SAN DIEGO — Officers served search warrants at several locations throughout the county Thursday morning.
The raids were part of Operation Mike Drop, according to civil rights activists who are up in arms about redactions in the warrants.
One search warrant left at a home in Spring Valley had all addresses, property locations, and person(s) to be searched information redacted.
The operation included multiple law enforcement agencies, including San Diego Police Department officers and FBI agents, who raided several homes early Thursday, in some cases before sunrise.
More than a dozen officers showed up with a bull horn at Greg Otis' house in Mountain View, the long-time resident said.
“They didn't knock. They just threw the flash bangs and jumped on the loudspeaker, ‘Come out with your hands up,’” Otis said.
Otis said officers were searching for his nephew, who had a warrant for his arrest.
“I had to put my pants on and my wife came out with her nightgown on. They took us across the street and handcuffed us,” Otis said.
Officers then searched the family's home, where Otis said he has lived since 1976.
The resident said officers did not present a search warrant and they did not find his nephew.
“If you're going to go to somebody's house, tell the owner what you're coming for. Don't just barge on in there, you know, and never tell them what for,” Otis said.
At a house on Kempton Street in Spring Valley, it was the same routine, according a resident who asked not to be identified.
Officers with a bull horn raided the house with four children inside, searching for a man with an arrest warrant, the resident said. The man was not there.
When the resident asked to see the search warrant officers left paperwork with the location, property, and persons to be searched redacted.
“No address or name on it. Whose house are they going to go to? Anybody in San Diego?” said Tasha Williamson, a local civil right activist and former San Diego mayoral candidate.
Williamson said she wants to know what the multi-agency operation was all about.
“You cannot come into people's homes and not provide them a search warrant. Your handcuffing grandmothers and grandfathers and disheveling their lives and don't tell them anything? Then you don't take anything from the house? That's wrong,” Williamson said.
Officers also raided an apartment complex on Logan Avenue at West Street in Mountain View.
An SDPD spokesperson issued the following statement to CBS 8:
"Warrants are being served in connection with an investigation, and more information will be available on Monday. Redacted/sealed warrants DO NOT mean police can search any location they want. The information is simply redacted or sealed on that copy. Warrants are court orders issued and signed by a superior court judge. Additional information will be available Monday."
The search warrants associated with the police operation remained sealed at the downtown courthouse.