There is no right of self defense in your home in America any more. Any question about that fact was put to rest Tuesday Evening, November 21, 2006. Here are the facts:


Kathryn Johnston was 88 years old and lived alone in a house in a very rough part of Atlanta. She had a gun for her own protection. It was legal.


Police went to Johnston's house with a search warrant after an informer allegedly bought drugs there from a man known only as Sam.


They had a no-knock "John Doe" warrant issued on Wednesday for the arrest of Sam, believed to be in his early to mid 30s.


The police chief said the officers identified themselves and then forced open the door of Johnston's house where she had lived for 17 years.


Johnston fired on them.


Initial reports were that Investigator Gary Smith, 38, was shot in the leg and Investigator Cary Bond, 38, was struck in the arm. Investigator Gregg Junnier, 40, was hit in the leg, the face and his bulletproof vest. Now there are reports that possibly only one officer was actually shot and the others were injured by shrapnel. In any case one or more of them fired back and hit Ms. Johnston in the chest, killing her.


The officers were taken to the hospital and are expected to recover.


Assistant Police Chief Alan Dreher called the killing "tragic and unfortunate" but said the officers were justified in returning fire.


Justified? No. No more than you or I would be justified in killing a neighbor who shot at me when I broke into his home. This is wrong, on so many levels. Let me count the ways-


Listen again to this part The fourth amendment requires a warrant to : particularly describe the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. But wait a minute- this was a "John Doe warrant!" Does that sound like a particular description of the person to be seized? Of course not. It allows anyone to be seized! Do you really think that was the kind of power the founders who crafted the bill of rights intended? Not if you're a rational, common sense, thinking individual! No, the kind of 4th amendment interpretation which would claim that a quote no-knock john doe warrant was in the spirit of the 4th amendment is the kind of thinking that is either completely ignorant of or lying about the rationale of our founders when they wrote the constitution in the first place. If that kind of policing was OK with them, what difference would a constitution make? They already had armed thugs busting unannounced into their homes. The king's soldiers. How do today's police think they're any different? A constitution that allows that is no constitution at all.


But beyond all that, here's what is really scaring me about this story. How-, under what possible rationale, were the police justified in returning fire? They bust unannounced into a person's home. A person who has a legal gun to defend herself. She opts to do so. The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated What the assistant police chief is implying is that she has no right to use her gun. If she does so, the police are justified in killing her. She is not allowed to be secure in her person or her house. The police think there might be some marijuana in there, and since they want to catch her with it, she has no right to defend herself against an unannounced group of people busting in to her home. That is the logical conclusion to this assistant police chief's statement. Since you don't know if the next person who's kicking in your front door in the dark of night is someone you can legally shoot as he bursts through your door, you are left with no legal recourse but to hold your fire until you determine whether that black-clad figure with the sawed off shotgun is a policeman or a gang banger intent on getting revenge. And either of them certainly can have the wrong address. If it's a cop, and you shoot, you will be killed. If it's a gang banger and you shoot, you may survive. If it's a cop and you don't shoot, you may survive. If it's a gang banger and you don't shoot, you'll be killed.


Do you see the impossible situation the police have put you in by saying they were justified in killing Ms. Johnston? Wrong address or not, lying informant or not, if you defend you 4th amendment right to be secure in your home and person, you are a criminal. This is how far we've come. We no longer have the right to self defense in our own homes.


Those of us who can read the plain language of the constitution and bill of rights know full well that there was no justification in the killing of Ms. Johnston. Those of us who understand the kind of tyranny our founders lived under and tried to prevent with the drafting of our constitution understand how twisted and corrupted constitutional interpretation has become by those in authority over us. There was no justification for returning Ms. Johnston's fire, even if it meant that those authorities had to live, or die, by the decisions that they made that placed them in her line of fire. And the police certainly could have withdrawn from the situation; backed out of Ms. Johnston's doorway, and when everyone calmed down they could have resolved the situation peacefully. It was a tragic situation indeed, but a situation created entirely by the cops. To hold Ms. Johnston responsible for her murder is the epitome of authoritarian arrogance.


For a cop, with no more delegated rights than you or I have, to intrude into a citizen's locked home and return defensive fire cannot be justified any more than it could be if you or I did it. When did peace officers become paramilitary enforcers? When did "to protect and to serve" become "to invade and intimidate"? Why have our American cities become urban battlegrounds where paramilitary tactics get played out every night in eerie reflection of Iraq and Afghanistan? Is it about cleaning up our neighborhoods or is it about controlling our people?


The police claim that they found some marijuana in Ms. Johnston's home. Are you as appaled at that image as I am? If true, After killing this woman they still searched her home! What is more harmful to our neighborhoods and families- the possession by a citizen of some marijuana or a police force that is willing and able to kill a woman and still claim a job well done because they found some pot?


And now the investigation is in the hands of the FBI and a man has come forward claiming he is the informer- and he says he never tipped the police off about buying drugs at that house. This one will be a long time playing out. Whatever happens, the war on drugs has claimed yet another victim and left a family without a loved one. More and more citizens are calling for an end to the war in Iraq, yet we hear nothing about ending this war on people the government claims use drugs. After several thousand American casualties, America is fed up with a horribly costly war in Iraq that shows no progress toward its stated aim. Yet we hear no uprising against a horribly costly war right here in our towns and cities that's been going on for over 40 years and has made absolutely no progress toward its stated aim. We hear more and more people claim that the war in Iraq is serving to make certain individuals and corporations richer and more powerful yet we hear no outcry about how the war on drugs has made police departments, through asset seizure laws, much more wealthy and powerful. We see the footage of the heavily armed house to house searches in Baghdad and listen to our leaders tell us that it's necessary to take the fight over there so we won't have to do it here on the streets of America, yet every night in streets all over America the same scenes are being played out by our militarized police forces. We watch American recruits going through rigorous training in simulations of what they'll encounter when they get to the war zone, to condition them to the sights, sounds and feelings of that situation. And we see news footage of police in American schools, guns drawn, dogs going through lockers and backpacks, and sobbing children, our children, on their knees, faces to the wall, in what was later explained to them was "only a drill". Only a drill. To condition them for what? To be ready to be on their knees later in life before their authoritarian masters? Is that what we're preparing our children for? Is that the real goal of the war on drugs? And perhaps the war on terror too?


This has been radio free liberty...