Jose Guerena Shot 60 times by Swat in his Home

[Guest friesepferd]

Is sending a SWAT team to serve a narcotics warrant standard procedure? This isn't a trick question; I simply don't know.

it is there, according to the chief of police.

and no... i dont think it should be

[DaveTN]

Is sending a SWAT team to serve a narcotics warrant standard procedure? This isn't a trick question; I simply don't know.

Generally… no, not unless there is reason to believe there will be a problem.

It is my understanding this was a suspect in a home invasion group.

It might be if your City/Department is big enough to keep a SWAT team busy.

[Guest nicemac]

The policy of using paramilitary tactics to execute a search warrant is the problem. Why couldn't they just pull this guy over on his way home from work and detain him while they toss his house.

+2

[Guest UberDuper]

It is my understanding this was a suspect in a home invasion group.

It's my understanding that this accusation was made by the lawyer hired to represent the officers involved. AFAIK the only official word from the police was that it was a search warrant for drugs, like all the other houses raided that morning.

[Guest Lester Weevils]

It is a shame the lawyer representing the officers feels it necessary to make the homeowner out to be a bad guy. Maybe he was a bad guy, dunno.

The officers on the front line probably didn't do anything wrong and ought not to be in trouble. The front line officers didn't choose the time, place or tactics.

On the other hand if Sheriff Dupnik gets in trouble it won't hurt my feelings. Or if the case brings attention to bad national and local policy.

[Guest GunTroll]

How many of you guys can wake from a deep sleep in the comfort and safety of your own bed to correctly identify cops from crooks as they break down your door within 18 seconds? As they break down your door, will you gamble on not having a weapon in your hands? If it's cops, you die. Will you gamble on NOT having a weapon? If it's crooks, you AND your family are at their mercy. Tough choice. I'd love to hear from some cops on how the law-abiding citizen is to deal with this life and death conundrum.

I'm still waiting on an answer for this question. The whole paragraph is spot on. What say you LE's prior and current? I'm not real interested in any other individuals opinion for this question.

I'm bothered by these type of "legal" home invasions that get a pass because someone signed the piece of paper that authorized it, and the perpetrator wears a badge. From my limited Military experience you escalate force as needed. Not drop the hammer right off the bat. Sooner or later the admin should be held accountable.

[Dolomite_supafly]

And even when the admin is wrong who do you think pays the settlement?

It is the tax payers. Either with higher taxes or reduced services county or city wide.

Dolomite

[DaveTN]

I'm still waiting on an answer for this question. The whole paragraph is spot on. What say you LE's prior and current? I'm not real interested in any other individuals opinion for this question.

Like anything else… tactics and training. Seek or stay in cover, identify your target, don’t be left standing pointing a rifle a bunch of shooters no matter who they are, decide if you want to fight or surrender.

There obviously is no magical answer. Mistakes are made. There are cases where mistakes were clearly made and innocent people died; this does not appear to be one of them.

I'm bothered by these type of "legal" home invasions that get a pass because someone signed the piece of paper that authorized it, and the perpetrator wears a badge. From my limited Military experience you escalate force as needed. Not drop the hammer right off the bat. Sooner or later the admin should be held accountable.

We don’t know what information they had on this guy. Maybe an informant told the cops that if you kick the door he will point a gun at you. That’s what happened and the force was escalated right then.

[DaveTN]

And even when the admin is wrong who do you think pays the settlement?

It is the tax payers. Either with higher taxes or reduced services county or city wide.

Dolomite

You are exactly right. The wife will get a big named lawyer to take her case. The County will cut a deal just so they don’t have to go to court. The attorney will get most of the money, the wife will get next to nothing, and the tax payers will foot the bill.

[bajabuc]

The police will always be on the side of the police. The anti-gun nuts will claim another reason to confiscate. The civilian is always wrong because the lawyer can make it so.

My friend Bill had prior information that the Narco squad was coming to bust him. He had a state legislator and a squad of Highway Patrolmen waiting. The narco squad were all carrying narcotics to plant at Bills house...they were searched and arrested. Bill got millions. Naturally I can't prove this because all the evidence was "removed."

