In response to Friday’s Border Patrol announcement of new directives in dealing with rock throwers and use of force, on behalf of the Southern Border Communities Coalition, Border Action Network’s Juanita Molina released a statement essentially declaring that the agency’s change in rules is meaningless without the release of the PERF report issued by a group of law enforcement experts commissioned by Border Patrol to review the 67 shootings along the border between 2010 and 2012:
Molina’s statement:
“While it appears that Customs and Border Protection is beginning to respond to the demands of border residents for greater transparency through this clarification of policy, it is difficult to assess whether or not this directive is in line with best policing practices in the absence of a public release of the PERF report. The agency must release the PERF report immediately and in full if the agency is serious about ensuring accountability and oversight.
It is not yet clear how exactly these policies would be implemented in our border communities. CBP must hold their officers accountable for what has become a clear pattern and practice of abuse of force. A clarification of policy does not address the systemic lack of accountability that has created a culture of violence and negligence within the agency. We welcome Chief Fisher’s guidance as an important, but incomplete, step forward in overhauling the agency’s use of force policies.”
This article appears in Mar 6-12, 2014.
“CBP must hold their officers accountable for what has become a clear pattern and practice of abuse of force. A clarification of policy does not address the systemic lack of accountability that has created a culture of violence and negligence within the agency.”
What “pattern?” FY 2011 through May 31, there were 299 rocking assaults and 476 total assaults, or already close to half the number of total assaults that were officially reported by Border Patrol agents in FY 2010. Agents deal with literally HUNDREDS of thousands of arrests per year. So all I see if a pattern of restraint compared to the amount of violence and danger they are subjected too. The “culture of violence” is what is pushed onto Border Patrol Agents from the smuggling organizations that have no respect for human life. However, organizations like “Southern Border Communities Coalition” have a extreme bias towards our law enforcement while they are virtually quiet about abuse from smuggling organizations that are causing this situation along the border.
A well thrown fist sized rock has about half amount of force as a small caliber round fired from a handgun. Maybe people should not threaten a uniformed law enforcement officer/agent with serious bodily harm and they would not have to defend their life with deadly force.
The fact of the issue is the only ally illegal aliens have when crossing the desert and mountains are the Border Patrol. It is not the humanitarian organizations that leave a few bottles of water in the desert thinking a person is going to find that needle in a haystack. It is not the smuggling organizations that assault, rob, rape, murder and leave for dead thousands of aliens a year in the desert. It is the agent that is following their foot sign through miles of desert and mountains looking for them. It is the special teams of agents that respond to distress calls with millions of dollars of assets to find them when they are lost.
When did our country start blaming our law enforcement when THEY are assaulted? I was taught by my parents that if you break the law, you will have to suffer the consequences. If you use physical force to try to harm another person, you will have to suffer the consequences. This mindset of blaming the officer and not the criminal is going to ruin our country and community.
http://www.hstoday.us/blogs/the-kimery-report/blog/dangerous-rock-attacks-on-border-patrol-agents-are-up-chopper-brought-down-by-rock-in-79/56d720dfd2a031fd9638f6e8123a5ca0.html
if they want to throw rocks,, shoot back !,,,, don’t want to be shot at ?? don’t throw rocks !!! simple !
The cry babies at Southern Border Communities Coalition, Border Action Network and Juanita Molina in particular need to start an educational program with those delinquents that assault our law enforcement. It is those throwing the rocks and not the Boarder Patrol that needs training.
Throw a rock – put yourself at risk; what could be more simple to these lawless youths. Someone throws a rock at me with the intent of harming, if not killing me, it is a crime and I have the right to respond with force; including deadly force. Why should it be different when these cartel-financed, criminals attack our agents working to protect all? If more bad guys die to learn this fundamental truth; so be it, sad, but so be it.
Southern Border Communities Coalition – Border Action Network – get out of the US!
i’m sure obama would have you appologize to them, give em democrate voters applications, welfare,and drivers licsence applications, roll out the red carpet, and point them north !!!!
Why does everything have to be “if you try to harm me, I will shoot you?” Ffs Theo of you just said if you attempt bodily harm it’s perfectly expected and normal to respond with deafly force. I live on the border. The violence is ridiculous. I live with border patrol vehicles attempting to run residents down just because they are out walking. It is most certainly an abuse of power and not all of the violence they perpetrate in the name of the government is in response to anything but a whim. Shooting a child is NOT an appropriate response to him throwing a rock. Ever.
Belle,
If you want I can get one of the 14/15 year old kids in my neighborhood and I can have them start throwing fist size rocks towards you. I would bet you would be singing a different tune once that reality hits you on the head…You should never say “ever” when concerning a person’s life and health.
The reason the response is deadly force is because they are trying to seriously harm a law enforcement officer while they are trying to enforce the law. A law enforcement officer does not have to retreat. Imagine if all a criminal would have to do is throw a rock, pull out a knife, or brandish another type of weapon and the officer/agent would use the option of retreating. It would completely cause that officer/agent to be ineffective at his job. In the case of the Border Patrol, it would cause an INCREASE of rock throwing since it would make the agent have to retreat and allow the group of illegal aliens/drug smugglers to get away. How is that any type of logic?
