Last month, Emancipate NC attorneys Ian Mance and Elizabeth Simpson, joined with co-counsel Emily Gladden and Abe Rubert-Schewel from the law firm of Tin Fulton Walker & Owen and Michael Littlejohn from Littlejohn Law, to sue the Raleigh Police Department on behalf of the families of Yolanda Irving and Kenya Walton.

Both families’ homes were wrongfully raided in an aggressive and frightening SWAT-style home invasion, with guns drawn and pointed at children and a disabled teen in 2020, after a corrupt confidential informant provided bad information to a corrupt Raleigh cop. That cop, Omar Abdullah, has since been fired, after already costing the city of Raleigh $2 million in settlement funds over other wrongful acts.

In addition to seeking justice for the families of Ms. Irving and Ms. Walton, our lawsuit seeks to curb the abuse of “No Knock” warrants. 

The lawsuit reads:

A “No Knock” raid or “No Knock” warrant is a colloquial term used to refer to the execution of a search warrant by law enforcement by entering a premises without warning, and without providing an opportunity for the occupants of the premises to voluntarily answer or open the door. [It] has expanded exponentially in use over the course of the last forty years, is connected with the exercised of deadly force by police and the deaths of innocent people, and it has been banned by three U.S. states because of concerns about officer and public safety and constitutional rights. 

Read the lawsuit

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