This whole SWAT thing is getting a little out of hand

[hirundo82]

Department of Education SWAT team raids California home due to loan default.

[AEA]

CRAZY!

[pbwalker]

this is not surprising...at least they (somewhat) got the right address.

[philip964]

Good he didn't think it was a home invasion and have his gun with him or he would be dead.

Is there not real crime out there?

[chasfm11]

The link no longer works. Our "revisionist historian" media is at work again. I can find the story all over the Conservative blog pages but I guess the news isn't fit to print in the mainstream organizations.

I'm all for making sure that student loans are repaid. Using a SWAT team should not be part of that equation.

[mamabearCali]

I may be wrong, but as I remember using deadly force to collect a debt is illegal. So perhaps everyone involved in this fiasco should be prosecuted under loan shark laws.

Since when has being in debt, even to the government, been a crime. As I remember debtors prisons went the way of Merry Old England.

If we are going after people who owe the government, when do we get to see swat teams attack the all the tax cheats--not people who are down on their luck--but true tax cheats in congress?

Now, one should pay ones' debts, but swat teams for a student loan!!! How about the tried and true wage garnishment/tax liens/property liens? Isn't that how people are supposed to be forced to pay debts?

[hirundo82]

Even if it was the Dept of Ed OIG doesn't mean it wasn't a SWAT team as well; virtually all law enforcement agencies have a SWAT team (who doesn't like to get dressed up like a ninja and play soldier?).

Regardless, breaking down the door to serve a warrant for a non-violent offender is overkill. What happened to waiting a reasonable amount of time for someone to answer the door and handing them the warrant?

[mamabearCali]

Still even if it was for Student Loan Fraud--which is a whole different creature than default, why were they using SWAT. Good God, knock. You likely could have gained entry to the home and searched it without terrorizing the man and his three kids. What if he had not seen the police cars and thought it was an intruder and protected his children. They would have shot and killed him and then what. They would have shot an innocent man for something that could have been handled much more calmly. Newsflash--You can't take bullets back. Nor can you now teach those kids that the police are here to help them.

[wheelgun1958]

They've been 'out of hand' since their inception.

[hirundo82]

They've been 'out of hand' since their inception.

They were originally concieved for hostage rescue situations (interest began after the botched rescue of the Israeli athletes at the 1972 Munich Olympics), which are of course extremely rare. As originally concieved, I could see justification for at most a part-time team for a region or even a single state (for some of the smaller states.

They've grown out of control due to their need to justify their own existence and the money available due to the War on Drugs. Multiple full-time teams with some of the larger department is just aking for them to be overused.

[ssnstump]

Since When is the Dept of Education a law enforcement agency? Or an IG office? IGs are investigative not enforcement.
Or am I all wrong? The "victim" here is very lucky he looked first.

[seamusTX]

Since When is the Dept of Education a law enforcement agency?

Good question.

The U.S. Department of Education Office of the Inspector General was authorized to use armed force by the Homeland Security Act of 2002 (Public Law 107-296):

http://www.ignet.gov/pande/standards/agleguidelines.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Every bureaucratic fantasy managed to latch onto an anti-terrorism bill in that timeframe. Once these agencies have their ninjas and expensive toys, they will go on forever.

I don't know what the "suspect" owed in defaulted student loans in this case, but it probably was less than the cost of the raid.

- Jim

[flintknapper]

Now they are saying it wasn't SWAT, it was OIG.

Being tight lipped about it of course..

http://www.news10.net/news/local/story. ... yid=141108" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Definitely not SWAT, (no dogs killed).

[i8godzilla]

Now they are saying it wasn't SWAT, it was OIG.

Being tight lipped about it of course..

http://www.news10.net/news/local/story. ... yid=141108" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Definitely not SWAT, (no dogs killed).

Or former Marines.