MELBOURNE, Fla. – A Melbourne officer is off the job after the city's SWAT team raided the wrong house.
Melbourne police Detective Jonathan Hawk submitted his resignation at the end of October, five months after the raid.
According to investigative transcripts, the SWAT team entered a home on Bentwood Court, when they meant to search the home across the street. The search was part of an investigation into an alleged drug house.
Documents show that within minutes of the search during the morning of May 24, officers realized they had the wrong house.
A member of the SWAT team told internal investigators that the actual suspects they were searching for began "walking out of the house across the street, which should have been the target house, loading things into a van ..."
During an interview with investigators, Hawk is quoted admitting he used Google maps to identify the house.
In transcripts, a SWAT team member said that thankfully, the innocent woman who had her home unfairly searched was not "handled and thrown on the ground and cuffed and -- and a lot of things that could have happened."
Melbourne police Chief David Gillespie wrote a letter to Hawk, saying he violated the department's policies.
The woman who lives in the home that was wrongfully searched told News 6 that she was terrified by the incident, but that she supports the work officers in Melbourne do.