Almost 1 year ago, those wonderful men in blue of Habersham County Georgia, sworn to serve and protect, burst into the Phonesavanh house in a midnight no-knock SWAT raid, barely opened a bedroom door and threw a flash bang grenade into the room. The grenade landed in sleeping baby Bou-Bous crib and detonated, burning at over 2,000 degrees, horribly burning the baby who was rushed to a hospital and placed into a coma. The raid was based on an anonymous tip that a $50 drug deal had taken place at the home. It was a false tip. No drugs were found in the home, no illegal activity, no charges were levied on the family. The family sued. The Habersham cops claimed innocent they claimed it was the babys fault. William Grigg went through the trial records explains the defense the cops used: http://www.freedominourtime.blogspot.com/2015/05/pity-poor-stormtroopers-baby-bou-bou.html The act of sleeping in a room about to be breached by a SWAT team constituted criminal conduct on the part of the infant. At the very least, the infant was fully liable for the nearly fatal injuries inflicted on him when Habersham County Sheriffs Deputy Charles Long blindly heaved a flash-bang grenade a destructive device, as described by the ATF, that when detonated burns at 2,000-3,500 degrees Fahrenheit into the crib. Merely by being in that room, Bou-Bou had assumed the risk of coming under attack by a SWAT team. By impeding the trajectory of that grenade, rather than fleeing from his crib, Bou-Bou failed to avoid the consequences of that attack. In any case, Bou-Bou, along with his parents and his siblings, are fully and exclusively to blame for the injuries that nearly killed the child and left the family with more than one million dollars in medical bills. The SWAT team that invaded the home in Cornelia, Georgia on the basis of a bogus anonymous tip that a $50 drug transaction had occurred there is legally blameless. Exageration? This is what the cops claimed in their formal legal defense, starting at page 33 of their legal defense presented to the court http://www.scribd.com/doc/265760507/Flash-Bang-Reply Fifth Defense: Plaintiffs' damages, if any, resulted solely from the voluntary and intentional conduct of plaintiffs or others and not from any conduct of these defendants or those over whom these defendants had any control. Sixth Defense: Plaintiffs' damages, if any, were caused by the independent acts and decisions of persons and entities other than these defendants or those over whom these defendants had some legal right of control. Seventh Defense: To the extent as may be shown by the evidence through discovery, these defendants show that plaintiffs' damages, if any, were directly and proximately caused by the contributory and comparative negligence of plaintiffs and their failure to exercise ordinary care. Ninth Defense: No act or omission of these defendants either proximately caused or contributed to any damages allegedly suffered by plaintiffs; therefore, plaintiffs have no right of recovery against these defendants. According to the cops, those wonderful men who man the "thin blue line" (which side of the line are they standing on?), they did nothing wrong. Its the parents fault for not preparing for the no-knock SWAT raid to ensure nobody was injured. The baby was negligent for being in the crib. Again from William Grigg: A tax-subsidized settlement was reached about a month ago in which the National Fire Insurance Company will pay $964,000 to the family -- a little more than $538,000 for medical expenses, and multiple installments of $200,000 to the infant after he turns 18 in 2033. This arrangement will leave the family facing at least a half-million dollars in current medical expenses, a figure that will be matched or eclipsed by future costs incurred by Bou-Bou's ongoing medical treatment. In familiar fashion, nobody responsible for this crime will be compelled to make restitution, or be held accountable for the nearly fatal injuries inflicted on the child and the significant but non-life-threatening injury suffered by his father -- during the 2:00 a.m. home invasion that took place nearly a year ago. The babys father was also injured, suffering shoulder injuries when he was thrown to the ground and assaulted by the men who protect the innocent. An entire police department rallies its forces to prevent a baby who they horribly wounded, injured for life, and nearly killed from receiving just compensation. The Habersham cops never even apologized. And you think there is justice in the "justice system"? You think cops are your friend? You still think this isn't a police state?
There is plenty wrong with the police actions in this case and you could make a perfectly calm, honest and valid argument against them so I don't see any justification in promoting and repeating blatant lies and emotive rhetoric in relation to it. Clearly you hate the police and would support anything negative presented about them regardless of whether it was legitimate or not and that only serves to help mask the real misconduct like this.
