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SWAT Team Destroys Man's Home with Explosives, Ram in Pursuit of Shoplifter

posted by janrinok on Wednesday June 10 2015, @07:31PM   
from the good-thing-no-one-was-jaywalking dept.

"gewg_" suggested a story, now widely reported, regarding a home in Greenwood Village, Colorado, that was all but destroyed during a standoff with an armed shoplifter:

According to reporting in AlterNet, the Denver Channel, Westword, and others:

A standoff between SWAT team members and an armed shoplifting suspect who barricaded himself in a Greenwood Village home ended, but now the home owner thinks police destroyed his house. Greenwood Village Police said the 19-hour standoff ended with no injured officers or citizens, but the home looks like a bomb went off.

There is a large hole in the front of the house, broken windows and glass are littered everywhere and shrapnel is stuck in the walls. Leo Lech said, "It looks like Osama Bin Laden's compound." Lech is no terrorist but an unlucky homeowner whose property was caught in the cross fire when the suspect broke into the home. A 9-year-old child who was in the home at the time was able to escape.

Greenwood Village Police say that the suspect had four active warrants out for narcotics and had a large amount of narcotics with him. The suspect tried to steal a car at the home and fired at police from the garage, Greenwood Village Police say. Negotiations with the suspect failed after police met two of the suspect's three demands, but the suspect severed communications with police. Police used explosives and a ramming device to gain entry into the home after negotiations failed.

"This is a complete atrocity," said Lech. "This is a paramilitary force used in a civilian environment ... for one gunman? To use this kind of power?" Lech said the Greenwood Village Police Department claimed it was not responsible and the city would not return his calls.

Additional sources:

• KDVR.com
• Daily Mail
• Denver Post

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Original Submission

• Re:You break it, you bough it. Re:You break it, you bough it. (Score: 5, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 10 2015, @08:07PM

  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 10 2015, @08:07PM (#194653)

  Hey - that's the price of 'murican FREEDOM!!!!

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• Re:You break it, you bough it. Re:You break it, you bough it. (Score: 3, Insightful) by looorg on Wednesday June 10 2015, @08:12PM

  by looorg (578) on Wednesday June 10 2015, @08:12PM (#194658)

  I guess it could be that, that or the PD forgot to get insurance or doesn't want to use theirs since the premium might go up and that might put an end to blowing shit up.

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  • Re:You break it, you bough it. (Score: 2) by mojo chan on Thursday June 11 2015, @10:12AM

    by mojo chan (266) on Thursday June 11 2015, @10:12AM (#194905)

    Isn't there any legal liability? Wouldn't the homeowner's insurance just sue them to recover the cost of the claim?

    That's normally how it works here. If say a builder damages your car while working on your neighbour's home and refuses to pay your only option is to sue them, or more commonly make a claim on your car insurance and then the insurance company sues them to recover their costs.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)

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