They always send notice to you before they conduct a raid.....
Wish this was the case for me back in 91 in Odessa Tx. I ran a 400 watt FM on 107.7 for 3 years till an insider decided to be stupid and make a phone call. Needless to say....he cant dial numbers with that one hand anymore.
Anyway...there was no notice. There was no "heads up". There were FBI, ATF, local sheriff and city police, county and state troopers, 4 or 5 national guard reservists, all came crashing through the door with guns held high and I am standing there by myself with a schematic and soldering iron in hand.
Man I must have really been doing something right to have so many federal friends drop by. Maybe they wanted to be interviewed.
The field engineer was very impressed with the home made tx and antenna system. He even said it was putting out a cleaner signal than the licenses stations were. So I said.."well why are you F*ng with me then...go after those idiots."
Ever since I have always believed that if a non-licensed operation can demonstrate the system meeting or exceeding the technical requirements in spectral purity and signal stability, they should be granted non-conditional approval to operate as long as their operations are serving the public interest and keeping things decent.
But we all know the current system is merely to protect the big corporate controlled media. After all, when was the last time a new license was granted for ANY new station, radio or television!
And it does not look like they will be granting any new licenses or even construction permits any time soon.
RFB