Florida Man Shot by Home-Invaders Treated Like Criminal Over Phantom "Pot Smell," Coerced into False Confession

by Maya Shaffer
PINAC
May. 14, 2015

By 2:00 am on May 8, Kris Massey of Lakeland, Florida had already had the worst kind of day. Sometime between 1:30 and 2:00 at least two people attempted to force entry into his home while he and his roommate were present.

The would-be home invader fired a shotgun blast through the front door that left 47 pellets in Massey's right hand. When the Polk County Sheriff's Department arrived, Massey's ordeal should have been over.

It wasn't.

The two responding officers, Sheriff's Deputy Colletti and Detective Kurt Karakash, claimed they "smelled pot".

Three minutes after the officers reached Massey's home, an ambulance arrived to take Massey to the hospital. The officer's priorities quickly became clear. Serving Massey by getting him needed medical help and protecting the community from the shotgun wielding home invader took a back seat to the "Drug War". The ambulance sat for around 30 minutes while the officer's questioned Massey about the "pot smell".

Even after Massey was taken to the hospital and treated for his gunshot wounds, the officers continued to hound him with questions. Massey says that he was grilled for about five more hours while on painkillers and that at one point, his heart rate spiked up to 168 beats per minute because the officers kept asking him the same questions, "are you a drug dealer, etc" all because his apartment "smelled like pot".

Massey told the officers he wanted to file a complaint against them. Suddenly the officers had a new priority more important than even the drug war... they needed to cover their butts.

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