A SWAT team in Texas showed up at the wrong home to execute a no-knock search warrant.
It was after sunset when a SWAT team gathered on the steps of 583 8 th Street, ready to break down the door. But Lieutenant Mike Lewis suddenly realized his SWAT team was about to undertake a no-knock raid at the wrong home. Crisis averted, the team reassembled at 593 8 th Street and launched their assault.
But that wasn’t the right house either! Instead, the right house was two doors down and the SWAT team was tearing apart the Jimerson family’s home.
Officers broke down the front door, shattered windows, and detonated a flashbang grenade. Karen Jimerson was in the shower, her partner James was still asleep, and their children were showered in glass as they lay in their beds. While the family was being held at gunpoint, one of the officers realized that they were in the wrong home arresting the wrong people.
Following the raid, the police department tried to pave over Lewis’s giant mistake by paying for repairs, but the Jimerson family was not compensated for the trauma they went through as their constitutional rights were being violated.
Karen sued the officers who needlessly blew apart her home and traumatized her family.
A federal district court granted most of the officers qualified immunity, but not Lewis. However, in a recent 2-1 decision, the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals overruled and ordered the lawsuit to be dismissed. Now the Jimersons are working with the Institute for Justice and asking the full court of appeals to let their fight for justice move forward.
The Fourth Amendment protects Americans from unreasonable searches and seizures. When SWAT teams raid homes, they must have a search warrant or special circumstances such as a hostage situation. A wrong house raid is a Fourth Amendment violation and Lewis admitted that he violated the family’s rights.
MORE FROM FORBES ADVISORBut, if you are familiar with qualified immunity, you know that an officer admitting they violated your constitutional rights is not enough to keep your civil rights lawsuit alive. The appeals court determined that because Lewis had taken at least some steps to try to get the right house, he had not violated “clearly established law.”
The court gave Lewis credit for doing things like “reviewing the search warrant” and “debriefing with DEA agents twice” but that’s like getting credit for studying before the exam even though you got the final answer dead wrong. While Lewis supposedly “confirm[ed] the house had the proper arrangement and size of windows,” it still took Mr. Magoo-like visual acuity to mistake the Jimerson’s house for the target house two doors down.
When Lewis directed the team to the Jimerson home, he did not check the house number. The correct house had its address clearly displayed. The warrant told Lewis the target house was the 13th on the block, but the Jimerson’s was the 15th. The Jimerson home also had a large wheelchair ramp that the target house did not have.
A no-knock raid is an extremely dangerous situation with police knowingly causing destruction to catch suspects by surprise. There is a good chance that people inside a house being raided will be injured. And a raid could easily result in what one legal expert calls a “legal shootout” in which a homeowner is legally defending their home while police are legally returning fire.
The utmost care must be taken not only to ensure that police get the right address for their warrant but then also that they raid the correct residence. The potential for things to go off the rails is why several states and a number of municipalities have banned no-knock raids.
Baseball hall of famer Frank Robinson famously said, “Close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades.” Police shouldn’t get credit for coming close when executing a no-knock raid. But while Lewis couldn’t get a do-over after raiding the Jimerson’s house, the full 5th Circuit has a chance to get things right by denying qualified immunity.