Pubdate: Sat, 25 Mar 2006
Source: Commercial Appeal (Memphis, TN)
Copyright: 2006 The Commercial Appeal
Contact:  http://www.commercialappeal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/95
Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v06.n361.a02.html
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

DID COPS ACT TOO SOON?

Methamphetamine labs are explosively dangerous and toxic. So it is
understandable that Horn Lake police officers, acting on reliable
evidence, moved quickly early Wednesday to shut one down.

The problem is that once they arrived on the scene, officers raided
the wrong house. In the action that followed, two octogenarians were
seriously injured. Horn Lake Mayor Nat Baker, a former police captain,
rightfully asked for an internal police investigation and a written
report on the 4 a.m. raid.

Two key questions need answering. Did officers make an unwise
assumption about which house to raid when they discovered there were
two homes at the scene, both sharing the same house number and a
driveway? Were house occupants A. L. Bostick and his wife, Lisa, both
in their 80s, unnecessarily roughed up by officers?

Underlying those questions, though, is the fact that a methamphetamine
laboratory actually was cooking in the house next door and a woman was
arrested and charged with manufacturing a controlled substance.
Officers also are looking for the Bosticks' son, Minor Ray Bostick,
49, on a charge of manufacturing a controlled substance. He deserves a
good deal of the blame, if eventually found guilty, for putting his
parents in an extremely dangerous situation.

Law enforcement officials across the country have called the making of
the cheap, highly addictive stimulant one of the more serious and
dangerous crime problems in the nation. The labs are prone to explode
and the cooking of the drug leaves potentially deadly toxic residues.
Despite these facts, however, the question remains whether officers
should have waited for more information when they were unexpectedly
confronted with two houses.
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MAP posted-by: Larry Seguin