Police found to be lying about 911 calls to conduct illegal searches.

[Savannahmann]

First the story.

DURHAM (WTVD) --
A Durham police officer admitted under oath that he lied in order to gain entry to a home and to serve an outstanding warrant.

During a court hearing last May, court officials say he told a District Court judge that it was a common practice within Durham's police department.

He said he knocked on a resident's door, claiming police had received a 9-1-1 hang up call. But, it never happened.

Common practice for the officers to lie? I and many other people here have been saying that for years. Many people have been saying that for much longer away from this site. But stop and think about this for a moment. Police officers show up at your home. They are looking for someone to serve a warrant on, or just want to take a look around. They report there was a 911 call in which the caller hung up. Why we have to enter to make sure you are safe the officer says. If you say no then we would be forced to think you were acting under duress and enter anyway. I mean, they are very concerned about your safety. So one of those exceptions to the 4th Amendment have been abused regularly by police, what were the odds?

Today's question, does anyone think that this practice was limited to the Durham police department? Or do you think that it is possible that other departments use this technique to search homes for wanted individuals, or just for a general look around? If Durham NC is doing it, then I doubt that they came up with the idea on their own. The Chief of Police has issued a memo telling his cops to knock that particular lie off. Because it was in the press they can't use it for a while. Or they have to use a cell phone spoofing program to fake the call so they can then conduct the search. So now the danger is that if the Police think you're harboring someone in the house they want, they'll just call and swear that they are one of your neighbors, and they saw you inside with a machine gun. So now you risk being Swatted by the cops to see if the bad guy is inside they are looking for.

As a reminder, Durham NC was the department that allegedly had a suspect in custody in the car after being searched who managed to shoot himself in the head while handcuffed. The officer received the most severe punishment. A week suspension without pay. WITHOUT PAY. We know how hard those cops work, and how underpaid they are. That cruel punishment is probably a violation of some law somewhere. If there isn't a law against cruel punishments, there should be.

The Chief of Police again took immediate action, other than suspending the officer in a cruel and unusual manner without pay. He ordered that the camera system that turned off after less than an hour, turn on automatically unless the officer logged on to turn it off. He also ordered that all officers get a two hour class on how to search someone to make sure they don't have a gun.

[Savannahmann]

1. I'm going to go ahead and kick this once

Just once mind you.