DOJ

Ashley K. Billig, Ph.D. | Director

State of Wisconsin Department of Justice

Bureau of Justice Information and Analysis

billigak@doj.state.wi.us

Ashley K. Billig,

Agency A had a few for question 1 and zero no-knocks requested, so this is the end of the monthly form for Agency A.  Just to give you an idea, of the 358 agencies that responded to our request for data a few months ago, about 37% had zero warrants at all, and only 12 indicated they had any no-knock warrants. s

Agency B fills out the form, but they answer YES to the last question - lets say they say they requested 4 no-knock warrants. There's more information required in the statute but specifically and only for no-knock search warrants. Could the form then open up 4 boxes within the same form, below these first three questions, for them to answer more information about those 4 no-knocks? We need to know additional information about those, such as were they approved, how were they executed, what crime(s) were suspected, did they include a property inventory form (no details about the property, just a Y/N), whether anyone died or was seriously injured during the no-knock, and the demographics of any primary suspects that were present when the no-knock was executed.

So my question is about whether those 4 boxes - one per no-knock warrant - can be within the monthly form they need to fill out, similar to how different subject boxes open up on the WIBRS incident form to give more detail about each person. And then these additional questions that are required for no-knocks only are all within those boxes, such that the agency is essentially filling out a box per no-knock, all within the monthly form without having to transmit separate forms?

Technically the statute doesn't require agencies to tell us those details per warrant, but trying to get that information in aggregate when there's more than 1 no-knock can be complicated and really not useful.

Our workgroup has also discussed optional fields that are not required by statute, including:

• have any knock-and-announce warrants led to death/serious bodily injury of anyone? (this would likely be an optional field on top)

  • if yes to the death/injury question for all kinds of warrants - splitting that apart by death and injury, and splitting it apart by whether the deceased or injured person is the suspect, law enforcement, or someone else. (this would either be on top if it was a Yes associated with a knock-and-announce, vs whether its a Yes for a no-knock warrant

• were any firearms seized during warrants (any kind of warrant)

• were drugs seized during warrants (any kind of warrant)

• whether no-knocks were part of a task force and if so, what other agencies were involved

• specific dates of requests, authorizations, and executions of warrants

• if someone was injured/killed, more information about who caused it and the circumstances

• ability to connect people together, so if a suspect was present at a no-knock, their age/sex/race/etc per person and then age/sex/race/etc for a second person, etc. rather than having all the people's information aggregated.

We got quite a bit of pushback when we planned on requiring additional fields that were not specifically in the statute, so anything we do include that isn't absolutely required by statute has to be optional. I think at least the ones in green were of interest to most of the group. 

I've attached the statute (20) that shows exactly what we are required to ask for...pretty basic except for a few more details about warrants that were executed as no-knocks.

Thanks!

Ashley

12 per Law Enforcement Agency, every agency in the state. State Statute Requires

New Form, currently a web site

None

DOJ Requested it

No

State Statute Requires reporting

Number of warrants and types of warrants, if no knock warrant more information is required and demographics of ppl in home.

DOJ

NO

DOJ and ppl who run the state.

DOJ Systems