I’m seriously starting to wonder what’s going on in American cities–Detroit’s mayor spent the night in jail only to be given some brand spankin’ new charges upon his release (full story) and the mayor of Berwyn Heights, MD, had his house raided and dogs killed by police…and he didn’t even do anything wrong.
Berwyn Heights mayor, Cheye Calvo and his wife was awakened by an early morning police raid seizing 32 pounds of drugs that did not belong to the Calvos. According to a Fox News article, “Police say Cheye Calvo and his wife appeared to be victims of a plan by two men to smuggle millions of dollars worth of marijuana by having it delivered to about a half-dozen unsuspecting recipients.”
The article goes on to say that a FedEx delivery man is under arrest for delivering packages of drugs that another man would come along and pick up. Nice, Calvo and his wife were innocent victims, and not only had their door broken down, but their two black labs were killed by police.
I’ve been around a lot of dogs in my life, and labs are one of the least threatening breeds. I mean, they’re 90 pound lap dogs, so I hardly believe it was necessary for the police to take down the dogs (one of which was reportedly taking off in the opposite direction). Officers did not apologize for killing the dogs because they “felt threatened”.
Ummm, what? I’m seriously thinking these guys need to find a new line of work if they’re threatened by dogs who were probably barking since their house was just raided by a bunch of gun-toting strangers. How do they deal with jaywalkers and the town drunks? Probably in the same manner.
To further add insult, Mayor Calvo, who was getting dressed at the time, was kept handcuffed in his boxers for a couple of hours by officers who refused to believe that he is indeed the mayor. Wow, talking about crappy intel. Shouldn’t you at least know whose house you’re barging into? It seems like basic police work to me. Or maybe check the guy’s ID card. I know I’m not a cop, but these seem like good places to start.
Naturally, this doesn’t cultivate good relationships between the mayor’s office and the police department. Ironically, the article also says, “The case is the latest embarrassment for Prince George’s County law enforcement. A former police officer was sentenced in May to 45 years in prison for shooting two furniture deliverymen at his home last year, one of them fatally. He claimed that they attacked him.” Delivering a sofa to your house is not an attack, sir! It sounds like these guys need some serious retraining if they’re frightened by dogs and furniture.
The whole thing is so sick, it’s almost laughable. That is, if a family wasn’t victimized, their dogs shot, and another blunder led to the death of a furniture deliveryman.
She is Beloved 
The story of that raid leaves me with so many questions. From the little I know, I’d have no faith in a police force that isn’t aware of where the mayor lives. And the dogs . . . shooting them seems so over the top, like an act of anger and aggression, rather than the rational assessment you’d expect law enforcement officials would give to the situation, especially since they weren’t under attack. It will be interesting to see this unfold.
There is certainly no shortage of examples of ridiculous behavior by American big city mayors. A major cause of this may be that many large cities are effectively single-party political systems. As we know from global experience, one-party states tend to be corrupt, authoritarian, and inefficient. What cities really need are checks and balances on political power, in the form of a legitimate multi-partisan political landscape (e.g. New York).