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Search Warrant and search Warrant Application - Long and Lots of Questions

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eromrab

Guest
What is the name of your state? North Carolina

Alrighty... here is my situation. The cops have been conducting surveillance on my house for about a month. It started when a CRI (confidential reliable informant) tipped them off (according to the search warrant app) and again later told them that they observed marijuana manufacturing (taking bigger bags of pot and making smaller ones) within our home. I live with 3 roomies in a house and i have my own room, another roommate has his own room, and the other 2 are boyfriend and girlfriend and share the master bedroom. Our front door and sliding glass door were both unlocked. They rammed the front door, breaking the frame so that now only the deadbolt (which we don't have a key for) works. We asked them why they didn't just open the door and they remarked that "breaking through the door is the best part of their job"... they asked if they could keep the metal part of the frame that the door knob hooks into as a soveigner. After pointing guns at everyone in the house and rushing us to the living room in handcuffs, they rummaged through our entire house. They destroyed and totally trashed the entire house. They presented a warrant and warrant application to me because i was the only person in the house who was on the lease at the time because my other roommate had left for the weekend. I hadn't noticed until after spending 3 days in jail and finally posting bail that the zip code on the search warrant application was wrong... it had my entire address except they used 28540 instead of 28546. Whereas the warrant itself had no zip code on it at all. After the cops busted into my house and brought us into the living room, they took us off one by one and asked us where a friend of my roommates was (he was supposed to be at our house according to them) and none of us told them. We had a friend show up to the house while they were there and they searched her and found pot in her possession. They moved all the cop cars away from our house hoping that our friend would show up and eventually he did. With alot of drugs on his person and in his g/f's car. They arrested the friend and his girlfriend. After that they took us off to jail. When we got back to our house we found that $200 in my roommates wallet was gone (we had mentioned this money to the cops while they were there) and their change jar was emptied (approx $50 in change) and they had taken the jar out of my roommates room and into the kitchen while we were in the living room. Another $138 was stolen from my absent roommates room, and approx 100-200 in change. No money was reported to be confisicated on the inventory form we received. I'm going to talk to a lawyer and also have a court appointed attorney though i don't think i'll be keeping him long because it's been a couple days and i haven't even been contacted by his secretary or anything and I have been trying to contact him. Can somebody help me?

One question is: Is the zip code being wrong on a search warrant application enough to dismiss findings?

Another: Can we make them pay to fix our door?

Yet another: Can we receive any possessions back from the police IF the search warrant is invalid?

Yep, another: Can we find out who the CRI was?

And finally: We had to go through a bail bondsman to get out of jail... we paid 10% up front and have to pay the other 5% over the next 5 weeks... bond was set at $5000 so that equals 500 up front and 50/week for 5 weeks... can we get this money back if the warrant was invalid?

Oh yeah this one too: Can we sue in civil court for slander due to our names and addresses showing up in the newspaper IF the warrant is invalid...

Sorry: Is there any way to recover the stolen monies?

Really Sorry: Can they search people who come there after they've raided the house?
 


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eromrab

Guest
More on stolen money

Their were a total of 8 people who were arrested in our living room at the point of the search after everyone had come and all that. The cops brought one of the change jars (of the b/f and g/f) into the kitchen and most of the 8 people and many of the cops saw it with money in it. My female roommate mentioned that she had just withdrawn $200 from the atm and that it was in her wallet to the highest ranking officer... a captain... and asked if she could take it with her, and he said no. But the fact that she mentioned that she had the money in front of 8 others and many cops AND she has an atm receipt from just before the raid (they had gone to the atm then went home). Nothing other than money is missing so that pretty much counts out theft from criminals because we have 4 computers, wide screen tv, xbox, plus a whole lot more... the money is not reported on the inventory as i said earlier and nothing of them confinscating it has been recorded/mentioned to us. Do you think there is anything we can do to recover the stolen money?
 

JETX

Senior Member
This one is really pretty simple:

"Is the zip code being wrong on a search warrant application enough to dismiss findings?"
*** No.

"Can we make them pay to fix our door?"
*** No. But you can claim it with your insurance company.

"Can we receive any possessions back from the police IF the search warrant is invalid?"
*** Depends. If the warrant were voided, you won't get your drugs back.

"Can we find out who the CRI was?"
*** The attorney might be able to upon submittal to the court.

"We had to go through a bail bondsman to get out of jail... we paid 10% up front and have to pay the other 5% over the next 5 weeks... bond was set at $5000 so that equals 500 up front and 50/week for 5 weeks... can we get this money back if the warrant was invalid?"
*** No.

"Can we sue in civil court for slander due to our names and addresses showing up in the newspaper IF the warrant is invalid..."
*** No. The newspaper only reported the facts. Besides they are exempt.

"Is there any way to recover the stolen monies?"
*** At this point, you don't KNOW that they were stolen. You only know that they are 'missing'. They could probably noted on the supplemental police report and shown as evidence or seizure.
 

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