Imagine the old Andy Griffith show, you know the one where he played a small town sheriff, but instead of gun crazy deputy Fife having a six shooter he would be carrying a SIG SG 551, .223 caliber, 30 round, fully automatic, swiss cheese maker. Yeah, Barney Fife with a weapon common to todays small town SWAT teams, and Marines fighting in Iraq.

The picture accompanying this story is of Cheye Calvo and his wife. Cheye is the Mayor of Washington D.C. suburb Berwyn Heights. He is also the latest casualty in the militarization of our police forces, and the total disregard of the US Constitution.

Last week, the Prince George’s County SWAT team busted down his front door without a single knock, tatically entered the house, shot and killed the mayors two black labrador retrievers (one of whom was running AWAY from the intruders), and handcuffed the mayor and his mother-in-law for 90 minutes.

HOLY SHIT… who did this mayor kill? Did he take a shot at President Bush or something?

Turns out the mayors crime was going out onto his front steps, picking up a package addressed to his wife left by a package delivery company, and bringing it in the house. That’s it. That is ALL the mayor did to provoke a full on home breach and shooting involving the police. Read the mayors own description of it here.

Now what the hell could have been in that package that demanded a full military style assault, with weapons blasting, into the home of the MAYOR of a US city? Weapons Grade Uranium? Plutonium? Anthrax? Tax money? An Al-Queda operative?

Nope. Reefer. Weed. Pot. Marijuana. Thirty + pounds or so. That is all it took for what are known as “Prince George’s Finest” to completely destroy the front door without knocking or announcing their presence to the residents inside the home. Now, the state of Maryland doesn’t issue “no-knock” warrants… but they’ve written exemptions into the law to allow for them, even though the cops can’t legally obtain them. The two exemptions are:
1. The officer(s) reasonably believe their lives would be endangered if they knocked and announced.
2. The officers reasonably believe the suspects can destroy the evidence before they can enter.

OK, so lets look at those two things in the context of this military raid. Any reasonable person involved in local law enforcement should know, with even the slightest investigation, that this is the home of a relatively small city MAYOR. Did the cops honestly believe the mayor was going to start firing at them while screaming “Say Hello To My Little Friend!”? Think about it. Then chew on the fact that the cops KNEW the box contained 30 pounds of ganja. THIRTY POUNDS! Just how the hell was the mayor going to dispose of THIRTY pounds of MJ in the one minute it takes for the cops to knock on the door and yell POLICE MUTHAFUCKA OPEN UP?

Well, one thing about this… the feds are finally getting involved in a fucked up police raid. Of course I don’t anticipate them finding the cops at fault. Cops are NEVER at fault… even when, as in this case, they are guilty of crimes against the US Constitution.

Oh, and the best part… the cops have acknowledged that neither the Mayor, his wife, or his mother-in-law were aware of the shipment of marijuana, that is was supposed to be intercepted before delivery by the actual criminals. I mean real “criminals”, not the ones with badges. Of course this would spark outrage if it wasn’t commonplace… but this happens EVERY day in this country.