Edited June 3, 2011 by bajabuc

[Guest GunTroll]

Like anything else… tactics and training. Seek or stay in cover, identify your target, don’t be left standing pointing a rifle a bunch of shooters no matter who they are, decide if you want to fight or surrender.

There obviously is no magical answer. Mistakes are made. There are cases where mistakes were clearly made and innocent people died; this does not appear to be one of them.

From what I read. Nothing was found. To me that makes the cops look bad and therefore , in the wrong for this particular use of force. From the detective who gathered the info to the swat team that killed him. If it turned out the other way where the evil pot was there, then I'd still say they were wrong.

We don’t know what information they had on this guy. Maybe an informant told the cops that if you kick the door he will point a gun at you. That’s what happened and the force was escalated right then.

More reason to go and kill him eh? "That man has a gun and we think he is a bad guy" KILL!!!!

And even when the admin is wrong who do you think pays the settlement?

It is the tax payers. Either with higher taxes or reduced services county or city wide.

Dolomite

More reason to NOT do this sort of BS! They should pay and pay dearly! Perhaps a personnel change is in order.

[Dolomite_supafly]

More reason to go and kill him eh? "That man has a gun and we think he is a bad guy" KILL!!!!

More reason to NOT do this sort of BS! They should pay and pay dearly! Perhaps a personnel change is in order.[/QUOTE]

That would be my thought in this situation. If someone I think is a bad guy has a gun pointed at me I am going to remove that threat. A person with a gun is not always an upstanding individual especially if they are saying “I’ve got something for you; I’ve gotten something for you guysâ€, which the husband was yelling at police as they entered. And honestly just because he didn't have anything in the residence doesn't make him innocent in all of this. And as a general rule officers don't show up to your house with a warrant for no reason. Maybe in the case of a wrong address but that isn't the case here.

Changing out the officers is not going to do anything to change the system. What happened was not the officer's fault at all. They did nothing wrong and would even venture to say they did everything right until they made the statement that he had fired his weapon. But the statements made after the fact would not have changed the outcome.

And honestly if I had to lay blame on anyone for this youn man's death it would be squarely on the shoulders of his wife. After all she was awake, coherent and has made statements that she even spoke to the officers before they entered. And rather than say to her husband "the cops are here" (or maybe she did) she said that the house was being broken into. I know we can only speculate as to what she actually heard but I find it really hard to believe she didn't hear the sirens or the officers announcing their presence especially if she talked to them prior to entering.

Immediately after the shooting stopped the team backed off and did not enter the home immediately. What the team did do was call for the wife to exit the house immediately but she remained in the house for 7 minutes longer even after being told several times to come out. What was she doing for those 7 minutes? I will not speculate but that is plenty of time to remove any incriminating evidence against her or her husband. Me personally I would be leaving the house immediately after soemthing like this. And even when she did leave she exited alone leaving her child behind in the house. It was only after 28 minutes the child came out on his own. It was after all of this that the team finally entered the house. I can guarantee that EMT's refused to enter to treat the wounded because the area wasn't safe. It wasn't the fact the officers refused to let them enter.

She is the perfect example of what society has become, shift blame to anyone other than those responsible. She as well as her husband are more responsible for what happened than the officers. The officers where not responsible but lets blame them.

Also, him being a Marine has nothing to do with what happened. It was just the media trying to drum up sensationalism and more readers because it was Memorial day. Just because someone is a veteran doesn't mean they are incapable of being a bad guy.

I predict a lot more is going to come out and the officers, the sheriff's office and anyone else on LE side will be cleared.

Dolomite

[Armed Aviator]

Dolomite. Great perspective. My original opinion was bad cops, bad procedure, bad admin. . . Thanks for the enlightenment and showing another aspect of this situation. I need to quit being so quick to judge. . .

