What went wrong?

"Better that 10 guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer."

– English jurist William Blackstone.

What went wrong?

What went so horribly wrong on the morning of April 11 that a Rocky Fork Lake area family of five was "terrorized" – in the words of one Highland County political party president – by U.S. marshals and local officers?

As first reported by The Highland County Press – and subsequently by other media, law enforcement officers arrested the wrong suspect on the morning of Thursday, April 11.

According to Hill Road resident Holly Bolin, officers were outside her home at approximately 8:15 a.m. Bolin said she looked out a window and noticed two cars, one unmarked and one from the Highland County Sheriff's Office.

"I was walking through my kitchen and saw the sheriff's car and walked out front," Bolin said. "An officer comes up to my house and yells 'Freeze' with a gun pointed at me. He asked, 'Where's William?'"

"I asked, 'Who's William?' They said, 'We want your boyfriend.' I told them, 'my boyfriend's Nick Brown.' They said 'that's him.' They entered the house. They did not read him his rights. They did not show a warrant. They arrested Nick."

Law enforcement officers were attempting to apprehend a black suspect. Nick Brown is white.

Patrick Sedoti of the U.S. Marshal's Southern District of Ohio office in Columbus told The Highland County Press it "looks like a glitch in the paperwork out of Franklin County (the Franklin County Sheriff's Office)."

Really? A paperwork glitch?

That's all you can offer?

(One itchy trigger-finger and your so-called "paperwork glitch" might have gotten someone killed.)

Sedoti said Highland County Sheriff Ron Ward and his office were not involved in this case.

Sedoti said the suspect is wanted on state drug charges.

Well, at least it was something remotely serious. Lord knows what the feds might have done if the suspect was wanted on really serious charges.

While it's commendable that Sedoti has deflected blame from local law enforcement officers, he did little to accept responsibility of his own officers' very serious mistakes.

That's not at all commendable.

The U.S. Marshals' motto is "Justice. Integrity. Service."

You can read this atop its taxpayer-funded website at www.usmarshals.gov/district/oh-s.

Justice. Integrity. Service.

On Hill Road in Highland County on the morning of April 11, there was precious little Justice or Integrity or Service.

English jurist William Blackstone is often quoted as saying it is "better that 10 guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer."

On April 11, five innocents suffered.

Nick Brown suffered. Holly Bolin suffered. Three young children, ages 6 years, 4 years, and 7 months suffered.

What went wrong?

Mr. Sedoti said after discussion with the Franklin County Sheriff's Office, it was determined that the arrest warrant had some incorrect "identifiers," from the Franklin County Prosecutor's Office, including the wrong date of birth and the wrong Social Security number for their suspect. Those numbers, he said, matched the Paint Township resident.

Highland County Sheriff Ron Ward said the officers who executed the search warrant were with the U.S. Marshal's Office's Southern Ohio Fugitive Apprehension Strike Team (SOFAST).

Maybe the marshals should change their popular nickname to TOOFAST. Or too damned fast.

"Our office simply accompanied them at their request," Ward said. "This was not our deal. In fact, our deputies were the ones who discovered they had the wrong person," Ward said.

Ward said HCSO deputies noticed that the search warrant identified the suspect as a black male. Brown is caucasian.

"It was clearly the wrong individual," Ward said.

Mr. Sedoti did not disagree.

Given Sheriff Ward's explanation, one might shudder to think what may have happened had local deputies not been involved with the bogus arrest.

There are many cases, nationwide – too many, in fact – of tragic losses of life when overzealous and ill-informed cops raid the wrong home.

One of the common fears is that if a law-abiding citizen, resting casually in his own home, upon being faced with an unexpected intrusion, and takes reasonable measures to defend himself and his family, he may very well be summarily executed having unknowingly fired at a cop who has more than sufficient brothers in arms just waiting to rise to the occasion.

It happens.

(After all, once an innocent citizen fires upon a law enforcement officer, all bets are off.)

As of this writing, the lead story on the U.S. Marshal's government website at: http://www.usmarshals.gov/district/oh-s/ was the following:

• District News: March 27, 2013 - The Southern Ohio Fugitive Apprehension Strike Team (SOFAST) and Acting U.S. Marshal, Patrick Sedoti, announced today that homicide suspect Jeffery Jackson has been arrested. SOFAST arrested Jackson earlier this morning in a parking lot in Dayton.

One cannot help but wonder how long it will take for Mr. Sedoti and his office to post another lead story, one that might begin with:

• District News: April 11, 2013 - The Southern Ohio Fugitive Apprehension Strike Team (SOFAST) and Acting U.S. Marshal, Patrick Sedoti, announced today that they arrested an innocent man and terrorized an innocent family in Highland County.

Knowing government as I do, I would not count on the latter announcement any time soon.

The U.S. Marshal's Office owes this family a very big apology. And if this family employs a reasonably competent attorney, it may owe them even more. (Of course, taxpayers will cover their erroneous ways.)

The Highland County Sheriff's Office owes the county an explanation, too, as to what went wrong.

Surely not every officer is color blind.

Rory Ryan is publisher of The Highland County Press.