Source: The Miami Herald
Two Santeria priests -- including one who fought for the religious right to sacrifice animals -- say police used excessive force earlier this month when they stormed, guns drawn, into a Coral Gables home where the homeowner was conducting a ritual involving the sacrifice of 11 goats and 44 fowl.
''They came inside this house where priests, old ladies and children were playing in a different room, pointing guns at everybody,'' said Ernesto Pichardo, president of the Lukumà Babalú Ayé Church in Hialeah, which won a landmark 1993 Supreme Court decision that ruled animal sacrifices a religious right.
Nineteen officers responded to the 911 call on June 8 from a neighbor who heard the shrieks of animals. Police say the homeowner, Noriel Batista, invited them into his home and explained the Afro-Caribbean faith, which merges Catholic and African beliefs.