Call it the meth lab that wasn't there: during a recent narcotics raid in Billings, Montana, a member of a police SWAT team dropped a flash grenade at the bedside of a sleeping 12-year-old girl, sending her to the hospital with second-degree burns and knocking out part of her bedroom wall.

"We generally do not introduce these disorienting devices when [children are] present," Police Chief Rich St. John explained later. He went on to clarify that the officer (presumably Barney Fife) holding the grenade didn't realize there was a time delay when he tried to detonate it and that the entire department "did not want a juvenile...to get injured."

After destroying the little girl's bedroom, officers realized that there was no meth lab inside, only terrified children. An investigation is currently being conducted.

"If we're wrong or made a mistake, then we're going to take care of it," St. John said, "But if it determines we're not, then we'll go with that," just in case it turns out they did not, in fact, throw a flash grenade at a sleeping girl but instead perhaps a portable meth lab disguised as one.

[Missoulian via AP]