Minneapolis thugs burst into a home in which a black man, Amir Locke, was sleeping with a pistol that he lawfully owned. As he began to wake up, the thugs saw he had a gun and shot him immediately to death.

I wonder if a white man in the same circumstances would have gone unscathed. It is possible, because unconscious racism is very common. Maybe a white man would have been allowed to drop his gun.

In effect, the decision to mount a no-knock raid is a decision to risk killing anyone on the premises, based on anxiety.

Is it possible for the first two thugs that enter in such a raid to wear armor that will protect them from bullets, so that they don't need to rush the decision of whether to shoot someone?

It isn't directly relevant, but I wonder why Locke was sleeping with a gun in someone else's house. Was he afraid someone was trying to kill him?