After 19 hours trying to extract and arrest a fleeing suspect who had attempted to hide in the house, "the house was condemned by the local municipality immediately after the raid" and the city "refused to pay fair market value".

Part of the city's defense in the subsequent suit is that: "the city wants the courts to reject the Takings Clause claim, arguing that the language only applies to "those whose property has been taken for public use". "

So, law enforcement takes and uses the home's structure in an attempt to arrest someone, destroying it in the process, then the city claims that they didn't "take" the property in the first place. Wow.

At least the home owner was not the victim of a SWAT raid initiated from a false report.

> At least the home owner was not the victim of a SWAT raid initiated from a false report.

Yes, it would be a shame if some of these city leaders' houses were destroyed without compensation by the local police following false claims about intruders inside.

It would be a great shame if the home owner's suit for an equitable resolution were derailed by this sort of escalation - an escalation that would tend to benefit the city by helping their defense make its case.

So to be clear : In the US the government (or its representatives) can damage your property, and then isn't paying for those damages without hassle for the owner ?

Besides that : Why does the police need to use this amount of force to apprehend someone with a gun ? Couldn't they just isolate the guy, and cordon off the area so he can't harm others and then just wait ? Unless there are hostages involved, or immediate danger to the public, it seems a more appropriate way is to de-escalate rather then escalate.

The US military commonly calls in airstrikes that drop bombs that cost more than houses from aircraft that cost more than entire city blocks, just to kill a single person with a rifle on the side of a hill.

They routinely do this. On occasion it's a civilian on the receiving end of this ridiculously expensive exercise.

Just as a point of reference, here in Germany, the police would have just left the suspect be. They already knew his name, and therefore his address, so they would have just filed a report and the prosecutors would have sent him a letter.

As an dual citizen that grew up in America, this is shocking to me, but it seems to work here in Germany. Of course, Germany has national address registration and doesn’t the same level of gun ownership..

Just wanted to point out a different approach.

A guy with a semi-automatic pistol who had fired on officers, "it's ok, we have his name and address"

Glad I don't live in Germany.

.. it is also not true. They would siege the house. And wait for him to give up.

Also not true, here's an example from July 2016

Stuttgart siege: Two dead after '100 armed police storm hostage situation' at law firm

Five hour stand-off ends after special forces called in

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/stuttgart-hos...

Yeah but this was a hostage situation.

We were talking about a situation, where a lone, armed fugitive has barricaded himself in some place.

And in this situation, there is no need at all for storming.

Turning off the water and wait outside, should be enough.

I’m talking about the point when he was just a shoplifter.

At that point, if he had valid ID, police wouldn’t even been called.

This article just became my new reply to the question "if I have nothing to hide, why should I care about government overreach?".

I'm not entirely clear on why this isn't a story about an insurance company suing the city. The author mentions that the city offered $5k to cover Lech's deductible, which implies the property was insured. Do homeowner's policies typically not cover this kind of scenario?

It depends. DP- are for rentals which often includes loss of rental income, HO- are for homeowners. Almost all US policies exclude flooding, which is a special insurance. There’s also umbrella insurance for special situations beyond personal or homeowners insurance.

For anything broken that can’t be fixed or replaced to the original value, he should seek a diminished value claim.

Comparision matrix of coverage amongst standard plans:

http://www.andersonmurison.com/personal/coverage%20compariso...

IANALOIA

It’s not up to the homeowner to use his insurance to repair his house when the city did the damage.

I'm not sure why not. Seems like exactly the sort of unlikely event that I'd want my insurance to cover. Isn't the whole point of insurance that they make me whole, and use their ample legal department to pursue the responsible parties to recover those costs (if such parties exist, in this case the city)?

Your insurance is there only to protect you, not to protect others that cause damages to you.

The case is Lech et al v. Jackson et al, 1:16-cv-01956

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