Border agents’ use of force criticized
WASHINGTON — Border Patrol agents have deliberately stepped in the path of cars to justify shooting at the drivers and have fired in frustration at people throwing rocks from the Mexican side of the border, according to an independent review of 67 cases that led to 19 deaths.
The report by law enforcement experts criticized the Border Patrol for “lack of diligence” in investigating U.S. agents who had fired their weapons. It also said it was unclear whether the agency “consistently and thoroughly reviews” use-of-deadly-force incidents.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection, which had commissioned the review, has tried to keep the scathing 21-page report from coming to light.
House and Senate oversight committees requested copies last fall but got only a summary minus the most controversial findings — that some border agents stood in front of moving vehicles as a pretext to open fire, and that agents could have moved away from rock-throwers instead of shooting at them.
The Los Angeles Times/Tribune Washington Bureau obtained the full report and the agency’s 23-page internal response. The response rejects the two major recommendations: barring agents from firing on vehicles unless its occupants are trying to kill them, and barring agents from shooting people who throw things that can’t cause serious physical injury.
The response, marked “Law Enforcement Sensitive,” states that a ban on shooting at rock throwers “could create a more dangerous environment” because many agents operate “in rural or desolate areas, often alone, where concealment, cover and egress is not an option.”
If drug smugglers knew border agents were not allowed to shoot at their vehicles, it argues, more drivers would try to run over agents....
FYI, Law Enforcement Sensitive means it's a law enforcement distribution, not general publication. A wanted notice saying John Smith, White Male, wanted for robbery is located generally not put out if we don't want Mr Smith to know he's wanted. It's not the report is Top Secret with a codeword. And a report that normally is an internal document used to identify issues is not something you want put out to the public. Houston Chronicle, you want your dirty laundry put out for all to read?
Now this is interesting.
Complaints by Mexico
...Mexico has complained for years that U.S. border agents who kill Mexicans are rarely disciplined, and that the results of investigations are not made public for years. Critics warn that more deaths or abuses are inevitable unless stricter limits on use of lethal force are imposed.
“There needs to be a level of accountability if you want to change the culture and the pattern,” said Christopher Wilson, an expert on U.S.-Mexico relations at the Woodrow Wilson Center, a think tank in Washington. “People are being killed that don’t need to be killed.”
The review was completed in February 2013 by the Police Executive Research Forum, a nonprofit in Washington. Experts from the group were allowed to examine internal Border Patrol files on 67 shooting incidents from January 2010 to October 2012.
Often no direct threat
The authors said the files suggested border agents in some cases stood in the road to shoot at drivers who were trying to avoid arrest and who posed no direct lethal threat to them or others.
“It should be recognized that a half-ounce (200-grain) bullet is unlikely to stop a 4,000-pound moving vehicle, and if the driver is disabled by a bullet, the vehicle will become a totally unguided threat,” the report reads. “Obviously, shooting at a moving vehicle can pose a risk to bystanders including other agents.”
The authors recommended training agents “to get out of the way” instead of intentionally standing in the oncoming vehicle’s path.
They also recommended that the Border Patrol adopt policies used by most U.S. police, which bar officers from firing at a moving vehicle unless deadly force is being used “by means other than a moving vehicle.”
First, Mexico, you don't want your citizens shot by our Border Patrol, keep them on your side of the border or let them go through the authorized crossing spots. Or as Chris Rock used to say, "Rule number one, obey the law."
Two, if you are deliberately driving a vehicle at a peace officer, you are using deadly force. This may shock some of the geniuses at this think tank, but driving a motor vehicle over a human will likely cause death or serious bodily injury. And that is definition of the legal justification for the use of deadly force. See comments above, obey the law and we don't have this issue.
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