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"SWATting" will get somebody killed because police enter without a warrant

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

From Yahoo! Tech and AP: AP IMPACT: SWAT teams deployed in 911 fraud. Scammers are using internet-based phone services to call 911 and report that they are high on drugs and shot their sister. The SWAT team responds and breaks in. Doug Bates and his wife, Stacey, were in bed around 10 p.m., their 2-year-old daughters asleep in a nearby room. Suddenly they were shaken awake by the wail of police sirens and the rumble of a helicopter above their suburban Southern California home. A criminal must be on the loose, they thought. Doug Bates got up to lock the doors and grabbed a knife. A beam from a flashlight hit him. He peeked into the backyard. A swarm of police, assault rifles drawn, ordered him out of the house. Bates emerged, frightened and with the knife in his hand, as his wife frantically dialed 911...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on February 03, 2009 (boomark / email).