During a no-knock raid in Minneapolis, 22-year-old Amir Locke was shot and killed while he was lying on a couch inside the target apartment. Video below shows what appears to be a gun in his hand, a gun that his family says was legally owned.
Locke was not a person listed on the search warrant, and may have just been in the wrong place at the wrong time. I don’t know his background or who his friends were, but this incident makes me think about a number of important things.
First and foremost, no-knock warrants have proven to be a bad idea, and police have even kicked down the wrong doors before. I’m not here to bash the police, rather the no-knock warrant strategy. I understand the benefits that come with it as well, but overall they seem to be a bad idea in my opinion.
Second, know who you associate with. Police were at the apartment executing a search warrant related to a recent homicide. If Locke wasn’t a subject of the investigation, other people inside the apartment were. Was Locke aware of their lifestyles? Probably, but one can’t be sure until the proof is put out there. Ultimately, we need to be cautious of who we spend our time with, because what we see in the video above can happen when we hang with the wrong crowds.
Third, from an armed citizen standpoint, I can’t blame the actions of Locke in the slightest. If people enter the place you’re staying in the middle of the night with guns, many armed citizens will be caught off guard and very well may have a gun in their hands in an attempt to defend themselves. Many keep their gun within an arms length, even while sleeping. This is not an uncommon thing.
Criminals have pretended to be police officers before, breaking into homes and the people inside believing that they are actually police. This is another reason why I’m not a fan of the no-knock warrants.
The investigation into this deadly shooting continues, and I’ll be following it closely to see how things play out.
