This is disgusting.
Why does LE get a free ride, a get out of jail card? I can see the need for "color of law" in some instances, but this one, no.....Thes officers need to be fired and put in jail.....If these officers are not going to do their jobs, confirm information from a CI, they do not need to be wearing badges. This, I dont care how you cut it, was a home invasion.
Family, Claiborne County reach settlement in botched-raid case
By JAMIE SATTERFIELD, satterfield@knews.com
August 21, 2006
It was a quiet Sunday night in Claiborne County.
Dennis K. Smith and his wife, Kristie Dawn Smith, had just put their preschool son to bed and were heading to their own when three armed men, one wearing a mask, burst into their mobile home on Blake Lane.
Awakened by the commotion, 5-year-old Jordan watched as his parents were ordered at gunpoint onto the floor and his father was handcuffed. The men identified themselves as Claiborne County Sheriff's Department deputies and demanded to know where the 116 pounds of marijuana was stashed. Where, too, the deputies wanted to know, was the methamphetamine, and where were the Smiths' "meth-cookers?"
The law enforcement crew, headed by then-Sheriff Eddie Shoffner, searched to no avail for drugs and soon found out why they had come up empty-handed.
The deputies had raided the home of a law-abiding family on the word of a drug-using informant. No effort had been made to verify the snitch's story, check who lived at the mobile home, or even confirm to whom vehicles in the driveway were registered.
Now Claiborne County taxpayers will cough up $10,000 to pay a mediated settlement in a federal lawsuit filed by the Smiths against Shoffner and the county he represented in July 2002 when the botched raid occurred.
"The (Smith) family is relieved to have this chapter in their lives come to a conclusion," said attorney Tasha Blakney, who represented the Smiths with attorney Richard Gaines. "It's been a very difficult time."
Morristown attorney Jeffrey Ward, who represented Claiborne County, did not return a call for comment.
Under the terms of the settlement, which has not been approved in U.S. District Court but likely will be at a hearing Sept. 1, Claiborne County admits no fault. That is standard in settlements in which both sides agree to walk away with their opposing viewpoints of a disputed incident intact.
But court records offer some of the uglier details that a trial in the civil lawsuit may well have aired. Ironically, some of the most damaging details for Claiborne County's ex-sheriff are found in a court ruling in his favor by U.S. District Judge Thomas Phillips.
Phillips previously relied on the words of Shoffner, who lost a re-election bid in August 2002, for many of those unfavorable details. The judge reviewed the former sheriff's deposition before reaching a decision that tossed the lawsuit - largely on grounds that law enforcement officers are generally immune under the law from litigation in work-related mishaps.
The Smiths appealed, which sent the case into a mandatory mediation effort that resulted in the proposed settlement awaiting Phillips' approval.
It was a confidential informant, identified in court records only as "CI," who led deputies to the Smiths' home. He claimed the deputies would find 116 pounds of pot in the closet, two "meth-cookers" and methamphetamine. The snitch said he had bought pot from a man there hours before. The snitch identified the pot dealer by name.
The Smiths' names were never mentioned by the snitch.
Unlike informants who work with law enforcement to try to earn sentencing breaks in their own criminal cases, this snitch worked for cash and apparently did not run afoul of Shoffner for his own drug crimes, according to Phillips' opinion.
"Shoffner had known the CI's family for a long time, as the CI's uncle worked for Shoffner's father," Phillips wrote. "Additionally, the CI's uncle and father had encouraged Shoffner to run for sheriff. Shoffner considered the CI to be 'like a member of the family' and thought of the CI's paternal uncle as a 'brother'
"The fact that the CI was an active drug abuser during the time he was providing information to the defendants was known to Shoffner," Phillips wrote. "Yet he considered the CI to be a 'dream informant.' "
Shoffner had a meeting to attend and sent the snitch to a now ex-deputy to handle, Phillips wrote.
"(The deputy) admits that she did not write down everything the CI told her," the judge wrote. "Shoffner states that he did not confirm the information in this case because it 'was a Sunday. Everything was closed. They were moving fast for 100 pounds of marijuana so they didn't check anything through Emergency 911.' Shoffner admits that he read and signed the affidavit even though he did not talk to the officers who measured the distance to the plaintiffs' house."