If you are concerned with the agents driving to fast (which I am guessing is what you mean with stating the agents are trying to “run” residents down), than call your local police dept or complain to Agent in Charge of the Station. I have a few friends in local law enforcement and their Chief pushed the issue of agents driving to fast to their Agent in Charge. My officer friends said they have a significant decrease in complaints from local residents. They stated most agents they talked to did not really realize their speed while they were responding to incidents and patrolling until the Chief talked to them about this problem.
“Anything but a whim?” If you are really that far gone where you think people in law enforcement want to kill another human being without any justification, I guess this response is a waste. I have over 15 years of law enforcement/military experience. The overwhelming majority of the people I was blessed to work with do not want to kill anyone. I thank god everyday that I never had to use deadly force. Most law enforcement officers feel the same way. However, when it comes to anyone that wants to threaten us with serious bodily harm/death, we WILL go home to our families at the end of the day. It is NOT the officer/deputy/agent’s fault if a person puts themselves into a deadly force situation.
Belle, no use arguing with these racist, xenophobic bozos. They have no sense of logic and their only source of information comes from Faux Snooze which you know, makes people STUPID.
Throw a fist sized rock at me and I would spread six 9mm rounds into the center of your chest.
Mike?
Please do think about taking a drive down to Nogales.
Where you can then drive over the border to stand at the exact location where a BP Agent fired across an international border to brutally pump 7 shots into a 16-year-old kid’s back.
Do be sure to bring along one of your 14 or 15 year-old-kids from your neighborhood.
Ask him to heave a rock at least up over a 75 foot cliff atop of which is a 18-foot high fence.
If you come, be sure to bring along a bag of rocks. Because the area below that huge cliff is a parking lot. There are no rocks there.
But if your kid manages to throw a rock that far, I’m thinking that he’s got a great career ahead of him as major league outfielder.
I have been along the area where there is the fence that is along the small cliff. I am not been personally to the area where the shooting occurred but I have seen photographs. I know it occurred by the Emergency Clinic on International Street. It is not impossible for a person to throw a rock up and over that wall. It happens on a pretty frequent basis, just as a Border Patrol Agent. Smuggling Cartels routinely use teenagers to throw rocks at Border Patrol when they are trying to arrest illegal aliens and drug smugglers on our side of the border. I equate that with how Iraqi Insurgent groups would use teenagers to spot for indirect fire, set up IEDs, and other hostile acts while I was deployed there. It is pure evil to have young impressionable people do your dirty work.
There is also disputes staying he was a lot closer to the wall than where he body ended up. Plus there was surveillance footage of the incident, but has not been released by the FBI.
Currently the only details that are out concerning the autopsy and any investigation are coming from Mexican authorities. During a report from KGUN 9, they had a Pima Cornor look at it and stated
“”Well, sometimes people confuse an entrance and an exit gunshot wound. So clearly, if the exits are really entrances then the trajectories would be completely the opposite,” “We haven’t produced the report ourselves. We haven’t seen photographs, haven’t seen the body and don’t really know the people that produced the report,”
Plus it was hard for US authorities to conduct a investigation on the scene of the incident. They started to get rocks thrown at them (I guess rock throwers brought rocks with them). Mexican authorities did not keep scene security on their side. So, the entire incident scene is compromised.
The primary investigative authority of all shooting concerning Federal Law Enforcement Officers is the FBI. To the best of my research and knowledge they have not released any reports. Then you have the investigation done by the agency and a separate one done by the union. These cases take sometimes years to have an conclusion.
Each incident is different. You and I do not know the exact details of the one you mentioned above. My general thoughts are if you threaten law enforcement with serious bodily harm/death, the officer/agent is justified with using deadly force. It is not dictated by solely on what type of weapon they are using or the age of the suspect. It is what a responsible officer would have done in that particular situation given the same amount of time to make that decision. That is what matters, not what you or I feel…
Oh boo hoo Mike. Did I hurt your feelings? If you had ANY sense, you would see that my comment was meant in general and the general sense of the answers in the comments, were as I STATED, made by lowly educated Faux Snooze-watching xenophobes. So don’t get your panties all in a twist. As for calling me ignorant without knowing who I am, puts you in the category of ASSHOLE striking out at something not directed at him in particular. So stop trolling the comments and go back to sleep.
Sure, Ice. I have sense enough to realize you meant your first comment towards anyone that disagreed with Belle’s statement.
Also, I did not call you ignorant. I called your comments about this subject and the people that support my viewpoint ignorant. Yes, there are people that support the same views on illegal immigration as me that are racist xenophobic assholes. However, your comments were making assumptions on people that posted the above comments and I felt like calling you out on it.
Bottom line, without all the name calling, I want to see a change in BP actions and not a change in BP policy. I want to see people held accountable for assault and murder. I do not think they can be trusted to appropriately investigate themselves. At least, they have not done so at this point.
Cascabal, The FBI is the primary agency that investigates ALL uses of Deadly Force by Federal Law Enforcement Officers and has the authority to prosecute agents. They make the final decision on if it was justified.