FAMILY SHAKEN BY DRUG WARRANT

Early Saturday, Francisca Perez's 13-year-old daughter woke to sounds of
sirens and loud banging. Seconds later there was a gun pointed at her and a
Bexar County sheriff's deputy was yelling at her to get on the ground.

"I was crying from the minute they handcuffed me," the teenager said.
Perez's fiance and their 3-year-old son received the same rude awakening.
The deputies, according to a search warrant, were looking for Rosalinda
Reyes Mendez, 33, who an informant had told them was selling cocaine. After
bashing through the Perezes' front door early Saturday, deputies overturned
drawers and rifled through Perez's closets while she and her fiance sat
handcuffed.

But Mendez wasn't in Perez's Hatchet Pass home. Deputies found Mendez in
her own home, next door to Perez's. There, officers reported, they found a
small amount of cocaine and $41,102 in cash. Mendez was charged with
possession of a controlled substance and was later released on $7,500 bail.

Perez called her experience a nightmare.

"It's been an experience that you would not even believe," Perez said.

"Everybody saw me get handcuffed. I told them 'You have the wrong house.
You're looking for her over there.' I have nothing to do with it."

The search warrants for the Mendez and Perez homes, both signed by
Magistrate Mary E. Fuentes-Valdez on Friday, gave deputies the authority to
enter the homes on Hatchet Pass because each is "known to be occupied by
Rosalinda Mendez," according to the documents and "is a place where a
controlled substance to wit: cocaine, is unlawfully possessed."

Bexar County Deputy Chief Ruben Garcia on Monday defended his narcotics
officers, saying the informant told deputies they also would find cocaine
in Perez's home. Deputies didn't find anything at the Perez home and soon
uncuffed the family. They were not charged.

Records indicate Perez has never been arrested.

Mendez was convicted in 2000 for drug possession and sentenced to prison.
"Mendez was known at one time or another to be at that location," Garcia
said of Perez's home.

Perez, however, said Mendez has never been inside her home and the two
don't have any sort of relationship. She said Mendez has knocked on her
door three times since Perez moved in nearly two years ago.

Just hours after deputies had left her home Saturday, Perez's 13-year-old
daughter cried as she talked about being led downstairs, handcuffed, asking
officers if anything had happened to her family and not receiving an
answer. Perez's other daughter, 11, who was asleep in the living room when
the deputies barged in, was more angry than upset.

"I knew they were wrong and they were making me upset," she said. "They
were just all jerks, really."

The San Antonio Express-News is not using the children's names at Perez's
request.

Monday, Perez stayed home from work. She said she still can't think
straight and her three children are afraid of being alone.

She has contacted the department's internal affairs unit and plans to file
a formal complaint today.

"This is too much," she said. "I cannot handle this."