No-knock warrants: A growing legacy of controversy, revised laws, tragic deaths

Police departments around the country have narrowed policies and states have passed laws banning or partially banning no-knock entries in the wake of deaths during unannounced raids.

But early Wednesday in Minneapolis – nearly two years after the death of Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Kentucky – a 22-year-old Black man was fatally shot after being roused from sleep on a couch at 6:48 a.m. by SWAT officers with a no-knock warrant.

"It happens with far too much regularity when it comes to Black people in Minnesota and across this country," said Nekima Levy Armstrong, a civil rights attorney and former president of the Minneapolis chapter of the NAACP. "There has been tragedy after tragedy of police officers using hypervigilant, militarized and aggressive tactics in circumstances that are often unwarranted."

The 15 seconds of body camera footage released by the Minneapolis Police Department shows officers using a key to enter the apartment and then yelling "police search warrant" as they walked through the door.

Other officers chime in, yelling "police search warrant" as a jumble of voices scream different directions at Amir Locke, who is asleep wrapped in a white comforter on the couch. One officer kicks the couch as others appear to yell words such as "hands," "get on the ground," and "show me your hands."

Locke's head peeks out of a comforter, as does the barrel of a gun – and in a still frame you can see his finger against the barrel but off the trigger – before three gunshots can be heard. Locke later dies at a hospital.

Attorney Benjamin Crump, who represents Locke's family, said Locke legally owned the weapon and had a right to protect himself.

Crump criticized the city.

"Minneapolis has not learned the lesson of trying not to use the most intrusive measures when it comes to interactions with Black people," Crump said Friday.

Bryan Strawser, head of the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus, also decried Locke's death.

“Amir Locke, a lawful gun owner, should still be alive," Strawser said. "Black men, like all citizens, have a right to keep and bear arms. Black men, like all citizens, have the right to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable search and seizure.”

So-called no-knock warrants, where officers do not knock nor do they announce themselves, are generally considered high risk and dangerous because people inside may be asleep or caught unaware – such as with earbuds on while listening to music. The idea behind a "knock and announce" is to give someone inside a chance to respond and open the door.

"If you’re sound asleep when somebody comes barging in your house, and the first time they’re announcing they’re the police they're inside the door and there’s multiple voices yelling 'search warrant,' and multiple people yelling at him to show their hands ... he may think he’s a victim of a home invasion robbery," said Jim Bueermann, a retired Redlands, California, police chief and former National Police Foundation president.

Bueermann called Locke incident "tragic," and said that it illustrated why no-knock warrants are "generally a bad idea." In his 33-year career, Bueermann said he never participated in a no-knock warrant and never authorized them as a chief.

"They're so dangerous, we always managed to do a knock and announce," Bueermann said. He also noted that best practice was to have one officer speaking and giving orders, so that anyone inside can hear and follow directions without confusion.

Law enforcement officials have argued that no-knock warrants are necessary in certain cases, to prevent physical harm to officers or other people, and to prevent the destruction of evidence. But their use has been increasingly regulated in recent years.

"These situations are inherently high risk, so you really want to narrow the circumstances under which you can use them, and they have to be fairly compelling," said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum. "If there are alternatives, there are other ways you could accomplish the same goal."

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Since Taylor's death in March 2020, no-knock warrants have been banned or their use extremely limited in jurisdictions across the country, including in Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, Maine and Minneapolis. In September, the Justice Department announced a new departmentwide policy limiting no-knock entries to when agents reasonably believe knocking and announcing their presence would create an "imminent threat of physical violence to the agent" or someone else, with few exceptions that require additional approvals.

In Locke's case, policing experts told USA TODAY that they questioned the necessity of a no-knock warrant, but lacked details on the underlying homicide investigation to make an adequate assessment. The warrants have been filed with the court but remain under seal, said St. Paul police spokesperson Steve Linders.

The search warrant was one of three issued for apartments in a complex in downtown Minneapolis that pertained to an ongoing homicide investigation by St. Paul police. It was executed with the assistance of Minneapolis police because the location was in their jurisdiction.

Linders told USA TODAY the department has not served a no-knock search warrant since 2016. In a follow-up email, he said that "each agency has its own protocols and policies for serving search warrants. The agency responsible for serving the warrant determines what tactics that will be used."

Minneapolis police spokesperson Garrett Parten declined to provide details and said there are multiple ongoing investigations. The officer involved, Mark Hanneman, is on paid administrative leave. He has seen four complaints against him, one of which remains open. He has not been disciplined for the others.

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Locke's parents told reporters during a news conference Friday that their son was a deep sleeper who had been interested in a career in music and also real estate. He had planned to move to Dallas the following week to break into music. They said he was a law-abiding citizen with no criminal record.

"A mother should never have to see her child executed like this," Karen Wells, Locke's mother, told reporters during the news conference.

Minneapolis police tightened its policies on unannounced entries in November 2020, months after George Floyd was killed by officer Derek Chauvin. The policy requires officers to announce themselves "prior to crossing the threshold of the door into the residence or building" and to give announcements periodically throughout.

It also notes that officers should be mindful of any possible barriers or obstacles to cooperation including mental, emotion, physical or language barriers.

"Just on its face, is that shooting reasonable? Yes, because the officer has got to make a decision whether or not he can be shot," said Jon Blum, a former cop and nationally esteemed police training curriculum developer.

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But, Blum said, there should also be more scrutiny as to why such a warrant was chosen in the first place – "there's got to be a specific reason why."

Interim Minneapolis police Chief Amelia Huffman said Locke was not named in the original search warrant and it was unclear if and how he was connected to the St. Paul investigation. She said St. Paul police did search the apartment and collect items they believe are of evidentiary value in their homicide investigation.

"There is no single best practice for making these kinds of entries" and policies and tactics may differ "even among agencies in the Twin Cities," Huffman said. "We'll look at the events in place that led up to this incident and we'll be examining the policies in place."

Armstrong said there needs to be a ban on no-knock warrants.

"There's enough evidence to know that there is a heightened risk of death or serious bodily harm," she said. "I don't think the risk outweighs the reward."

Because the search warrant was executed before 7 a.m., it is considered a nighttime search under Minnesota state law, and requires additional facts for a judge to sign off on it. Those include the need to "prevent the loss, destruction, or removal of the objects of the search or to protect the searchers or the public."

Blum said nighttime service can be beneficial, especially when someone lives in a house, in order to help officers avoid being seen by looking out the window, for example, while approaching the house, but that's less of an issue in an apartment.

He said that in his seven years on Winston-Salem's police SWAT team, he participated in only one no-knock warrant, and ironically, no one was home.

"You really need to show probable cause of extreme danger there and that you needed to have some element of surprise," Blum said.

Bueermann criticized Minneapolis Police Department for seeming to hide behind St. Paul's homicide investigation to avoid providing details on Locke's death, especially after the turmoil the department went through after Floyd's death.

"I’m amazed they would allow no-knock search warrants, and that once this tragedy occurred, that they would not be more forthcoming," Bueermann said. "That literally makes no sense."

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said Friday that he would work with the Hennepin County Attorney's Office "to conduct a fair and thorough review" of the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension's investigation of Locke's shooting.

On Friday evening, Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey imposed an immediate moratorium on any request or execution of no-knock warrants in the city, and said in a statement that national experts would be brought in from Eastern Kentucky University to review and suggest revisions to the department’s policy.

Tami Abdollah is a USA TODAY national correspondent covering inequities in the criminal justice system. Send tips via direct message @latams or email tami(at)usatoday.com

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Amir Locke shooting renews criticism of police for no-knock warrants