Yardley Family Sues DEA, Lower Makefield Twp Police in Wrong-House Raid

Imagine waking up to pounding on the front door of your home at 4:30 in the morning  with federal authorities yelling “search warrant ” and subsequently discovering later, those same authorities “raided” the wrong home.

Such is the case in lawsuit filed by Robert McLaughlin and his wife against U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), Lower Makefield Township, Lower Makefield Police Chief Kenneth Coluzzi, unidentified Lower Makefield police officers, and unidentified DEA agents, in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, last week.

The lawsuit stems from what the complaint describes as a wrong-address police raid carried out at the family’s home in Yardley, on May 16, 2024.

According to the complaint, law enforcement officers and DEA agents allegedly executed a warrant at 907 Morgan Drive instead of the intended address at 905 Morgan Drive during an early-morning operation on May 16, 2024.

The lawsuit alleges that  at approximately 4:30 a.m., the McLaughlin family were  sleeping  inside their home when officers began aggressively banging on the front door before allegedly using a battering ram to forcibly breach the entrance. The lawsuit alleges officers entered the residence with assault rifles drawn while conducting the warrant operation.

McLaughlin was physically restrained, handcuffed, and removed from the home while partially clothed, according to the complaint.

According to the court filing his wife, Christine, and two children were forced outside in pajamas and underwear and detained at gunpoint on the family’s front lawn by law enforcement officers and DEA agents.

McLaughlin and his family repeatedly identified themselves and informed officers of their correct address during the incident. The complaint alleges the family continued to be detained until a superior officer later acknowledged that law enforcement had entered the wrong residence, the complaint says

“The allegations in this complaint describe every family’s worst nightmare,” said Brian Fritz, partner at Fritz & Bianculli Law Firm LLC. “Our clients were asleep in their own home when armed officers broke down their door, pointed weapons at them, and detained them despite clear indications they had the wrong address. This lawsuit seeks accountability for the profound emotional and constitutional harms the McLaughlin family suffered.”

The federal lawsuit alleges violations of the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution and includes claims involving unlawful search and seizure, unlawful detention, false imprisonment, assault, battery, negligence, invasion of privacy, negligent infliction of emotional distress, and failures involving police training, supervision, and warrant execution procedures.

The complaint also alleges the McLaughlin family suffered severe emotional and psychological trauma following the alleged wrong-house raid, including anxiety, nightmares, hypervigilance, sleep disturbances, fear of being inside their own home, and other PTSD-related symptoms.

The complaint alleges authorities failed to properly verify the target residence before forcibly entering the McLaughlin family’s home and continued detaining the family even after information allegedly made clear they were not the intended subjects of the warrant operation.

Lower Makefield officials were not immediately available  for comment on this story.