Montgomery County police deployed its SWAT team 163 times in 2014, ranking third in the state in the number of deployments, behind the Baltimore City and Prince George’s County police departments, according to statistics released by the state earlier this month.
The 163 deployments marks a 21 percent decrease from 2013, when the county deployed its SWAT team 205 times.
Only Baltimore City, with 230 deployments, and Prince George’s County, with 418 deployments, had more SWAT team activity than Montgomery County, according to the fiscal year 2014 statistics, which included deployments from July 1, 2013 to June 30, 2014.
The data has been released annually since the General Assembly passed a law in 2009 intended to create transparency around SWAT activity. Berwyn Heights Mayor Cheye Calvo had lobbied for the release of data after a Prince George’s County SWAT team raided his home in July 2008 and shot and killed his two dogs. The raid occurred after a package of marijuana was delivered to Calvo’s doorstep. Calvo told police he did not know where the marijuana came from. He was not charged in the incident.
The law requires jurisdictions to submit SWAT statistics that detail the location, legal authority, reason for and outcome of each deployment; but the state website only publishes a summary of deployments statewide and not the details for each jurisdiction.
The Governor’s Office of Crime Control & Prevention has not responded to Bethesda Beat’s Aug. 18 request that it release the data pertaining to jurisdictions.
Of the 1,689 statewide deployments in fiscal year 2014, 93 percent were undertaken as part of a search warrant, 3.6 percent were for barricade situations and 2.2 percent were “other.” Sixty-eight percent of the deployments statewide involved forcible entry, while about 30 percent did not, according to the released statistics.
About 60 percent of the deployments statewide resulted in an arrest. Five deployments resulted in someone being killed; 23 people were injured statewide during deployments and five animals were killed by SWAT teams. A SWAT officer was injured during 11 deployments during fiscal year 2014, according to the statistics.