POLICE TOO QUICK TO BUST DOWN DOOR

Judge Says There Wasn't Enough Time To Answer

A husband and wife have been acquitted of growing marijuana after an RCMP
officer failed to give them enough time to answer their door before he
smashed it down with a battering ram.

"This judgment reinforces the fact that the police should knock and
announce and give the homeowner an opportunity of getting to the door," the
accused's lawyer, David Tarnow, said yesterday after the B.C. Supreme Court
ruling.

The decision by Justice Brian Joyce involved a ruling that a police warning
of one or two seconds, discounting the testimony of investigating officer
Const. D.M. Duplissie, was insufficient.

The trial also involved the startling revelation that Duplissie lived
across the street from the accused and detected the smell of marijuana
coming from the house two months before he took direct action.

The judge said that when the officer did obtain a search warrant he did not
wait a reasonable time to permit the occupants to respond after he knocked.

"It is clear that Const. Duplissie had a personal interest in this matter
in the sense that he was understandably concerned about a possible
marijuana grow operation in his own back yard, so to speak," the judge
writes. "In my view, he let his zeal and his desire to do something about
the situation overcome what he knew was his duty."

The accused, Li Qing Mai, and her husband, Zhi Wen Tang, of Mission, were
charged with unlawful production and possession of marijuana and theft of
electricity.

Duplissie testified that he knocked on the door and said, "Police. Search
warrant."

He told the court he waited eight to 10 seconds and could see movement of
some figures inside the house. He said he decided no one was coming to the
door and that for officer safety and to prevent destruction of evidence he
used the ram to break the door.