There is everything wrong about this escapade, from the "investigation" leading to the raid, to the raid itself, the cover-up and lying, and the trial and lawsuit. I didn't even get into the injuries to the babies father (suffered when cops threw him onto the floor and "restrained" him), or the lies the cops told the parents about why their baby had been taken away and why there was blood on the crib. Perhaps you can list the "blatant lies"? Emotive rhetoric is absolutely called for, everyone should be disgusted with these abusers in uniform.
We know that police brutality is happening. The reason why a SWAT team was there, had a flashbang there, is because of our war on drugs. So then why is it so hard to accept the fact that police officers engage in such brutality when it makes national headlines? Think about Freddie Grayson, how many people on PF and in the media said that he broke his own back? It's clear that this is taking a hard stance against the police, so why not for Freddie Grayson or anyone else as well? What makes their case so different? The only one I can really see is that this was a trial, but there have been plenty of other stories that people have been angry at police without a trial in the first place too. So what's the real difference?
This is just terrible. I'm less angry about their mistake and their actions regarding that than I am about them trying to avoid paying the family. This child's life is changed forever, as well as the parents, and this is all due to the police negligence. They really do need to give the family some compensation. All of the hospital bills should be paid, as well as any future medical bills. I would assume that this child will have to (if not already) have reconstructive surgery, skin grafts, and all kinds of complicated medical procedures. The family is definitely entitled to some compensation, IMO. Poor little baby! Heartbreaking story.
Another casualty of the War on Drugs. I remember listening to a video where Ron Paul told a story about an incident where police raided a house based on a false tip-off. They burst into the house without warning and found a man sitting on the couch holding what appeared to them to be a gun. The man jumped up in surprise and they shot him dead. Turned out the man was just holding a black remote control sitting in front of his TV.
After a terrorist attack, the first thing you liberals say is, "they (Muslims) aren't all like thaaaaat..." Well, by the same token, not all the 'men in blue' are like that, so don't talk as though they are.
Yes, when will people realize the utter waste of human treasure and time is wasted by keeping Marijuana illegal or, for that matter, any of the drugs on the illegal schedule. Criminialization is causing easily available drugs with unknown potency and ingredients which causes deaths and overdoses. We have a world-wide criminal Cartel and underground economy that includes murder, guns, gangs, etc. If caffeine were illegal, we'd have the SAME problem. We all know what happened in the case of the prohibition of alcohol. Sorry for the rant but these stories of USELESS deaths caused by making an substance illegal is just getting overwhelming. I mean, what are they afraid a Heroin addict is going to do? The ONLY reason addicts commit crimes is because their chosen 'poison' costs so much money. If it were LEGAL, it would be cheap AND the potency and content would be KNOWN.
William Grigg is either a complete ret@rd or a pathetic inflammatory sh/tbag is he is actually attempting to twist the defense into this: The act of sleeping in a room about to be breached by a SWAT team constituted criminal conduct on the part of the infant. At the very least, the infant was fully liable for the nearly fatal injuries inflicted on him when Habersham County Sheriffs Deputy Charles Long blindly heaved a flash-bang grenade a destructive device, as described by the ATF, that when detonated burns at 2,000-3,500 degrees Fahrenheit into the crib. Merely by being in that room, Bou-Bou had assumed the risk of coming under attack by a SWAT team. By impeding the trajectory of that grenade, rather than fleeing from his crib, Bou-Bou failed to avoid the consequences of that attack.
Nobody is blaming the baby and the officer who actually threw the flash-bang doesn't appear to have said anything personally. Your choice of thread title and the nature of the blog you decided to quote actually damages the very significant legitimate points that should be made. Emotive rhetoric is never called for. It only serves to cloud the facts and encourages exaggeration and misinformation, as you've aptly demonstrated. It's perfectly normal to be absolutely disgusted by this, including the legal response, but if you're incapable of addressing it calmly and honestly, you're just another part of the problem.
So, no lies to report? I linked to and quoted from the actual trial document written by the cops defense attorney and presented to the court. The defense literally blamed the baby and the parents for their injuries. When cops - or anybody - take such a disgusting tactic in order to avoid their own responsibility, they deserve all the scorn and ridicule possible.
