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Narc Squad Suspended in Death of Woman, 88

The entire narcotics division of the Atlanta police department is under suspension as a federal investigation continues into the fatal police shooting of an 88-year-old woman in the city. The woman was killed when three officers entered her home in a drug raid without warning.

Police say they entered the house based on the word of a confidential informant who bought drugs there. Officers got a special "no knock" warrant, which allowed them to enter the home without warning. The warrant says the informant bought crack cocaine from a man named Sam at the home.

No cocaine was found -- only a small amount of marijuana. But now the informant has come forward to say he has never been to the house, and that police asked him to lie to provide cover for the death of Kathyrn Johnston. When three officers in plain clothes burst into Johnston's home where she lived alone, they found Johnston with a gun. She opened fire.

The wounded officers fired back, hitting Johnston twice in the chest and killing her.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Kathy Lohr
Whether covering the manhunt and eventual capture of Eric Robert Rudolph in the mountains of North Carolina, the remnants of the Oklahoma City federal building with its twisted metal frame and shattered glass, flood-ravaged Midwestern communities, or the terrorist bombings across the country, including the blast that exploded in Centennial Olympic Park in downtown Atlanta, correspondent Kathy Lohr has been at the heart of stories all across the nation.