Tijuana Brown says police using a battering ram to break open the door of her Jamaica, Queens home just before 6 a.m. on March 5 left behind a great deal of physical and emotional damage.

“I don’t sleep straight through the night! I’m up. And I’m up through the duration of the night,” said Brown.

Brown says the officers tore her home apart for more than an hour, narrowing in on her nephew Andre Brown, who lives in the basement. But she said they only found a very small amount of marijuana. 

What You Need To Know

  • Tijuana Brown says police used a battering ram to break open the door of her Jamaica, Queens home just before 6 a.m. on March 5, leaving behind both physical and emotional damage

  • She says the search came up mostly empty

  • The NYPD says officers lawfully executed a search warrant, after complaints of drug and gun sales at the home
  • Brown says she plans on suing the city

“They said it was a bust and then said, ‘Sorry for the inconvenience.’ And they left. But this is definitely more than an inconvenience,” said Brown. 

The no-knock raid was first reported by the Daily News. An NYPD spokesman says the officers lawfully executed a search warrant reviewed and signed by a criminal court judge, and supervised by the Queens District Attorney’s Office. The spokesman says neighborhood residents had alleged drug and fire arm sales at the location. The spokesman added that Andre Brown is on parole for a violent robbery — and was convicted of carrying an illegal gun. 

The District Attorney’s Office would only say that it has no public record of this incident.

Tijuana said her nephew wasn’t home when we spoke to her Monday but the charges stemming from last month’s warrant didn’t stick. 

“They charged him with having marijuana on him and in a week it was thrown out,” said Brown.

There is a growing national movement to ban no-knock warrants or raids — a tactic when police don’t identify themselves until they’ve knocked down the door. It was during a no-knock raid last year that Breonna Taylor was mistakenly shot dead by police in her Kentucky home.

Tijuana Brown says she didn’t know the officers were police — until they were already inside her home.

“We could have had life that was taken here. Because at any time I or anyone else in my house could have tried to defend the house not knowing who they were,” said Brown.

Brown says calls to the NYPD and the District Attorney’s Office for answers have gone nowhere.

“They spoke to me as if I was a criminal,” said Brown.

Brown paid $1,000 to repair her front door. Now, she’s planning on hiring an attorney and hopes the city will put more scrutiny on this tactic, so no one else has to go through what her family experienced.