Oath Keepers take to the streets of Tucson against Sheriff’s Corrupted Swat Tactics
by Stephanie Sledge
The Government Rag
In yet another example of how Pima County needs a complete overhaul, the Oath Keepers take to the streets in Tucson to honor two-term Iraq war veteran, Jose Guerena who was violently blown away with 22+ rounds from the Pima County SWAT team in Tucson, AZ.
According to reports, Pima County Sheriff Dupnik SWAT team, headed up by Richard Carmona, former Surgeon General of the United States, trained and allowed a SWAT team to bust the door down of the home of Jose Guerena to serve him a warrant in the form of bullets. Jose was killed instantly. His girlfriend, describes a nightmare as she shielded her son from harm as the child overheard the murder of his father take place.
Initial reports claim, that Vanessa Guerena was making breakfast when the Pima County SWAT rolled up in an armored vehicle and carried out a military style raid as they shot a man to death because he was holding a gun and taking a stance to protect his family against an unknown enemy. After all, someone was allegedly ‘breaking in’ and allegedly no announcement could be heard from inside the house when the shots started ringing out. Pima County attorney, Mike Story, responded according to reports, “they should not hold their breath, I cannot fathom what apology is required at this point. There is nothing wrong with sending the SWAT team in like they did. There is nothing wrong with the policy. It has worked for several years and will continue to work for several years to come. My advice would be if you hear the police pounding on your door, let them in.”
So, can it now be assumed that citizens can expect the training of the ‘new police’ handed down from DHS to become increasingly hostile and deliver warrants military style? Does it begin to resemble a hostile military takeover of forcing and /or enforcing the stripping of the constitutional rights of the people using the police? Could this be the signal to put every American on high alert that our SWAT members are being trained to ‘shoot to kill’ and ‘fire at anyone that has a gun’ without thinking about the Oath? Just the bear thoughts of these types of raids creeping into our American communities just makes my gut hurt with sharp pains. The extension of the Patriot Act that Obama recently signed could mean more military style police tactics to become more punishable and violent.
According to an article posted at the Oath Keeper’s website, Confederate Yankee, Final Analysis, written by a USAF veteran, suggests a point of view on the Pima trained raid giving relevant observations over the SWAT killing. The writer has written extensively on the Eric Scott case since August of 2010. The Guerena raid also closely resembles a Utah man that was also recently served a warrant in the form of bullets. The USAF veteran, who was a security police officer in SAC, in the Cold War, offers up some relevant observations of the SWAT raid:
- “The activation of the siren appears to be uncoordinated with the action at the door. I cannot hear any radio traffic asking for such activation, and there are no visual signals requesting it. If the residents heard it at all, it could be easily mistaken for a car alarm.”"The evidence currently suggests that Vanessa Guerena, Jose’s wife, spotted armed men roaming about the yard. Telling Jose, he directed her to hide in a closet with their four year old child, and taking up an AR-15, crouched in a hallway to intercept what he likely thought were armed home invaders. The exact time frame of these actions is currently unknown.”
“The shooting begins with 4-5 evenly spaced shots, apparently on semi-automatic. Those shots are quickly joined by a wild melee of fire which lasts about eight seconds, followed by a two second silence and one final shot. According to media accounts, the SWAT team “leader” said that the officers involved exhausted their ammunition. That’s not at all hard to believe, and it is possible that more than 71 rounds were fired.”
“What I heard on the video was panicky fire. Two officers heard the first firing, and they simply opened up and held their triggers down, or kept pulling the trigger, until their bolts locked back, their magazines having been emptied. No doubt their trigger fingers were still jerking even then.”
“Items found in Jose Guerena’s house included: a Colt .38-caliber handgun, paperwork, tax returns, insurance papers, bank statements and a bank card, reports showed.”
“Notice that there is no information to indicate that any drugs or money were found in Guerena’s home, or that Guerena or his home, were in any way directly related to criminal activity. In fact, the police have, to date, not released the search warrant affidavit, warrant and return for Guerena’s home. However, there is no evidence to indicate that they found anything at all illegal in Guerena’s home. If they had, considering the public and Internet attention this case is generating, they surely would have made it public. Any drug case they were working has long been blown. Secrecy is no longer an issue.”
Hundreds of protestors marched to Guerena’s home in support for the family that is grieving over the unacceptable raid and also in support of a rapid change in Sheriff Dupnik’s SWAT tactics and practices. Sheriff Mack attended the march and made this comment, ” this should not happen anywhere in America. SWAT is being overused. They go on many mundane calls that do not merit a SWAT.” The OathKeepers are expected to believer a petition to the Governor of AZ and Attorney General demanding change and calling on Dupnik to reevaluate how the SWAT is being used.
An informed citizen told a citizen reporter his thoughts on the Guerena raid, “they’ve been doing things like this for a long time. You know, it’s being compared to Ruby Ridge and Waco. We have no rights at all. That man did nothing at all –he was at his own house, on his own property. They had no right to come into his own. It was based on suspicion only, just suspicion. Nobody’s got any control over this shadow government in Tucson - Dupnik is in real trouble.” Then he pointed to a newspaper article discussing how the AZ State government is asking the federal government to investigate over 99 million in jail funds that are gone.” “This is just 1/10th of what has been taken since Dupnik has been in office.”
An Oath Keeper member, named Lee Tidwell, who is a Veteran from the USAR makes a statement to The Government Rag about the Tucson march, “what happened in Tucson, that took the life of a veteran, needs to be stopped. DHS and people like Sheriff Dupnik have turned our LEO’s into a very inexperienced force of untrained people that are disregarding the US Constitution at whim, on the basis they were just following orders. I really wonder how many of these people that participated in the murder of this Veteran, have ever read the US Constitution? I never thought I would live long enough to see such a nightmare in America become a reality.”
The recent media coverage across the nation zeroing in on Dupnik’s office following the Giffords/Loughner shooting event that took place on 1/08/11 and the recent exposure of the violent SWAT tactics being enforced upon the Tucsonian citizens brings more questions to the Nation as to Dupnik’s agenda in a suppressed city.
