ok this aired a few days ago and they are still at it. My question is.. wtf dont they just get an undercover informant outside the house somewhere and just wait.. then when and if the suspect shows up.. go get him. The video is sad in a way.
http://ksla.com/Global/story.asp?S=2586460&nav=0RY5TImp
Every time the police come to Sandra Fleming’s house looking for her son, she tells them he doesn’t live there. And every time, the officers search the house anyway, looking for Tavarus Pines, who’s wanted for a parole violation. They’ve been to the Cedar Grove house four times in recent months, and not once has Pines been found.
“I’m tired of them busting up in my house,” said Fleming, while she was being kept out of her house during a search a few weeks ago. “They don’t ever show me a search warrant. They just ransack my house and leave.”
Officers gathering around the house, patrol cars parked up and down East 72nd Street , an irate being forced to wait outside – all familiar sights to Fleming’s neighbors, and all increasingly infuriating to Fleming herself.
“I cooperate with them even though they don’t cooperate with me,” she said, as an officer led a K-9 search dog up her front steps. “They don’t show me any warrant. They just look at me like I don’t exist: ‘You go sit down until we finish doing what we got to do.’
“Why can’t I go in the house? Why can’t I watch what they’re doing inside my own house? They let a dog go in my house, but not me.”
Following nearly 45 minutes of searching, officers cleared out of the house. One of them thanked Fleming for her cooperation, and, at her request, showed her the arrest warrant that ha
d been issued for her 24-year-old son.
“We have this active arrest warrant,” Probations and Parole Officer Butch Shaver explained. “We also received information this afternoon that he was present in the house, which gave us reason to come over.”
But, the explanation – and the fact that her address is listed on her son’s warrant - didn’t satisfy an irate Fleming, who was left to pick up the furniture and laundry strewn about her house.
News 12 asked civil rights attorney Nelson Cameron if the police acted appropriately.
“It would seem to me, that after they’ve been there four or so times, they should realize he’s not there,” Cameron said. “And they no longer have that ‘reason to believe.’”
The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution protects citizens from illegal searches. By legal definition, a search warrant allows officers to search a home. An arrest warrant, which is what the Shreveport officers had in this case, does not.
“An arrest warrant only gives officers the right to enter a residence to make an arrest,” Cameron said. “For the officers to enter the home and do a thorough search seems to run afoul of the Fourth Amendment and the Louisiana constitution.”
As a civil rights attorney, Cameron has heard stories like this before.
“Often times, there’s more to these people’s stories,” he said. “If everything they said would be true, you might have an airtight lawsuit against the police department. But, it does happen.
“And you don’t hear about this ever happening in Spring Lake or places like that. Where this happens is in poorer, black neighborhoods, where people often don’t have the resources to fight back.”
But, the Shreveport Police Department, whose officers assisted on the last search of Fleming’s home, vehemently denies that it has violated her civil rights.
“Any time you’re looking for someone who’s committed a crime, you have to proceed with caution,” said Kacee Hargrave, spokeswoman for the Department.
Tavarus Hines, the fugitive in question, was paroled over a year ago after being found in possession of stolen things. His record also includes a charge for resisting arrest.
“Officers have been killed searching for someone who didn’t want to be found,” Hargrave said. “We have to proceed with extreme caution.”
In Fleming’s eyes, the problem is that officers did precisely the opposite, proceeding instead with total disregard for her home and the possessions inside.
“I can understand the mother’s frustration,” Hargrave said. “But there are a lot of mothers out there who don’t want their sons to go to jail. I don’t know what her situation is. But we do have a fugitive out there, and it’s in the best interests of the citizens of Shreveport to get him off the streets.”
At least one citizen disagrees.
“My son doesn’t live here,” Fleming said. “If I knew where he was I’d let them get him. Because he’s in trouble, I’m on the chopping block too.”