A Colorado man is out of luck after police destroyed his house during a confrontation with an armed shoplifter.

In 2015, police fired rockets into the home of Leo Lech during a 19-hour standoff with an armed man who hid in the house after he was caught shoplifting from a nearby Walmart. Even though Lech himself had nothing to do with the crime or the shoplifter, the city refused to pay more than $5,000 for the damage caused.

Now a federal appeals court has ruled that the city doesn’t owe Lech anything more, arguing that police were enforcing the law and that the incident does not constitute a government seizure of property.

Lech told the Washington Post, “It just goes to show that they can blow up your house, throw you out on the streets and say ‘See you later. deal with it.”

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2019/10/30/police-blew-up-an-innocent-mans-house-search-an-armed-shoplifter-too-bad-court-rules/