https://stopthedrugwar.org/chronicle-old/429/badraid.shtml

It was just business as usual when the Horn Lake, Mississippi, Police Department's SWAT-style special unit busted down the door of a suspected meth lab at about 4:00am on March 22. But it was the wrong house, and what happened to the elderly couple at the residence is leading to questions about just what constitutes business as usual in Horn Lake. The heavily-armed (and cutely-named) Tactical Apprehension Containment Team (TACT) didn't find any meth, but they did manage to send Arthur and Lillie Bostock, a couple in their 80s, to the hospital, she with a dislocated shoulder and he with a bruised rib.

SWAT Teams -- out of control and everywhere

The TACT team was looking for a different house on the same property. It was the home of the couple's son, who was arrested along with two others on meth charges when police finally got to the right house later that morning.

"We had good information from a reliable source that had been backed up by a purchase of narcotics linked to the address," said Police Capt. Shannon Beshears in remarks reported by the Associated Press. "However, when we arrived at the designated address, there were two houses on the lot. We hit the larger of the two houses. "It was the wrong house," Beshears said. "The house was totally dark and the TACT members went through to the bedroom looking for the suspects."

Beshears had little to say about what happened to the Bostocks except that they were injured as the TACT team secured the house. No drugs were found there. Horn Lake Police Chief Darryl Whaley was apologetic, but backed up his officers. "Obviously, a mistake was made and it was regrettable," he said. "But I stand by my officers. I think they acted properly."

Some neighbors didn't agree with the chief. "I don't think they had enough information, and I think they should have got their facts together and not broken in a house and beat up somebody," Cheryl Miller told WREG-TV News Channel 3 in Memphis. The chief's apology was insufficient, she said. "If you don't think before you react and you beat up old people, I don't think you belong in that job as a policeman," she says.

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