Jamie Satterfield may be reached at 865-342-6308.
http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/article/0,1406,kns_347_4931615,00.html
Why does LE get a free ride, a get out of jail card? I can see the need for "color of law" in some instances, but this one, no.....Thes officers need to be fired and put in jail.....If these officers are not going to do their jobs, confirm information from a CI, they do not need to be wearing badges. This, I dont care how you cut it, was a home invasion.
Family, Claiborne County reach settlement in botched-raid case
By JAMIE SATTERFIELD, satterfield@knews.com
August 21, 2006
It was a quiet Sunday night in Claiborne County.
Dennis K. Smith and his wife, Kristie Dawn Smith, had just put their preschool son to bed and were heading to their own when three armed men, one wearing a mask, burst into their mobile home on Blake Lane.
Awakened by the commotion, 5-year-old Jordan watched as his parents were ordered at gunpoint onto the floor and his father was handcuffed. The men identified themselves as Claiborne County Sheriff's Department deputies and demanded to know where the 116 pounds of marijuana was stashed. Where, too, the deputies wanted to know, was the methamphetamine, and where were the Smiths' "meth-cookers?"
The law enforcement crew, headed by then-Sheriff Eddie Shoffner, searched to no avail for drugs and soon found out why they had come up empty-handed.
The deputies had raided the home of a law-abiding family on the word of a drug-using informant. No effort had been made to verify the snitch's story, check who lived at the mobile home, or even confirm to whom vehicles in the driveway were registered.
Now Claiborne County taxpayers will cough up $10,000 to pay a mediated settlement in a federal lawsuit filed by the Smiths against Shoffner and the county he represented in July 2002 when the botched raid occurred.
"The (Smith) family is relieved to have this chapter in their lives come to a conclusion," said attorney Tasha Blakney, who represented the Smiths with attorney Richard Gaines. "It's been a very difficult time."
Morristown attorney Jeffrey Ward, who represented Claiborne County, did not return a call for comment.
Under the terms of the settlement, which has not been approved in U.S. District Court but likely will be at a hearing Sept. 1, Claiborne County admits no fault. That is standard in settlements in which both sides agree to walk away with their opposing viewpoints of a disputed incident intact.
But court records offer some of the uglier details that a trial in the civil lawsuit may well have aired. Ironically, some of the most damaging details for Claiborne County's ex-sheriff are found in a court ruling in his favor by U.S. District Judge Thomas Phillips.
Phillips previously relied on the words of Shoffner, who lost a re-election bid in August 2002, for many of those unfavorable details. The judge reviewed the former sheriff's deposition before reaching a decision that tossed the lawsuit - largely on grounds that law enforcement officers are generally immune under the law from litigation in work-related mishaps.
The Smiths appealed, which sent the case into a mandatory mediation effort that resulted in the proposed settlement awaiting Phillips' approval.
It was a confidential informant, identified in court records only as "CI," who led deputies to the Smiths' home. He claimed the deputies would find 116 pounds of pot in the closet, two "meth-cookers" and methamphetamine. The snitch said he had bought pot from a man there hours before. The snitch identified the pot dealer by name.
The Smiths' names were never mentioned by the snitch.
Unlike informants who work with law enforcement to try to earn sentencing breaks in their own criminal cases, this snitch worked for cash and apparently did not run afoul of Shoffner for his own drug crimes, according to Phillips' opinion.
"Shoffner had known the CI's family for a long time, as the CI's uncle worked for Shoffner's father," Phillips wrote. "Additionally, the CI's uncle and father had encouraged Shoffner to run for sheriff. Shoffner considered the CI to be 'like a member of the family' and thought of the CI's paternal uncle as a 'brother'
"The fact that the CI was an active drug abuser during the time he was providing information to the defendants was known to Shoffner," Phillips wrote. "Yet he considered the CI to be a 'dream informant.' "
Shoffner had a meeting to attend and sent the snitch to a now ex-deputy to handle, Phillips wrote.
"(The deputy) admits that she did not write down everything the CI told her," the judge wrote. "Shoffner states that he did not confirm the information in this case because it 'was a Sunday. Everything was closed. They were moving fast for 100 pounds of marijuana so they didn't check anything through Emergency 911.' Shoffner admits that he read and signed the affidavit even though he did not talk to the officers who measured the distance to the plaintiffs' house."
Jamie Satterfield may be reached at 865-342-6308.
http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/local_news/article/0,1406,kns_347_4931615,00.html