Black woman suing Fort Worth police over ‘unlawful’ armed raid

Nelda Price’s husband died weeks after raid and she believes stress of incident triggered heart failure

A 69-year-old Black woman from Texas has accused police officers of using excessive force and unlawfully searching the home she shared with her husband during a drugs raid.

In a lawsuit obtained by NBC News on Wednesday, Nelda Price, from Fort Worth, Texas, said that at around 8pm on 11 March, officers “smashed in the doors to the residence and stormed into the house with guns drawn.”

Ms Price alleges in the suit, which has been filed in a Tarrant County court against the city of Fort Worth, that officers did not give a verbal warning or knock on the door before forcing their way into the residence.

The suit alleges that Ms Price and her late husband John Price, who are both Black, had guns pointed at them, before their hands were zip-cuffed behind their backs and they were taken outside to their front garden.

The Fort Worth Police had no reason to suspect that the couple, “who were relaxing in their home on a weekday evening, were involved in or engaged in any criminal activity,” the lawsuit states.

It adds that the couple did not pose “any threat to the safety of the Fort Worth Police Officers or any other individual.”

The couple said that they were left handcuffed outside for several hours. Ms Price was wearing a nightgown, while her husband was in his pyjamas.

During the time they were left outside, Mr Price, who took blood pressure medication, started to feel ill, but Ms Price’s pleas for help to the officers were initially ignored, according to NBC.

An officer did eventually check on Mr Price, and he was treated at the scene after emergency medical help was called for.

Ms Price alleges that the raid caused damage to her home, and that the incident created anguish for her and her husband.

Mr Price died from heart failure five weeks after the raid, and his wife believes his death was triggered by the trauma of the incident.

When the couple were let back inside their home, they were not told why the house had been searched by officers, but were left with a search warrant.

It said police were looking for methamphetamines and any items linked to narcotics trafficking, but nothing was seized during the search.

The warrant also stated that there was “sufficient reason to believe that to knock and announce their purpose by the officers executing this warrant would be futile, dangerous, and otherwise inhibit the effective investigation of the offence or offences related to the purpose of this warrant.”

The suit, which is asking for actual and punitive damages, accuses the department of having a “history of racial profiling and biased based on policing.”

It notes multiple cases of police brutality against Black residents by Fort Worth authorities and the death of Atataina Jackson in 2019, a Black woman who was fatally shot in her home by an officer.

Despite requests from multiple news organisations, including The Independent, the Fort Worth Police Department has not commented on the raid.