Early in the fall of 2017 morning, FBI agents knocked down the front door of an Atlanta house with a beating ram. The gun drew the gun, and they took out a flashing grenade and charged it inside.
The couple who lived there, Hilliard Toi Cliatt and Curtrina Martin blocked themselves in the closet. Agents dragged Mr. Criat out of the gun and handcuffed him. They told Ms. Martin that she begged to see her 7-year-old son, she fell asleep in another room.
He spoke when they asked Mr. Cliart. This is different from the agent having an arrest warrant.
One of the agents, Lawrence Guerra, identified the correct house earlier, and he said it was a similar house, nearby on the other street. He said his GPS device was misled on the morning of the raid.
The couple is prosecuted for false arrests, false imprisonment, assault, assault and other claims, but is lost in the lower court for various reasons, especially the actions of government officials in the performance of duties involving discretion.
The legal issues in the cases heard by the Supreme Court on Tuesday are a series of tangled exceptions and conditions involving the Federal Tort Claims Act, although sometimes only litigation against the government is allowed, despite the principle of sovereign immunity.
Most of the arguments are technical and the court appears to be taking a modest ruling to send the case back to the lower court for further consideration.
But when federal government lawyer Frederick Liu said the raid did not violate any policy, several justices seemed incredible.
“There is no policy to say that you don't break down the wrong door?” asked Judge Neal M. Gorsuch. “Don't it cause occupants? Really?”
Mr. Liu clarified his position. “It is the U.S. policy to enforce an arrest warrant in the right House,” he said.
“I should do this,” Judge Gordie replied.
Nevertheless, Mr Liu said the agency’s discretion in planning the raids was “full of policy considerations”, including “weighting public safety considerations, efficiency precautions, operational security.”
He said the plaintiff tried to put these judgments second, for example, the agent should have checked the House number.
Justice Gorasitch said: “Yes, you might look at the address of the house before you knock the door down.”
But Mr Liu said: “Checking the house numbers at the end of the driveway means exposing agents to potential fire.”
Justice Gorsuch continued. “How about making sure you're on the right street?” he asked. “Check the signposts – Is that too much to ask?”
Mr. Liu said the agent made a “reasonable mistake”. He added that an amendment to the Federal Tort Claims Act in 1974 was intended to make the infamous attack in Collinsville, Illinois easier to file a lawsuit.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor was not convinced. “It's ridiculous,” she said. “Congress is looking at the Collinsville raid and providing remedies to those who have been attacked by mistake, and now you say, 'No, they really don't want to fully protect them.'”
“There is no doubt that there is no policy here,” said Patrick M. Jaicome, an attorney at the Judiciary Institute, on behalf of the plaintiff in the case, Martin v. U.S. Case No. 24-362.
He said: “As my friend said, the government's policy is to raid the right house. They didn't do that. Preparation doesn't matter to the end result here. If you really, really have to put the pizza down at the right address, it's OK.
