LAWSUIT FILED OVER DRUG RAID

MEMPHIS -- A local family has filed a $2.5 million lawsuit against
the Shelby County Sheriff's Department and other officers, claiming
they had the wrong address when they ransacked the family's house and
mistreated them during a raid last year.

Filing the lawsuit against Sheriff A.C. Gilless, detectives G.
Stauffer and R. Reed, and unnamed officers are homeowner Ruby J.
Lott, her son Harvey L. Lott, her father William Mason, her nephews
Lee Durant and Lenoris Spencer, and her granddaughter Candice Lott.

According to the suit, Reed and Stauffer obtained a search warrant
for the residence after they said a reliable informant told them he
had been in the house where a man named "Robert" stored and sold
marijuana and cocaine.

Narcotics officers raided the house about 1:30 a.m. on March 8, 2000.

The lawsuit said they shouted obscenities, damaged several items, and
forced at least three of the family members to the floor, where they
were handcuffed.

In the case of 13-year-old Candice, "one officer held a gun to (her)
head, ordered her not to move and threatened to hurt her," the
lawsuit said. It also claimed that one of the individuals handcuffed,
91-year-old Mason, suffers from Alzheimer's disease.

Durant said he told the officers the man they were looking for didn't
live at his home, but that a Robert lived next door in a house where
drugs were allegedly sold. That house is now vacant.

Deputy Chief Don Wright said the Lott home was one of two residences
in different neighborhoods searched that night after officers were
told they were drug houses operated by the man named Robert.

While neither Robert nor drugs were found in the Lott home, Wright
said at "the other house they hit they found a large stash of
marijuana and a large amount of money."

As for the Lott home, he said, "We feel like we hit the right house
- -- just hit it at the wrong time."

The lawsuit said the officers involved in the raid failed to report
the "misconduct" by some of their colleagues during the invasion and
that those officers should be fired or disciplined.