A Berkeleysider sent an email to us this morning:
On my bike ride to BART this morning I saw a big swat team of police, including battering rams and machine guns, at a house on Acton, 1/2 a block south of N. Berkely Bart. Wonder what was going on?
According to Berkeley Police Department’s Public Information Officer, Jamie Perkins, there was an operation that involved search warrants this morning. The Berkeley PD, however, was not the lead agency in the operation so it won’t provide further comment. Berkeleyside has contacted the FBI, the lead agency, to find out what was happening in North Berkeley.
Any reader reports?
Update FBI public information officer Patty Hansen confirmed to Berkeleyside that the FBI, together with the Berkeley PD, served some search warrants this morning in North Berkeley in connection with a drugs investigation. No arrests have yet been issued but the investigation is continuing.
Update, 13:00: Reader Kim Duir provides this eye-witness report: “I live next door at 1818 Acton St. There were more than a dozen FBI agents in camouflage and carrying automatic weapons who began shouting out side the house at 7 AM. “Search warrant, open the door!” It appeared that they broke down the door of the in law unit in the back. Very few people in the house speak English except the children. It is an extended family with elders and toddlers who mostly speak Chinese. There was no shooting and Berkeley PD and CHP officers were also on the scene.The street was filled with big SUV’s with blacked out windows. Shortly after the heavily armed and armored FBI agents went inside, they went back to their SUV’s and drove away, leaving other, less heavily armed agents to carry boxes out of the house and put evidence markers on boxes in the yard. When I expressed my concern about the children who live in the house I was told “We are aware, we are being careful, but there is more to this than meets the eye.” When I looked out my bedroom window this morning to see the source of the shouting, it looked more like a military operation in Iraq than anything I ever thought I’d see in Berkeley.”
