A teenage burglary suspect, cooperating with police as an informant, told the county investigators that he had seen guns and grenades in Apartment No.
Shortly after the middle of May, in 1971, Special Agent Marcus J. Davis of the ATFD received information from Detective W. F. Seminuk, of the Prince George's County Police Department, indicating that a quantity of hand grenades had been observed by a confidential reliable source in Apartment No.
A search of records showed that Ken Ballew was arrested on 20 November 1970 for a misdemeanor (for carrying a concealed weapon) and that he had not registered any grenades with the National Firearms Act registry.
This additional information, presented on June 7, 1971, the day of the raid, was deemed an adequate probable cause to add Apt.
The joint task force of ATFD and county police attempted to carry out raids on two apartments in the same building while retaining the element of surprise: this raised the sense of urgency.
102 the raid team found only two minor children present (a small child and a slightly older babysitter); the agents left a note for James Russell Thomas.
The raid team entered the utility corridor by a service entrance and approached the solid door to avoid being identified by the occupants.
ATFD agent William H. Seals claimed he knocked on the door, announced "Federal officers with a search warrant, open up."
ATFD agent Marcus J. Davis decided the occupants had heard the knock and call-out and had been allowed enough time to open the door.
McNeil claimed that they believed burglars were invading their home and that she armed herself with her own revolver based on that belief.
ATFD agent William H. Seals in civilian clothes (but wearing a badge) came through the door first and saw a nude man in the hallway aiming a revolver at him.
Clad only in her underwear, she surrendered to the officers when ordered to do so, becoming hysterical and shouting, "Help, murder, police," when she saw plaintiff lying wounded on the floor.
Such grenades were classified by then (1971) and later (2009) ATF regulations as non-weapon curios and may be owned as military souvenirs without federal registry.
[3] Of the five grenades, two were bookends for a collection of military books and three had been rigged to pop caps: Ballew had used them as handheld noisemakers on Fourth of July on his balcony (the ATF affidavit stated "that Ken had been observed in the recent past playing with several hand grenades in the rear of 1014 Quebec Terrace.")
At the time of the raid Ballew was gainfully employed as a printing pressman at the Washington Star newspaper and was a Boy Scout troop leader.
He was a member of the National Rifle Association (NRA) and owned a collection of legal firearms, mostly Civil War era reproductions.
Ballew's lawyer claimed the federal government was negligent in relying on stale, hearsay and erroneous information.
... "[2] The defense alleged that staging a raid by fourteen or more agents from different agencies on a domicile had a high potential for error and was negligent.
The government countered that the officers acted in overwhelming numbers because 1014 Quebec Terrace was in a high crime neighborhood, with many reports of burglary and gunfire.
The government also argued that, by barricading the entrance to their home and being armed, Ballew and McNeil "were actively resisting the entry of the law enforcement officers.
More likely, plaintiff was not dressed when he first heard law enforcement officers at his door and in his haste to arm himself and try to keep them out, he did not take the time to clothe himself.
[2]Multiple claims echoed in the gun press:[citation needed] that a proper investigation would have shown that Ballew was not a dangerous person, that such evidence as was presented against Ballew did not rise to the level of probable cause to justify a raid, that the proper way to execute a knock-service warrant specifying a day-time search of a home is to go in daylight to the front door, knock, and present the warrant to the subject, that breaking down the backdoor with a battering ram at 8:30 p.m. was not day-time knock-service, that when un-uniformed people break down one's door at night the natural reaction is to defend oneself, and that this incident demonstrated that the ATFD zeal in enforcing gun control had gone too far.
[citation needed] However, at Congressional hearings on the Waco raid in 1995, Victor Oboyski, testifying as then-president of the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association, a pro-federal agent lobbying organization, stated: The day of a couple of agents or a couple of detectives walking up to somebody's front door and knocking on a door in three piece suits to execute a warrant of any kind is over ... [9][10]