Bedford County authorities blamed a communications provider Wednesday for a botched child pornography raid at which Shaquille O'Neal was present, but refused to answer any other questions about an incident that terrified the family of a Pittsylvania County farmer.

Investigators from Bedford and Pittsylvania counties searched the wrong house in Gretna on Sept. 23 because FairPoint Communications Inc. had given them the wrong address, said Maj. Ricky Gardner of the Bedford County Sheriff's Office.

Reading from a prepared statement at a news conference, Gardner said that the sheriff's office regretted and apologized for "any inconvenience caused by the inaccurate information provided to us by FairPoint."

Representatives of the Charlotte, N.C.-based telephone and Internet service provider did not return phone calls Wednesday seeking comment.

NBA star O'Neal, a Miami Heat center, is a Bedford County sheriff's deputy and a member of Operation Blue Ridge Thunder, the department's Internet Crimes Against Children task force. The raid was part of a Blue Ridge Thunder investigation.

Gardner said O'Neal was acting in an investigator's capacity during the raid, but he would not elaborate.

He also would not answer questions about what safeguards exist to prevent such mistakes in the future, or whether such a thing has happened before.

The investigation apparently began July 26, when Blue Ridge Thunder investigators received a download of child pornography images from someone's computer.

FairPoint mistakenly identified the computer subscriber to authorities as A.J. Nuckols of Gretna, according to Gardner.

Nuckols wrote in a letter to the Chatham Star-Tribune that he was held at gunpoint, searched and taunted before he and his wife and children were interrogated.

The "para-military search-and-seizure team" took his computers, cameras, DVDs and VHS tapes, the letter said. The items were returned nine days after the raid.

Nuckols filed formal complaints with both the Bedford and Pittsylvania county sheriff's offices.

Gardner said investigators later determined the search's correct target, another Pittsylvania resident. On Oct. 19, they recovered a computer containing images of child pornography and got a confession from a suspect. Gardner declined to discuss the case further.

Neighbors on White Fall Road near Gretna spoke highly of Nuckols and his family. Nuckols raises cattle, grows tobacco and gives away the excess from his crops of corn, pumpkin and cantaloupe.

"This guy's as straight as he can be," said Alfred Aliperti, who's known Nuckols for 13 years. "He takes care of his family. I've never seen a man work so hard in my life."

Nuckols' wife, Lisa, works as a fourth-grade teacher at Mount Airy Elementary School in Gretna, according to the school's Web site.

Nuckols did not return phone calls seeking comment Wednesday.

Although a mistaken police raid might cause public outrage, it would be difficult for the victim to collect any damages in a lawsuit, according to the head of the Virginia Bar Association's civil litigation section.

Under federal and state law, unless there's evidence of a deliberate violation of someone's rights, or a violation that came about because of extreme indifference or incompetence, "the law is not going to be too sympathetic to a remedy," said David Anthony, an attorney with the Richmond law firm Kaufman & Canoles. "The law does not expect a government to be mistake-free."

Miami Heat spokesman Tim Donovan said the team has no comment on the incident.

O'Neal has declined to comment, referring questions to the Bedford County Sheriff's Office, Donovan said.

reed.williams@roanoke.com 981-3334

mike.allen@roanoke.com 981-3236