FAMILY SAYS COPS RAIDED WRONG HOME

NEW YORK -- A Brooklyn family accused police of breaking into their
apartment, throwing tear gas inside, dragging an 18-year-old disabled girl
out of the shower, and handcuffing them all while searching for drugs and
guns before saying it was all a mistake.

"I thought this was a war," said Basil Shorter, 62, who was in the
apartment along with his wife and two daughters at the time. "I said to
myself some foreign force has come to kill us."

But the Police Department has a different version. Yes, they raided the
Shorter family's apartment in Crown Heights, handcuffed the family and
searched for drugs and guns, and found nothing. But they had a warrant and
were at the right apartment.

Chief Martin O'Boyle, head of the Organized Crime Control Bureau, said
Thursday that police received information from a confidential informant
that drugs and guns were being sold at two apartments at 1602 Union St. One
of the apartments was the Shorter family's.

Before raiding the family's home May 1, police raided Apt. 3C and recovered
a gun, a small bag of cocaine, and a small quantity of marijuana, O'Boyle
said.

"What we believe to this point is the information was good," he said.

He added that police had warrants to search Apt. 3C and Apt. 1A, which is
the Shorter home.

Neither O'Boyle nor Police Commissioner Howard Safir offered an apology to
the family.

Harvey Weitz, the family's attorney in Manhattan, was furious upon hearing
that no apology had been offered. He described the Shorters as regular,
ordinary, decent people.

"This says to me, and everyone else, this is just another day at the office
for the Police Department, Weitz said.

Checked-by: Richard Lake