City Council plans public hearing on no-knock warrants

Meeting scheduled for Oct. 28 to discuss proposed ordinance banning police use

The Santa Fe City Council will hold a public hearing later this month to discuss a proposed ordinance that would prohibit police from executing no-knock search warrants and require police officers to wear body cameras during all search warrant procedures.

Mayor Alan Webber proposed the ordinance earlier this year in the wake of a number of national stories about police shootings and reform efforts.

The council voted unanimously Wednesday to schedule the hearing for Oct. 28.

Speaking before Wednesday’s council meeting, Webber said he proposed the idea as part of a larger plan to analyze how the police department could best serve the community.

Citing several national studies and reports on the issue, he said that “there are a number of consistent improvements or assessments that cities are being encouraged to

make as a way of addressing concerns over police reform — one of which has to do with no-knock warrants and whether they are in the best interest of the community.”

He said the ordinance is one of many actions that “people around the country are looking at seriously that are finally getting some traction … to provide a different way to respond to community calls.”

No-knock warrants, which allow police officers to enter a residence with a search warrant without knocking or announcing their presence, began in the 1970s as a way to demonstrate “toughon-crime” policies and give narcotics officers more leeway when conducting anti-drug operations.

Critics warned that the procedure could give police too much power. For example, when Congress first began considering approval of no-knock warrants in the Washington, D.C., area in 1970, Sen. Sam Ervin, a Democrat from North Carolina, argued against the policy, saying it would give police “the right to enter the dwelling houses of citizens of the District of Columbia in the same way that burglars now enter those dwelling houses.”

Though other critics echoed those thoughts, the no-knock routine become more popular in the 1980s.

In June of this year, Thomas B. Harvey, Justice Project director with the nonprofit Advancement Project, told Reuters that police carry out about 20,000 no-knock actions a year, “overwhelmingly against black and brown people in America.”

Political leaders around the country have been lobbying for a ban on such operations since the March 13 shooting of Breonna Taylor, an emergency medical technician who was killed by police in Louisville, Ky., during a raid that started with a no-knock warrant.

Louisville recently prohibited no-knock search warrant procedures, and several other cities, including Cincinnati and Atlanta, are considering following suit.

After Wednesday’s council vote, Deputy Chief Paul Joye of the Santa Fe Police Department said it’s been at least 10 years since the department conducted a no-knock warrant operation.

“Our current policy is in line with this ordinance,” he said. “I don’t think it’s a bad idea to have an ordinance in the event that trends change down the road.”

He said the police department has given body cameras to 161 personnel, including officers, detectives, public safety aides and animal control officers. In addition, the department has 10 spare body cameras on hand, he said.

The proposed ordinance also would require the department to retain all recorded data from those body cameras for at least five years.

The proposal has no funding component to it. Joye said it would be hard to predict whether the need to buy or update body cameras and expand storage space for the video would add additional costs “until we try it.”