Awareness ProjectPorterville, CA 93258(800) 266-5759 Contact: Mark Greer (mgreer mapinc.org) Webmaster: Matt Elrod (webmaster mapinc.org) CannabisNews MapInc. Archives:http://cannabisnews.com/news/list/MAP.shtml
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