Posted: 12/10/2009 9:23:03 AM EDT
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Dallas police acknowledge raiding wrong home in search for assault suspects
09:31 AM CST on Thursday, December 10, 2009 By JON NIELSEN / The Dallas Morning News [email protected] In its attempt to capture those who raped a 20-year-old woman last weekend, a Dallas police tactical team raided the wrong home, police acknowledged Wednesday. Ruben Moontiel told WFAA-TV (Channel 8) that he was working in the front yard of his home in the 7000 block of Red Bud Drive on Saturday afternoon when he saw the unit preparing for a raid. Just as he went inside to tell his wife, officers stormed their home, he said. Police seized the family vehicle, which had a special car seat for his 3-year-old son, who is disabled. "Obviously, it's a concern when we make entry into the wrong place," said Assistant Chief Charlie Cato, who oversees the department that includes SWAT. "We acted on information in good faith that this was going to lead us to the perpetrators of an outrageous crime. "We'll review to make sure this doesn't happen again." Officers were searching for the men who kidnapped, raped and robbed a Southern Methodist University student-athlete after she left a party at an Old East Dallas home early Saturday. Police believe that she was targeted at random and taken by several men about 2:20 a.m. Saturday. Her abductors threw her in a black sport utility vehicle and drove her to a deserted area, where more than one of them raped and robbed her. They took her cellphone, jewelry, shoes and jacket, according to a Dallas police report. Late Wednesday, Dallas police announced the arrests of Arturo Arevalo and Alfonso Zuniga, both 28, on aggravated sexual assault charges in Saturday's attack. They had been taken into custody for questioning late Tuesday. Charges were pending against a third suspect, said Senior Cpl. Kevin Janse, a police spokesman. Later Saturday, detectives traced activity from her stolen cellphone to an area near Jim Miller Road and Redbud Drive in Pleasant Grove. Officers were looking for the black SUV used in the crime. When they ran the license plates of various black trucks in the neighborhood, one came back with a registered sex offender listed as a previous owner. The truck, which later was purchased by Moontiel, was parked at Moontiel's home and seemed suspicious, police said. "Everything pointed to that specific address," police Lt. Andrew Harvey said. Moontiel returned to get his vehicle and his child's car seat Tuesday night. Dallas police waived the impound fees. "Unfortunately, sometimes mistakes occur. We try to do everything to limit those mistakes," Harvey said. "At the end of the day, no one's perfect." Jason Whitely of WFAA-TV (Channel 8) contributed to this report. According to the TV report, the woman's foot was broken when officers stepped on it but they refuse to pay the medical bills. |
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Ruben Moontiel told WFAA-TV (Channel 8) that he was working in the front yard of his home in the 7000 block of Red Bud Drive on Saturday afternoon when he saw the unit preparing for a raid. Just as he went inside to tell his wife, officers stormed their home, he said.
How many of us here would have gone inside and grabbed the fo bag and prepared for a seige? How many of user here would have walked over to the SWAT guys and offered them cookies and milk? |
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Quoted:
"We'll review to make sure this doesn't happen again." Well at least they didn't call it a successful raid, hand out medals and promotions - now that would be wrong. 
BTW - she suffered and they should pay the frieght Just like the IDIOTS in St. paul Minnesota did. 
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So... am I reading right that the only piece of investigation they did to pick that house to raid was determine that a car parked in the driveway had been owned by a sex offender once? That's it, thats their PC to commit to something as dangerous (for both the officers involved and the residents of the house) as a raid ?
If that is the case, this was not a raid on the wrong address since they meant to raid that specific house - it was negligent police work and someone should be facing charges. How are they going to prevent this from happening again, make a rule that says "before committing to kicking in someones door with a SWAT team, please actually do some investigation"? |
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Quoted:
The create havoc, break the woman's foot, and impound their vehicle. They won't pay the med bills, won't tow his vehicle back...I love how they said they waved his impound fee...WOW...just WOW! I'd have a google of attorney's up in their pie hole. Gaggle of attornies! Hopefully using spell-check <forgive me - I could not resist> |