[Guest GunTroll]

Sorry, 60 something hits to stop the threat. Were they aiming for his toes? Apprehending this suspect alive was not high priority evidently. Growing or trafficking pot or whatever he was "guilty" of is punishable by death on the spot in AZ evidently. Pointing firearms at LEO's is bad. He had a choice it sounds like. Poor choice perhaps if the new reports are true. For the wife not coming out quickly as comanded...I probably would have a hard time leaving my bullet ridden spouse laying on the ground side. Not real sure what I'd be thinking. Shame on anyone judging her without being her. When I said a personnel change I did not mean the officers. I was more thinking policy makers and the Dumbstick Sheriff.

Don't confuse my opinion, I'll stress that again, OPINION, I don't lay blame on the swat officers. Thats what they do. Shock and awe tactics are their specialty. I blame the paper pushers and anyone higher up than the cop on the street. Perhaps the detective that gave the Intel too. You don't make it onto swat being a pansy second guesser I'd imagine.

I use to repo cars back in the day. In the ghetto of ATL. I probably repo'd several hundred in my time. I had only three incidences that I was "busted" by the dead beat owner. I did my own recon and cased out many of the jobs. I never went after the target car at say 6pm or 6am when the owner was awake and ready. I would grab it while the owner was at work or asleep. What I'm getting at is this operation was bad from the start. Poor intel and or bad plan from the beginning. Why do a head on confrontation when there could be way easier ways of nabbing the suspect? Because the swat officers are bored and need to get some action? I don't know but perhaps. They could have grabbed him coming home from get the milk or checking the mail but they choose to breach and clear. Does any of that make any sense????

For the record I'm not a cop basher. Instead I am a stupid person basher. Stupid looking, acting, sounding, actions. Everyone can be stupid at times, cops too. This mans death in front of his family was needless. Poor plan from the start. I do not blame the entry team for this mans death as others have said.

Its is not OK that cops are going militarized. I assume a lot are vets or NG themselves. Lets leave the war tactics in the war zone. Escalation of force instead of the hammer. Not in this case but what about the other "wrong house" cases? Are we to continue to turn the other cheek and give this kind of stuff a pass? IF you LEO's keep it up everyone of you will need to become swat or use swat tactics before long because the masses will reach their breaking point. Stuff like this adds fuel to the fire.

Legalize pot too (but thats another topic all together).

[1gewehr]

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that there is still no excuse for this incident. The use of the SWAT team to break into the guys house with his wife and child there is reckless and unnecessary. Surely there are better, less dangerous ways to arrest someone suspected of violence? Why not a routine traffic stop? Why not have him come in for some routine reason and arrest him then? Without really thinking hard, I can come up with half a dozen ways to arrest someone without endangering the public or causing a huge scene.

I understand the desire to keep a SWAT team busy. Those guys train hard, and it's hard to maintain a level of training and proper mental concentration if you don't actually use that training. But the SWAT team should be the LAST resort. Too often, tasking the SWAT team is the first option chosen. When you send in a SWAT team, it should be because the threat of armed conflict is virtually inevitable and other options are no longer valid.

In this case, the individual who made the decision to deploy the SWAT team to deal with an arrest should be the one to bear responsibility for this man's death.

[Guest GunTroll]

Yep

[peejman]

And honestly if I had to lay blame on anyone for this youn man's death it would be squarely on the shoulders of his wife. After all she was awake, coherent and has made statements that she even spoke to the officers before they entered. And rather than say to her husband "the cops are here" (or maybe she did) she said that the house was being broken into. I know we can only speculate as to what she actually heard but I find it really hard to believe she didn't hear the sirens or the officers announcing their presence especially if she talked to them prior to entering.

This bit of information might help explain both Jose and his wife's reaction...

From here: Jose Guerena Killed: Arizona Cops Shoot Former Marine In Botched Pot Raid

There may also have been something else on Guerena's mind: Last year, two of Vanessa Guerena's relatives were murdered by armed intruders. The intruders also shot the couple's children.

[ttocswob]

The Guerena Shooting: Initial Analysis & The Guerena Shooting: Initial Analysis 2

Scroll down for the story, as Confederate Yankee doesn't link individual posts.

Jose Guerena is innocent until proven guilty, and sadly, he will not have his day in court.

[Dolomite_supafly]

It seems everyone has a problem with the number of shots fired. Please, for us who obviously don't know, what is the correct amount of rounds it takes to remove a threat?

