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COUPLE SAYS COPS CLIMBED THROUGH WINDOW WITHOUT WARRANT AND SHOT THEIR DOGS
Rhema Thompson pnj.com Two deputies remain on administrative duty and many questions still are unanswered three days after Escambia County sheriff’s deputies entered a Warrington couple’s home without a search warrant and shot the couple’s two dogs, resulting in one of them being euthanized. The Sheriff’s Office refused Wednesday to elaborate on what led deputies to climb into a window while looking for a suspect, enter the home, roust the residents from bed, handcuff them and shoot the two dogs. “There is both a criminal and an administrative investigation ongoing,” sheriff’s spokeswoman Sena Maddison wrote in an email Wednesday. “More details will be available pending the conclusion of both the criminal and administrative investigation. But not before that time.” The deputies went into the home of Travis Nicholas, 22, and Cristina Moses, 32, on Flynn Drive on Sunday night in search of a suspect involved in an armed disturbance that occurred earlier on the same street, a sheriff’s report released Tuesday said. Earlier in the evening, Wayde Morris, 22, was arrested on a charge of aggravated assault after allegedly getting into an argument with his ex-girlfriend and her father and approaching them with a baseball bat and machete. But several witnesses also reported that another man pointed a gun at several people involved in the earlier disturbance, and one witness identified the man as “Travis,” according to an incident report. In a 911 dispatch record from the same night and address, a man is heard telling the dispatcher, “This little punk down the road has got a gun pointed at me, my daughter and my roommate.” Neither Nicholas nor Moses had been charged as of Wednesday, and Nicholas denied owning a gun or making threats. The couple said six deputies entered their home, but it was only one officer who fired shots at their dogs. How many came in the window is not clear.
Legal entry?
Whether the deputies could legally enter the home is in question. Under the law, officers must either obtain a search warrant or must identify emergency factors that make a warrantless entry necessary, such as probable cause to think people are in imminent danger, evidence faces immediate destruction or a suspect will escape. The sheriff’s news release Tuesday said, “Deputies entered the house through the open widow in an effort to locate the suspect and to assure the safety of the occupants.” Moses disputed that account, saying the window was not open because the air conditioning was on. She said the officer who fired the shots was Deputy Mikel Anthony Lee. Lee’s name is listed as the reporting officer on a sheriff’s report on which Nicholas is listed as the suspect. However, the Sheriff’s Office redacted the entire narrative of the report, saying it is not a public record. Maddison declined to confirm if Lee was the deputy who fired the shots or give any further details about the deputies involved.No video
Nicholas and Moses said they were sleeping in their bedroom with the two dogs with the door closed when deputies arrived. Deputies reported that they knocked on the door, but the couple said they didn’t hear anything until the deputies approached their door and the dogs began barking. “I opened the door, and there were six police officers pointing guns at me and flashlights, saying ‘Show me your hands. Get on the ground,’ ” Moses said Tuesday. She said she and her fiance had been dragged to the hallway and the dogs were in the bedroom when the single deputy returned to the bedroom and shot the dogs. Deputies later took the dogs to a veterinary hospital. One was euthanized the next morning; one is recovering at home with a bullet still lodged under his lung. A sheriff’s report states that there is no video evidence of the incident, and the Sheriff’s Office has declined to provide a reason. A spokesperson for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement said the agency is not investigating the case at this point.Sign up for our free e-mail list to see future vaticancatholic.com videos and articles.
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