SAN ANTONIO – An early morning raid by FBI agents at a home on San Antonio’s Northwest Side came as a surprise to more than just the subjects of that operation.
Neighbors up and down a street called Hunters Raven, located not far from Loop 1604 and Bandera Road, said they were stunned by the sudden activity shortly before 6 a.m. on Tuesday.
“Quite a wild start to a Tuesday morning,” said Eric O’Hara, a neighbor who lives down the street said.
O’Hara and other neighbors say loud noises awakened them. Then, they noticed a collection of FBI vehicles, SAPD and Department of Public Safety patrol cars, and an ambulance lined up along the street.
“(I) came to the front door, took a peek out and there was a police car sitting here,” O’Hara said. “Over their microphone, (the officer) called out my house number and told me to get back inside.”
Another neighbor, who did not want to reveal her identity, says the surprise operation left her shaking.
She initially thought the agents were trying to break into her home.
“I opened the door, but I noticed it was my neighbor’s house,” the unnamed woman said. “The bangs were so loud that I felt the vibration coming through my house.”
An FBI spokeswoman would not release details on the operation.
However, she did confirm that the agents were carrying out court orders when they descended on several locations, including the Hunters Raven address and a home across town on Hackberry Street.
A KSAT 12 News crew also visited the location on Hackberry near Iowa Street, but there was no activity there at that time.
At the home on Hunters Raven, agents could be seen searching the home and two cars parked in front of it.
“They were throwing some kind of concussive charge with some gas into the house,” O’Hara said, describing the source of some of the earlier loud commotion.
O’Hara said he saw one man who lives in the raided home being led away in handcuffs. He says his wife saw two men in custody.
He and another neighbor said the two men who live in the home appear to be brothers, both in their 30s or 40s.
“They normally keep to themselves, so we really don’t speak to them,” the unnamed neighbor said. “Maybe in passing, ‘hello,’ but that’s about it.”
With no details being released on the nature of the arrests, neighbors are left to wonder what will become of the men and what may have been happening inside the house so close to their own homes.