DURHAM MAYOR SAYS RAID ON CHEEK ROAD LEGAL

Residents Say Children Were Pinned at Gunpoint

DURHAM - More than 80 people attended the Durham NAACP's monthly meeting
Sunday afternoon to discuss complaints by Cheek Road Apartments residents
about a police raid Feb. 15 through 17.

Residents of 1835 Cheek Road, who have said the raid was too aggressive,
met with NAACP members to rally support and determine who will attend a
meeting later this week with Acting Police Chief Steve Chalmers.

Curtis Gatewood, president of the Durham chapter of the National
Association for the Advancement of Colored People, said he hoped to
organize the residents and choose a place to hold the meeting. He blamed
police for being tough on "poor black folks" and suggested they target some
of the city's upper-class neighborhoods instead.

"We want justice," Gatewood said. "We want everyone's rights to be
recognized and observed regardless of where they live. ... There's a
difference in a police presence and police brutality."

Operation TAPS, The Aggressive Police Strategy, involved more than 100
officers from Durham, the State Bureau of Investigation, the National Guard
and other organizations. It netted 35 arrests, including many on drug and
weapons charges, and 65 motor vehicle tickets from Friday through Sunday.
Officers seized drugs, guns and ammunition.

On Thursday, Chalmers received the NAACP complaint and 12 letters from
residents describing terrified children, empty apartments being ripped
apart, masked officers with guns and officers pressuring residents into
searches.

On Sunday, residents complained about their phone lines being cut off and
their children being pinned to the ground at gunpoint.

Robert Carrington, a Roxboro resident who said he drove to Durham during
the raid to play cards with a friend who lived nearby, was pulled over at a
roadblock in front of Cheek Road Apartments.

Carrington, 36, said that police searched his car, handcuffed him and his
brother-in-law, then charged them both with felony cocaine possession after
spotting a piece of plastic on the vehicle's floor.

Both men, who spent the night in jail, insist there were no drugs in the
car and said tests were never done on them or the plastic. Carrington found
his car the next morning at the apartments, his wallet on the seat.

"I don't know anybody down there," he said. His court date is March 8.

Police and Mayor Bill Bell have called the police actions legal and pointed
out that they followed a six-week undercover operation that included drug
buys and surveillance. Police took paramedics and teddy bears to calm
children. Chalmers has said police intend to execute similar raids in other
crime-ridden areas.

"I supported the raid," said Bell, who attended Sunday's meeting. "If the
police did not handle themselves properly, I don't support that. ... If
things were done wrong in that raid, they're going to be corrected. But
that doesn't mean the raids are going to stop."