By Craig Anderson

Because there’s no authorization for no-knock warrant executions in Delaware Code, Delaware Association of Chiefs of Police president Patrick Ogden said they aren’t used by the state’s law enforcement agencies.

However, at least one organization, Campaign Zero, notes that they’re not officially banned through state law, so part of its “End All No Knocks” nationwide initiative is focusing on clarifying Delaware’s code, too.

The project, which evaluated law enforcement’s use of warrants across the country and issued report cards for all states, has no-knock warrants at the top of a list of issues it believes need addressing.

“I think my analysis is Delaware has a lot of work to do in terms of really ensuring that no-knock raids are rare and that we’re not putting officers and civilians in unnecessary danger,” said Katie Ryan, Campaign Zero chief of staff.

“We’re also super-hopeful that Delaware could make a lot of these changes with little resistance and pretty easily in the immediate future, that there’s no need for a big, long legislative process,” she added. “A lot of this can occur pretty quickly and (by) anyone who’s a champion of just ensuring that people’s homes aren’t being raided, and individuals and kids and families aren’t in harm’s way, and necessarily would be able to make these changes quickly.”

Banning such warrants in Delaware Code would require legislation passed in the state’s General Assembly.

So what exactly are no-knock warrants?

The Associated Press defines them as “orders by judges that allow police to enter premises without notifying residents, such as by ringing the doorbell or banging on the door. They’ve been blamed in several killings of Black people, some of which have led to criminal prosecutions against officers, and prompted bipartisan calls across the country to curtail their use.”

Ms. Ryan said the errant shooting death of Breonna Taylor by police in Louisville, Kentucky, in March 2020 spurred the examination of no-knock warrants.

It was a national topic at the time, and in December of that year, two of Ms. Taylor’s aunts watched as Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam ceremonially signed a statewide ban against the use of no-knock search warrants, named “Breonna’s Law.”

Two other states — Oregon and Florida — already had similar bans, while several municipalities, including Louisville, have prohibited the practice since Ms. Taylor was killed.

In November 2020, in the wake of George Floyd’s death, Minneapolis’ mayor and its police chief changed a policy that dictates how officers should carry out no-knock warrants, requiring officers to announce their presence as they enter premises, as well as make periodic announcements while inside. The change was part of several adjustments made by police at the time, AP reported.

In the First State, Justice of the Peace Court Chief Magistrate Alan Davis said, “Judicial officers review search warrants submitted by police agencies; approval or denial is based on the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, Delaware Constitution, statute and case law.

“With the exception to specific requests for warrants to be executed during nighttime hours, the police execute that warrant based on operational necessity, as guided by legal precedent. Unlike some other jurisdictions, there is nothing in Delaware law specifying a ‘no-knock’ warrant as opposed to a ‘standard’ warrant. A warrant is a warrant.”

He continued, “Police must be mindful of legal precedent and case law because if a warrant is not executed correctly, it may be challenged by the defense, and if a judge rules that it was not properly executed, the results of that search could be suppressed and any evidence gathered under that warrant found to be inadmissible at trial.”

Ms. Ryan said she was unsure if no-knocks were used in Delaware and their frequency if so “because there is no oversight or reporting requirements for law enforcement, which is another huge barrier to accountability.”

The American Civil Liberties Union Delaware maintains that no-knock warrants should be sharply limited and issued only in extreme cases.

“No-knock warrants have a deadly impact on aggressively over-policed communities and are primarily used as a tool in fighting the failed and racist War on Drugs, even when there is not a public safety threat,” said Javonne Rich, ACLU-DE policy and advocacy director. “With a no-knock warrant, police can barge into a person’s home without notice and without identifying themselves, oftentimes in the dead of night.

“These types of raids pose a danger to civilians and law enforcement, as they are likely to encounter resistance from civilians who believe they are justifiably defending themselves from intruders — not knowing that the intruders are, in fact, the police.”

Scrutinizing no-knocks

Campaign Zero’s examination of no-knock warrants took a two-pronged approach, Ms. Ryan said.

“We wanted to start conducting some research to figure out, like, what precisely is the solution to prevent those types of deaths from occurring again,” she said. “And we also wanted to know how pervasive the issue of deaths and harm with no-knock search warrants was across the country.”

The first step was to contact Dr. Pete Rasca, a professor who Ms. Ryan said “is the nation’s leading expert on police militarization and no-knock search warrants, to just sort of get our heads around the issue.”

With that resource, Campaign Zero began researching case studies nationwide and aimed to find two in every state. In Delaware, the group referenced one, which occurred as a raid Oct. 8, 2012, in Middletown. The recap said police officers arrived and used a battering ram to break down a door, and it was determined that the person named in the warrant was the previous homeowner and had sold the property four years earlier.

Following its research, the nonprofit gave out report cards for every state on an array of issues surrounding various warrant types.

When it came to no-knock warrants, according to Campaign Zero, Delaware received zeros on two counts:

• Bill/law does not ban/restrict no-knock search warrants. Bill/law does not cite specific crimes/circumstances in which no-knock search warrants would be authorized.
• Bill/law does not outline warrant application requirements for no-knock search warrants specifically.

Ms. Ryan said that a zero point in a given section means that there is no state law (or the state law is not sufficient enough) to meet that criteria.

For example, she said, Delaware has zero out of two points in the first category because there is no law ending no-knock warrants and because there is no law that requires a more comprehensive application for warrants where officers are seeking a no-knock exception.

Also, Ms. Ryan said, out of a total of 15 laws/policies that Campaign Zero believes are essential for ending no-knock raids, Delaware has only 1.5 in place.

Ms. Ryan said a Campaign Zero representative presented the findings to the Delaware Law Enforcement Accountability Task Force, which was authorized by state legislators to examine use-of-force issues.

“From what I recall, they were receptive to our recommendations,” she said.

However, no-knock warrants were not referenced in a final LEATF list of recommendations to be submitted to the Council on Police Training, which is tentatively tasked with creating a standard statewide use-of-force policy.

Attempts to obtain comment from LEATF co-chairs Rep. Franklin Cooke, D-New Castle, and Darryl Parson, were unsuccessful.