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elderberries
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1996-05-06
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From: john@rtfm.mlb.fl.us (John Blasik)
Newsgroups: alt.drugs,talk.politics.drugs
Subject: "...but i didn't swear at them"
Message-ID: <1991Oct13.050259.4326@rtfm.mlb.fl.us>
Date: 13 Oct 91 05:02:59 GMT
This story appeared in the Florida TODAY "The Space Coast's Newspaper"
on October 11, 1991
Typos are probably my fault.
File this under "Colateral damage of the War on Drugs"
-- john
$700,000 civil suit sprouts from `marijuana' raid
Associated Press
ORLANDO -- They sure looked like marijuana plants.
At least that's what Orange County Deputy John Brick was thinking
when he ordered five members of the Carden family to lay face down in
their back yard while he called for help.
Brick handcuffed several family members, pointed his gun at a
5-year-old boy and his grandfather, and cursed at them repeatedly,
the family said.
It took another hour and the arrival of dozens of other deputies
before an officer realized the demon weeds were actually wild
elderberry plants.
"I believed they were pot plants until my sergeant told me they
weren't. I honestly made a mistake, and I learned from it," Brick
said.
Brick said he apologized for the incident. Later, his supervisors
mailed a letter of apology to the family. But the Carden family said
the raid was more than a mistake -- it violated their constitutional
rights.
Thursday, [Oct. 10 -- jb], they formally notified the sheriff's
office they intend to sue for $700,000.
"I'm never going to get over what happened," said Jan Carden, who
owns the property with her husband, Ed. "It was like we were on the
set of `Miami Vice.'"
Brick, who was disciplined for not immediately calling for backup,
said he didn't realize he he needed a warrant to look for pot in the
woods, and didn't realize he was in someone's back yard.
He also denied swearing at the family. "If they say that happened,
it's going to be a lie," said Brick, who is 28 and a 6-1/2 year
veteran deputy.
After spotting the plants, Brick said he noticed the Carden's
son-in-law, Russell Smith looking at him from a nearby trailer.
Brick ordered Smith, 25, and his sister-in-law, Carmel Carden,15, to
to the ground.
Then three more family members walked by. Brick ordered them face
down as well. When little Joshua Carden ran to his grandfather
instead, Brick became agitated and trained his gun on the boy, said
Roger Poirier, 54. "I said, `Are you crazy? That's my grandson, and
he's 5 years old!' " said Poirier, Jan Carden's father.
Brick acknowledged the he was "probably a little excited."
"When I saw the man in the trailer, I thought `Now is the time to
take him down. I can't give him a chance to shoot me,'" he said. "I
just wanted to secure everything so I didn't get hurt.
"At the time, I honestly believed the plants were marijuana, and I
was facing five or six of them and just me"