Photo past The Spider Hill on Flickr. (Not the author's house.)

In the spring of 2009, the police attempted to suspension into my firm.

The previous resident of our home was arrested a few days before in a traffic stop. Her son successfully fled on foot, dropping a gun as he did so. When law asked her where her son lived, she gave the police our address telling them that he lived in that location with some of his friends.

As he was wanted on a warrant, and known to traffic in guns, the police were eager to search the habitation figuring that they would find a stash of illegal guns. Since the doubtable had lived there up until 2007, they found several references to our home's accost that seemed to ostend her story.

On the evening of May 14, 2009, near 40 Metropolitan Police Section (MPD) officers showed upward at our house and attempted to execute the warrant they secured for the doubtable. When no one answered the door, they proceeded to attempt to pause down our back gate. Afterward 45 minutes with a battering ram, drill and a crow bar they succeeded in damaging our security gate we installed before moving in, the door frame and parts of the house'southward outside about the door, only they had not gotten in. They were in the procedure of getting a ladder then that they could break in through the second story window when my wife arrived.

Afterwards determining what was going on and showing the officers her ID, my wife was able to convince them to stop trying to break in. She coaxed them into showing her the search warrant and and so allowed them within. They briefly searched the house and admitted that they had fabricated a mistake. They gave her some forms about how to be reimbursed for the damage, apologized and left.

We weren't angry. Police piece of work is often time-sensitive and the impression they gave was that they were eager to catch some bad guys — which we support. They made an endeavour to avert mistakes, merely withal mistakes will be made when one is in a hurry. No one was hurt and we expected to fabricated whole.

Unfortunately, nosotros had to pay to repair the harm first, and and then enquire to exist reimbursed. To replace the door and the frame toll several thousand dollars, which we were able to pull out of our savings. Simply fixing damage to the exterior of the firm would require removing much of the wall and the windows, and would have set us back over $10,000. Nosotros couldn't afford to float DC a loan to fix this and we were concerned that we might get stuck with the bill. Since the damage was just corrective we decided not to repair the outside.

We had the repairs done over the course of the summer and fall, submitted the paperwork in November of 2009 and received a reply in Jan of 2010. We were advised that while the District intends to compensate residents for amercement for which information technology is liable, it was not liable for amercement in our case because the search warrant was valid.

All the same, DC MPD Full general Order 309 states, "In those instances where a forcible entry occurs every bit a result of misinformation, misinterpretation of information, or erroneous judgment, the Department will provide an explanation to the owner/occupant, and will repair the impairment as presently every bit possible."

We started a dialogue with the urban center'south Office of Risk Management (ORM) which makes the determination in these types of claims. They informed u.s.a. that they accept to follow the determination of the MPD, which said the claim should not exist paid. When nosotros contacted our District MPD, they said it was for the ORM to decide — though the police have their own ORM which the metropolis's ORM accused of stonewalling.

Feeling similar both sides were trying to blame the other, we asked if we could have a meeting with both agencies together. MPD declined, proverb that, "The matter has been properly addressed by both agencies, DC and MPD's ORM… Although the MPD ORM does not decide whether to award or deny a merits, we do support and stand by the DC ORM's ruling that your claim is denied." I called MPD's ORM and was told, somewhat rudely, that my merits was denied, and "how hard is that to understand." After that my calls and emails to the MPD's ORM went unreturned.

Left with seemingly no other recourse, we filed suit against the District.

Property damage complaints related to law investigations are not new: the Police force Complaints Board investigated them in 2005, finding that officers occasionally failed to inform people why their houses were being searched and left without arranging for repairs or informing the owners how to accept repairs reimbursed. We learned from that study that MPD is supposed to immediately contact the on-phone call Facilities Management staff member to brand necessary repairs when it appears MPD is responsible for repairs. This was not washed for the states.

We were not eager to go to court and were concerned that the District would win for reasons of sovereign immunity. And then I made a last ditch effort and wrote messages to and then-Mayor Fenty and Chief Cathy Lanier [My married woman joked that I might as well write Barack Obama too, as much as that it probable to work]. I cited the general order that calls for the metropolis to repair impairment in cases like this.

I was impressed when Chief Lanier wrote me the adjacent forenoon to inform me that she would get involved. By the following mean solar day, a representative of the MPD's ORM told me that, "in calorie-free of the contempo development," my claim would be paid. By contempo development I assumed he meant getting chewed out by the Chief of Police.

In the end we were reimbursed in full, about v months after making our claim, simply in that location are three key means this frustrating and time-consuming debacle could accept been avoided.

DC needs better electronic record-keeping. Before the warrant execution, we sent back dozens of pieces of official mail, including checks intended for the previous residents, to the Commune. And there were at least iv places in DC records where the sale, buying and new residents of the home were documented. If the MPD is going to rely on these records as the ground for a search warrant, they should piece of work to link them so that when changes to the recorder of deeds records are fabricated, for example, a flag goes upward in other records.

Ideally the organisation could be searchable so that they could search for an accost and get a time-ordered listing set of records pertaining to that address. Had that existed, they could see that the person they were looking for had lived at that place, only that all the newest records related to a new set of owners. The information they needed was in their possession, but their system couldn't easily access it.

When holding is damaged in this fashion, MPD needs to follow policy and offer to make repairs immediately. I'1000 not sure we would have taken them upwards on it every bit we preferred to use our ain contractor, simply not everyone is able to front the money. I have visions of people living with a broken downwardly door for months, and that'southward not acceptable.

MPD should be proactive and permit residents know if they're going to reimburse them for damage, and for which harm, within a very short time after an incident (i.e. a calendar week) instead of only subsequently the repairs are made. Nosotros were left to gauge as to which damage would be covered and which would not, and to worry that none of it would be covered. A slow, mysterious bureaucratic process is not a productive way to handle these kinds of situations.