Barbering License Up To Date? Orlando Cops Sent SWAT Team To, Uh, Check
It's what I call policing creep -- the way cops have started using extreme force even in situations where there might...might...be a minor violation.

Radley Balko writes in the WaPo about an example of this -- SWAT raids on Orlando barbershops by the Orange County Sheriff's Office:

The raids were basically fishing operations for drug crimes and to recruit confidential informants. All of the raided shops were black- or Hispanic-owned. The problem is that, because they were fishing expeditions, the police didn't have enough evidence to obtain a warrant. Instead, the police asked an occupational license office to send along an inspector. Voila! These were no longer drug raids. For the purposes of the Fourth Amendment, they were now officially licensure inspections that just happened to include armored cops storming the businesses as if they were harboring an ISIS sleeper cell.

A bit from one of the raids:

Plaintiffs [Reginald] Trammon, [Jermario] Anderson, and [Edwyn] Durant were in the barbershop when the officers stormed in. The officers directed Anderson and Durant to present their driver's licenses for identification, and Inspector [Amanda] Fields instructed Anderson to retrieve his barbering license from his work station. Trammon and Anderson, who were in the process of cutting customers' hair, were then immediately patted down and handcuffed with plastic zip ties. Anderson was handcuffed by a masked officer, and Trammon was restrained by two deputies who were not wearing masks. Sometime after Trammon was handcuffed, he informed the officers that he was in possession of a concealed firearm for which he had a valid concealed-weapons permit. The officers patted him down to retrieve the weapon and located the permit without incident.

[Police Cpl. Keith] Vidler, who was the supervisor on the scene, admits that he ordered deputies to detain Trammon. When Trammon argued to one of the officers that he had done nothing wrong, the officer responded, "It's a pretty big book, I'm pretty sure I can find something in here to take you to jail for." Durant, though told to "sit down and shut up," was not handcuffed and was eventually permitted to leave the shop.

More:

I've since posted about incidents in which SWAT teams were sent to raid someone suspected of credit card fraud and a woman involved in an ongoing zoning dispute with the local government. Of course, we've also seen hundreds of SWAT-style raids on people in the medical marijuana business, even though they pose little threat to police or the public. There have also been SWAT raids on doctors and patients suspected of crimes involving prescription painkillers, even though, again, there's little reason to think these suspects are dangerous. Last year, a spokesperson for the St. Louis County, Mo., police department told a local TV station that all felony warrants there are now served with SWAT teams, regardless of the crime.

So a level of force once reserved for hostage situations, bank robberies and active shooters is now being used on low-level drug offenders, people suspected of white-collar crimes, people who have unkempt property and to make sure the local bar is properly labeling its beer. Keep in mind, too, that anyone who happens to be in these homes or businesses at the time of the raid gets subjected to the same terror, fright, and abuse as the suspect or business owner.

This is abuse, under the color of law, sometimes sans probable cause -- in the cases of regulatory checks via SWA. And as Radley notes, in this case, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit came to the conclusion that "a criminal raid executed under the guise of an administrative inspection is constitutionally unreasonable."

However, not all courts come to this conclusion, and it's sick that police overreach seems to be spreading. These raids are dangerous and often unconstitutional, and they have no place in what we think of as a free society.