Denver police sued after SWAT team searches 77-year-old grandma's house

A Denver SWAT team, wearing body armor and wielding automatic weapons, carried out a, “terrifying hours-long search,” at an elderly woman’s home on January 4, bodycam footage released by the ACLU of Colorado shows. The footage shows officers arriving in an armored vehicle and ordering 77-year-old Ruby Johnson, a retired postal worker and grandmother, out of her home. Chuckles are heard in the video as Johnson – who was wearing a bathrobe and bonnet, according to court documents – comes out and tells officers she is home alone. The footage then shows police searching Johnson’s house. The ACLU said in a press release on Wednesday, November 30, that they filed a lawsuit against Denver Police Detective Gary Staab, accusing him of, “unjustifiably violating the privacy and security of Ms. Johnson’s home by hastily seeking, obtaining, and executing a search warrant without proper investigation, adequate facts, and legal justification, in violation of the Colorado Constitution.”

Credit: ACLU of Colorado via Storyful