Budapest Post

Cum Deo pro Patria et Libertate
Budapest, Europe and world news

Police bodycam shows raid at Florida home of scientist who said she was fired over Covid data

Police bodycam shows raid at Florida home of scientist who said she was fired over Covid data

The video shows Rebekah Jones asking her husband and children to come downstairs "carefully."


Police body camera video has been released of authorities raiding the home of Rebekah Jones, a Florida scientist who said she was fired for refusing to censor the state's coronavirus data.

The video was released Thursday by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) and blurred by them. It shows a Tallahassee police officer and an FDLE agent approach Jones' home. They ring the doorbell and knock numerous times but no one inside the home answers.

Eventually, an agent starts banging on the door and yells several times, "police, search warrant. Open the door."

When Jones comes to the door, the officer yells for her to "open the door now" as another agent points his gun in the direction of the home.

"They have a gun out," Jones is heard saying in the video before she opens the door and walks outside with her hands in the air. The agent lowers his gun.

Jones tells authorities that her husband and two children are still in the house.

As an agent enters the home, he calls for them to come down. Jones yells, "Do not point that gun at my children. He just pointed a gun at my children. Why is he pointing a gun at the stairs, there are children up there?"

The video shows Jones asking her husband and children to come downstairs "carefully." Before the footage ends, her family walks out of the house and authorities begin their search of the home.

The agency's video — which blurred the faces of the investigators — comes after Jones posted footage of the raid on her Twitter account, accusing officers of pointing a gun in her face.

"They pointed guns at my kids," she wrote in the post on Monday. The FDLE has said that "at no time were weapons pointed at anyone in the home."

The agency said in its statement Thursday that its agents initially "tried to minimize disruption to the children" and attempted to speak with Jones at the door to explain why they were at the home.

"The situation continued for 23 minutes without cooperation of Ms. Jones, including several phone calls to her," the FDLE said, adding that agents who walked around to the back of the home saw Jones' husband going upstairs.


The agency said it was releasing the footage because the actions of its agents have been "vilified over the past few days regarding the legal search warrant executed at the residence of Ms. Rebekah Jones."

“This video demonstrates that FDLE agents exercised extreme patience," Commissioner Richard Swearingen said in a statement. "Agents afforded Ms. Jones ample time to come to the door and resolve this matter in a civil and professional manner. As this video will demonstrate, any risk or danger to Ms. Jones or her family was the result of her actions."

Swearingen went on to say that he was "proud" of the way agents performed the search warrant and said that Jones should release the entirety of her video.

The agency raided Jones' home in search of computer hardware and electronics after a person at the residence used her email address to illegally gain access to a state-run communications platform, according to a search warrant.

The person also sent a group text on Nov. 10 telling people that it was "time to speak up before another 17,000 people are dead."

Jones, who led the effort to establish a public information portal that listed the numbers of coronavirus deaths and cases in Florida, denied sending the text. She has not been charged with a crime.

"Pretty sure if I was gonna go through the trouble of learning how to hack, then hacking DOH of all places, I'd be damn sure to get the death count right," she said in a message, adding that the accurate death toll on Nov. 10 was 17,460.

She went on to say that the agents seized evidence of "corruption at the state level," and blamed the raid on Gov. Ron DeSantis.

The governor's office said in a statement Friday that the FDLE does not discuss what a search warrant yields with anyone, including DeSantis, and said that authorities did not "raid" Jones' home.

"They executed a lawfully obtained search warrant and did so with patience, professionalism, and reasonable caution," spokesman Fred Piccolo said in part. "For the thousandth time, the Governor did not, in any way, involve himself in the investigation or judicial processes.”

Jones, who was fired from the state's Health Department, told WPEC-TV of West Palm Beach that her exit came after she refused to "manually change data to drum up support for the plan to reopen."

The FDLE said that during its search, electronic devices belonging to Jones' children and husband were forensically examined at the scene and "determined to have no investigative value" so they were not seized.