She knew the officers were there. She has made a statement that she told them to "don't kill me because I have children". That is an odd statement to make to an officer unless you know something bad is about to happen. When was the last time anyone here greeted an officer with the words "don't kill me"? This is not the officers statement this is HER statement to reporters. I find it hard to believe to she was able to talk to an officer and not know it is an officer. Especially when everybody and their mother it seems was yelling "Police, Search Warrant!".

Could the preplanning have been better, of course but as far as the timing of the raid goes it couldn't have been any better. The man was sleeping which is about the best time to hit a residence. And then there was the fact it was daytime which helps the officers identify and conduct operations in a safer manner than during the night. The wife wasn't supposed to be there and had she not been we wouldn't be 8 pages into this discussion because it would have been an uneventful raid.

I do not like the use of SWAT or any other special teams to serve search warrants unless it is known, without a doubt, the person being served has been violent in the past. Personally I believe SWAT should only be used to save lives. Not to serve search warrants.

What happened is unfortunate but his wife is hardly the victim here, nor was her husband. The child yes but not the parents.

I am the farthest from being pro LE. I have worked in LE for a better part of my life. I will not tolerate and did not tolerate officers the brought discredit upon the uniform. But in this case the officers did nothing wrong. And as I said before LE doesn't just randomly pick your name out of a hat and then serve a search warrant, doesn't happen. Despite what the family has said there was a reason for the officers to be there regardless of whether there was any evidence left at the scene or not.

I suspect all officers will be cleared of anyu wrong doing. The family will receive a minor settlement because it will be cheaper than preparing for trial. ANd then taking a chance on the jury which it seems overwhelmingly against LE. That is unless it is you on the other end of the 911 call.

Again I am not pro LE. I have even been accused of being a basher. I do bash bt only those who are repsonsible, whether it be LE or anyone else.

Dolomite

[Dolomite_supafly]

The Guerena Shooting: Initial Analysis & The Guerena Shooting: Initial Analysis 2

Scroll down for the story, as Confederate Yankee doesn't link individual posts.

Jose Guerena is innocent until proven guilty, and sadly, he will not have his day in court.

The writer of the article is an idiot that obviously has no clue about firearms. Claiming a AR has very low muzzle blast is idiotic especially when you are talking about the weapons they use for entry with shorter barrels. Watch the video, not a single AR was used. It was all handguns.

Dolomite

[Guest Gunbunnie]

We see the video from the out side, what about the helmet cams form the officers that did the shooting?

[Guest UberDuper]

http://www.kvoa.com/files/Scanned%20Document0582_000.pdf

So this guy was related to and observed around bad people a couple times.

The story about him being in a home invasion crew was a lie. Looks from the warrant he's just some guy that got lumped into the warrant by association.

[TNRobocop]

That is a hell of a warrant. It is extremely detailed and I can see where a judge would agree that all parties were involved in the mid-level drug trade. Nobody has any type of fixed income from a job, yet all parties have lots of expensive assets and property.

There is more than "by association". It appears that he was observed making suspected drug runs, plus had prior arrests dealing with narcotics and weapon charges.

Just because somebody is or was in the military, doesn't mean they are a good person. I have arrested plenty of military individuals. Doesn't get you a free pass.

[Dolomite_supafly]

Lines 275, 276, 277 and 278 of the warrant indicate Jose Guerena was arrested on 5 felony counts involving drugs and weapons charges. Hardly an angel.

He owns vehicles values at over $105,000. On a salarly of $41,000 before taxes. He also OWNS the house that is valued at $105,000+.

He has been in the same vehicle as KNOWN drug dealers who happen to be part of his family. Two drug dealers left a 1,000 pound drop off at a stash house then went to Jose's house immediately after. Kind of an odd place for drugs dealers to go if Jose is an innocent victim here. It was also noted he was very uncooperative with agents.

He keeps a lot of drug dealing thug types for friends. It is all in the warrant.

Dolomite

[Dolomite_supafly]

That is a hell of a warrant. .

+1,000

A lot of detail compared to most warrants.

Dolomite