Yesterday, the Atlanta police provided even more horrifying evidence that the government’s war on drugs continues to be a disastrous failure.

The case involves one of the latest casualties of war: 92-year-old Kathryn Johnston of Atlanta, whose November 21 death was the result of a botched “no knock” drug raid on her home.

A search warrant stating crack cocaine was being sold in her apartment allowed the officers to cut through the burglar bars protecting Johnston's home and burst through her door without identifying themselves.

Johnston, who lived alone, apparently mistook the plainclothes officers for intruders and fired on them with an old revolver her niece had given Johnston for protection in her notoriously dangerous neighborhood.

She didn’t hit any of the officers. The police responded, firing 39 shots, killing Johnston and apparently wounding three of their own.

After her death and a fruitless search of her home, the officers planted marijuana to justify the raid.

An excerpt from an Associated Press article reveals the despicable depths to which the officers sank before, during, and after the raid:

The deadly drug raid had been set up after narcotics officers said an informant had claimed there was cocaine in the home.

When the plainclothes officers burst in without notice, police said, Johnston fired at them, and they fired back.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Yonette Sam-Buchanan said Thursday that although the officers found no drugs in Johnston's home, Smith planted three bags of marijuana in the home as part of a cover story.

The case raised serious questions about no-knock warrants and whether the officers followed proper procedures.

Atlanta Police Chief Richard Pennington asked the FBI to lead a multi-agency probe. He also announced policy changes to require the department to drug-test its nearly 1,800 officers and require top supervisors to sign off on narcotics operations and no-knock warrants.

To get the warrant, officers told a magistrate judge that an undercover informant had told them Johnston's home had surveillance cameras monitored carefully by a drug dealer named Sam.

After the shooting, a man claiming to be the informant told a television station that he had never purchased drugs there, leading Pennington to admit he was uncertain whether the suspected drug dealer actually existed.

You can read the entire article here and another article about this atrocity here.

While this story is outrageous, it isn't unique. In the bottom-right corner of the front page of MPP's Web site, you can read a whole series of stories about other drug-war victims.