AI Disclaimer: An advanced artificial intelligence (AI) system generated the content of this page on its own. This innovative technology conducts extensive research from a variety of reliable sources, performs rigorous fact-checking and verification, cleans up and balances biased or manipulated content, and presents a minimal factual summary that is just enough yet essential for you to function as an informed and educated citizen. Please keep in mind, however, that this system is an evolving technology, and as a result, the article may contain accidental inaccuracies or errors. We urge you to help us improve our site by reporting any inaccuracies you find using the "Contact Us" link at the bottom of this page. Your helpful feedback helps us improve our system and deliver more precise content. When you find an article of interest here, please look for the full and extensive coverage of this topic in traditional news sources, as they are written by professional journalists that we try to support, not replace. We appreciate your understanding and assistance.
Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
The World Economic Forum has cleared Klaus Schwab of “material wrongdoing” after a law firm conducted a review into potential misconduct of the institution’s founder
A Computer That Listens, Sees, and Acts: What to Expect from Windows 12
Bitcoin hits $123,000
Southwest Airlines Apologizes After 'Accidentally Forgetting' Two Blind Passengers at New Orleans Airport and Faces Criticism Over Poor Service for Passengers with Disabilities
United States Sells Luxury Yacht Amadea, Valued at Approximately $325 Million, in First Sale of a Seized Russian Yacht Since the Invasion of Ukraine
Russian Forces Advance on Donetsk Front, Cutting Key Supply Routes Near Pokrovsk
It’s Not the Algorithm: New Study Claims Social Networks Are Fundamentally Broken
Sixty-Year-Old Claims: “My Biological Age Is Twenty-One.” Want the Same? Remember the Name Spermidine
Saudi Arabia accelerates renewables to curb domestic oil use
The Billion-Dollar Inheritance and the Death on the Railway Tracks: The Scandal Shaking Europe
World’s Cleanest Countries 2025 Ranked by Air, Water, Waste, and Hygiene Standards
Denmark Revives EU ‘Chat Control’ Proposal for Encrypted Message Scanning
Perplexity makes unsolicited $34.5 billion all-cash offer for Google’s Chrome browser
Cristiano Ronaldo and Georgina Rodríguez announce engagement
Taylor Swift announces 12th studio album on Travis Kelce’s podcast after high-profile year together
Asia-Pacific dominates world’s busiest flight routes, with South Korea’s Jeju–Seoul corridor leading global rankings
Sam Altman challenges Elon Musk with plans for Neuralink rival
Trump and Putin Meeting: Focus on Listening and Communication
Instagram Released a New Feature – and Sent Users Into a Panic
China Accuses: Nvidia Chips Are U.S. Espionage Tools
Mercedes’ CEO Is Killing Germany’s Auto Legacy
US Postal Service Targets Unregulated Vape Distributors in Crackdown
RFK Jr. Announces HHS Investigation into Big Pharma Incentives to Doctors
Australia to Recognize the State of Palestine at UN Assembly
The Collapse of the Programmer Dream: AI Experts Now the Real High-Earners
Security flaws in a carmaker’s web portal let one hacker remotely unlock cars from anywhere
Denmark Pushes for Child Sexual Abuse Scanning Bill in EU, Could Be Adopted by October 2025
Street justice isn’t pretty but how else do you deal with this kind of insanity? Sometimes someone needs to standup and say something
Armenia and Azerbaijan sign U.S.-brokered accord at White House outlining transit link via southern Armenia
Barcelona Resolves Captaincy Issue with Marc-André ter Stegen
US Justice Department Seeks Release of Epstein and Maxwell Grand Jury Exhibits Amid Legal and Victim Challenges
Spain Scraps F-35 Jet Deal as Trump Pushes for More NATO Spending
France Faces Largest Wildfire Since 1949 as Blazes Rage Across Aude
French Senate Report Alleges State Cover‑Up in Perrier ‘Natural Mineral Water’ Scandal
British Labour Government Utilizes Counter-Terrorism Tools for Social Media Monitoring Against Legitimate Critics
OpenAI Launches GPT‑5, Its Most Advanced AI Model Yet
Brazilian President Lula says he’ll contact the leaders of BRICS states to propose a unified response to U.S. tariffs
US envoy Steve Witkoff arrived in Moscow to seek a breakthrough in the Ukraine war ahead of President Trump’s peace deadline
WhatsApp Deletes 6.8 Million Scam Accounts Amid Rising Global Fraud
Britain's Online Safety Law Sparks Outcry Over Privacy, Free Speech, and Mass Surveillance
Nine people have been hospitalized and dozens of salmonella cases have been reported after an outbreak of infections linked to certain brands of pistachios and pistachio-containing products, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada
Karol Nawrocki Inaugurated as Poland’s President, Setting Stage for Clash with Tusk Government
US Charges Two Chinese Nationals for Illegal Nvidia AI Chip Exports
Texas Residents Face Water Restrictions While AI Data Centers Consume Millions of Gallons
U.S. Tariff Policy Triggers Market Volatility Amid Growing Global Trade Tensions
Tariffs, AI, and the Shifting U.S. Macro Landscape: Navigating a New Economic Regime
German Finance Minister Criticizes Trump’s Attacks on Institutions
India Rejects U.S. Tariff Threat, Defends Russian Oil Purchases
United States Establishes Strategic Bitcoin Reserve and Digital Asset Stockpile
Thousands of Private ChatGPT Conversations Accidentally Indexed by Google
×