So which of those quotes, specifically, did the cops blame the baby? Because looking at your defense points, no such thing was said, in any way, shape or form, and only a complete and utter ret@rd would make that leap. To summarize: The defense made specific claims in their defense, none of which blamed the baby. William Grigg using childish logic and rhetoric, translated those defense points into, 'they blamed the baby', and you lap it up and try to proclaim it as fact.
You are not correct. The baby (Bou-Bou) is the lead plaintiff lead plaintiff. The cops defense document to the court states all injuries were "directly and proximately caused by the contributory and comparative negligence of plaintiffs and their failure to exercise ordinary care". The cops blame the plaintiffs - remember the principle plaintiff is the baby. The grenade injured the baby and the father was injured because the baby and the parents were "negligent" and did not "exercise ordinary care" in preparing for the surprise 2 am secret raid. Those are the facts, bub. I gave you the link to the defendants own legal court document, here is the link to the plaintiffs complaint http://www.scribd.com/doc/265758801/Bou-Bou-Complaint Read it for yourself, the cops directly blame the baby for being injured by the grenade thrown by the cop. Pretty despicable.
Wrong again, the complaint specifically identifies the baby as the principle plaintiff, and claims for injuries were levied specifically for injuries to the baby, injuries the cops despicably want people to believe were the result of the baby's negligence and parents negligence. You can repeat yourself 100 more times, its obvious the cops are at fault, were negligent and reckless, and blame a baby for the injuries the cops caused by throwing a grenade into the babies crib. Its not as bad as the cops disgusting behavior both in the raid and the trial, but your defense of the cops is quite repugnant.
Irrelevant, since the suit names multiple plaintiffs and the defense's points refer to the plaintiffs in the plural sense. I never said the police were not at fault in the case. No-knock warrants, while useful in certain situations, have a world of bad that can go with them. The point I am refuting is your and Grigg's ret@rdation that the police are trying to say the baby was at fault. Obvious to anybody with an I.Q. above that of a doorknob, that they are referring to the culpability of the parents (and I disagree with that alleged culpability also). But hey, your reading comprehension skills are somewhat lower than my daughter's, and she is in first grade.
If you are correct, then the police claim the parents were negligent and irresponsible for putting the baby in its crib in their bedroom to sleep through the night, and claim the parents are negligent for not seeing the grenade be thrown into the dark room and jumping up and getting the baby out of the crib before the grenade went off. You are in a lose-lose situation. In one case the cops blame the baby for being too slow to get out of its crib, in the other they essentially accuse the parents of hurting the baby. One is only slightly less despicable than the other, but its academic because they actually did blame the baby for its injuries.
Your thread title states that the cop (singular) who threw the flash-bang blames the baby. That remains totally unsupported by anything you linked or quoted. Again, there are plenty of real wrongs in this case and this kind of trash only serves to distract from them.
The cop was represented by the lawyer who - in the cops name and with the cops approval - clearly blames the baby. You keep saying there are "plenty of real wrongs" but you seem to resent it when the cops are called out for their egregious behavior throughout all aspects of this case. The cops were wrong, they lied, they were incompetent, they were reckless and negligent, they severely injured 2 innocent people, and they played legal games to avoid justice. If the community of cops were decent, even if they were just honest, in fact even in the interest of good public relatins simply protecting their own jobs, they would ostracize the Habersham PD. They would call out the baby-burners and demand they be fired. Instead, they remain silent or actually support the bad cops - and tacitly support the injuries to the baby and family.
That's because liberals are incapable of articulating worthwhile criticisms of the police. They see the widespread violence committed by police and realize that there's something wrong, but are unable to attack the police as an institution because their worldview demands that police exist. This inevitably leads them to highlight individual cases of abuse because that's all they have. The fact of the matter is the police, as an institution, exist to defend the rule of the capitalist class, and that alone is what makes them worthy of criticism. The fact that this line of work tends to attract domineering, aggressive, psychopaths is both obvious and largely irrelevant.
the only thing more dangerous in this case, is the scumbag (*)(*)(*)(*)ing attorney that wrote this........the cops and he both deserve what ever misery they get in life. That's like the cop who shot the 7 year old through the head that walked because they jury wouldn't convict. His attorney needs to be brought up on charges as well. We are literally paying for our own executions
