June 8, 2011 11:48AM # Department of Education SWAT Raid for Unpaid Student Loans By [David Rittgers](https://www.cato.org/people/david-rittgers) --- SHARE Department of Education officers [employed a SWAT team](http://www.news10.net/news/article/141072/2/Dept-of-Education-breaks-down-Stockton-mans-door) because of unpaid student loans. I am not making this up: > Kenneth Wright does not have a criminal record and he had no reason to believe a S.W.A.T team would be breaking down his door at 6 a.m. on Tuesday… > > > As it turned out, the person law enforcement was looking for was not there — Wright’s estranged wife. > > > “They put me in handcuffs in that hot patrol car for six hours, traumatizing my kids,” Wright said. > > > Wright said he later went to the mayor and Stockton Police Department, but the City of Stockton had nothing to do with Wright’s search warrant. > > > The U.S. Department of Education issued the search and called in the S.W.A.T for his wife’s defaulted student loans. This, along with the [Jose Guerena case](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/25/jose-guerena-arizona-_n_867020.html), demonstrates how the militarization of police terminology and tactics is incompatible with a free society. [Police officers aren’t “operators”](https://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=13174) like Green Berets or Navy SEALs. This is just one more reason to [abolish the Department of Education](https://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=4560) and oppose [police militarization](https://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=6476) and [federal overcriminalization](http://www.amazon.com/Three-Felonies-Day-Target-Innocent/dp/1594032556). ##### Related Tags [Constitutional Law](https://www.cato.org/constitutional-law), [Robert A. Levy Center for Constitutional Studies](https://www.cato.org/robert-levy-center-constitutional-studies) [![Creative Commons License](/build/cato_2020/images/creative-commons.svg)](http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/) This work is licensed under a [Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/).